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Can Dems Sweep the 2024 Elections? · Pod Save America

0:20
Speaker 1: Welcome to another special episode of Pod Save America. I'm
0:23
Speaker 1: Dan Pfeiffer. This is the second of four bonus pods
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Speaker 1: I'll be hosting on Sundays in the lead up to
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Speaker 1: the election and If you like these episodes, I highly
0:30
Speaker 1: recommend you sign up to get my subscriber show Polar
0:32
Speaker 1: Coaster by subscribing to Friends of the Pod at crooked.com
0:35
Speaker 1: slash friends or through the Apple podcast feed. It's where
0:39
Speaker 1: we really dig deep into polling and it's a great
0:41
Speaker 1: way to support Crooked Media. And we have a 25%
0:43
Speaker 1: off discount for annual subscriptions right now. In today's episode,
0:47
Speaker 1: I'll be talking to Amy Walter, one of the smartest
0:49
Speaker 1: people I know in politics, the publisher and editor-in-chief of
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Speaker 1: the Cook Political Report and host of her own podcast,
0:54
Speaker 1: The Odd Years. about the state of the House and
0:57
Speaker 1: Senate races and Democrats' chances of winning a trifecta in
0:59
Speaker 1: this election. Amy Walter, welcome to Pod Save America. How
1:02
Speaker 1: are you?
1:03
Speaker 2: Thank you. I'm pretty good. I'm still here. So really,
1:08
Speaker 2: that's the goal. That is the goal that I am
1:11
Speaker 2: upright and, you know, just trying to pace myself.
1:17
Speaker 1: While we have you on, I want to talk about
1:18
Speaker 1: the presidential race, but also the Senate and the House,
1:20
Speaker 1: something both of all three of which you're an expert in.
1:23
Speaker 1: Let's start with the presidential. Three weeks ago or so,
1:27
Speaker 1: Democrats were feeling ecstatic. They were feeling confident. Over the
1:31
Speaker 1: last week or so, the Democrats have gotten anxious. This
1:35
Speaker 1: is the phase we get in every year. Have you
1:38
Speaker 1: seen anything in what you've seen in the race, in
1:41
Speaker 1: the polling, the people you're talking to that would justify
1:44
Speaker 1: the vibe shift among Democrats?
1:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, Dan, it's a really good question. And I dug
1:51
Speaker 2: into this myself because I always wonder how much of
1:56
Speaker 2: this is real and how much of this is just
1:58
Speaker 2: sort of a mood that's not backed up by actual data.
2:02
Speaker 2: And so if you look at the national average, like
2:05
Speaker 2: things haven't moved that much. They're moving around the edges more.
2:09
Speaker 2: At the state level, I think the reason for the frustration, depression,
2:15
Speaker 2: whatever you want to call it, anxiety among Democrats is
2:18
Speaker 2: that you could see, and if you go to the
2:21
Speaker 2: 538 site, which does a great job with this, right,
2:23
Speaker 2: because they have the trend line, and you, as well
2:29
Speaker 2: as many of the folks in your business and our
2:32
Speaker 2: business appreciate a good trend line, right? And what you
2:36
Speaker 2: can see, though it is a very small trend line,
2:39
Speaker 2: but that the peak for Harris was basically, not surprisingly,
2:43
Speaker 2: close to the end of September, right? That was after
2:46
Speaker 2: she had the strong debate performance. You had the DNC
2:52
Speaker 2: that went really well. The waltz rollout went well, right?
2:55
Speaker 2: Like that was, I would say, peak for Harris. And
2:59
Speaker 2: since then, it's kind of, gone down. And so instead
3:03
Speaker 2: of being ahead in a state like Michigan by an
3:06
Speaker 2: average of two points, she's now ahead by nine-tenths of
3:10
Speaker 2: a point, right, or one point. So we're really talking
3:13
Speaker 2: about movement of a point or a half a point
3:15
Speaker 2: in most of those battleground states. But as you know,
3:19
Speaker 2: half a point or a point is the difference between
3:22
Speaker 2: winning and losing in these states. So It seems there
3:26
Speaker 2: is some reason to, again, if you're just looking at
3:29
Speaker 2: the poll averages, to say, well, boy, was that a peak?
3:33
Speaker 2: Did she peak too early? That's the thing Democrats also
3:36
Speaker 2: love to talk about. Oh, we peaked too early. We
3:39
Speaker 2: need to peak at the election. But it's also a
3:43
Speaker 2: sign that, you know, coalescing the base has gotten her
3:47
Speaker 2: to a certain place, but it's not getting her— as
3:51
Speaker 2: far as she needs to, to win this thing outright.
3:55
Speaker 2: The other thing I noticed, and we noticed this in
3:58
Speaker 2: our own data, as well as just looking at all
4:01
Speaker 2: those national, the network polls that came out last weekend,
4:06
Speaker 2: that her slipping is with independent voters. And so, you know,
4:11
Speaker 2: that's something to keep aware of. But again, we're talking
4:15
Speaker 2: about a movement of half a point to a point.
4:21
Speaker 2: So freak out about that as you will.
4:23
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Choose your level of panic based on
4:26
Speaker 1: that information. It's so hard because we've never seen a
4:31
Speaker 1: race this close in all the states.
4:33
Speaker 2: That's right.
4:34
Speaker 1: It's just usually the margins are a little bit larger
4:37
Speaker 1: and usually they're larger in some states and maybe narrow
4:40
Speaker 1: in just the tipping point state, for instance. But here,
4:42
Speaker 1: it's all seven and nationally are within the margin of error.
4:45
Speaker 1: So it's so hard to separate real movement Exactly. From
4:49
Speaker 1: statistical noise.
4:50
Speaker 2: From noise. And then, right. And from what is, to me,
4:55
Speaker 2: it kind of comes back to, all right, well, how
4:58
Speaker 2: likely do you think these people who are answering the
5:01
Speaker 2: polls or who we're waiting the polls to are going
5:04
Speaker 2: to show up, right? And that's where we really get
5:08
Speaker 2: into the difficult prediction part because you know, we all
5:15
Speaker 2: talk about it comes down, it all comes down to turnout.
5:19
Speaker 2: But nobody really knows what that's going to look like.
5:24
Speaker 3: Yeah.
5:24
Speaker 1: And you, you know, as part of your political report,
5:27
Speaker 1: Swing State Polling Project, you had an analysis that showed
5:30
Speaker 1: that Kamala Harris is doing much better with highly engaged voters,
5:36
Speaker 1: and that Trump is depending on low to mid propensity.
5:39
Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about what you guys
5:40
Speaker 1: found there? Yeah, yeah.
5:41
Speaker 2: Thanks for bringing that up. Right. We did this We've
5:45
Speaker 2: had three different polls. We're doing them with BSG, the
5:49
Speaker 2: Benenson Strategy Group, a Democratic polling firm. and GS Strategy Group,
5:53
Speaker 2: which is a Republican firm. And these guys have been
5:57
Speaker 2: fantastic partners, in part because they both work in states
6:01
Speaker 2: that are purple or sometimes in states that aren't friendly
6:04
Speaker 2: to their side, so they appreciate a real swing state.
6:08
Speaker 2: But what we did is we broke up the overall
6:12
Speaker 2: electorate in those seven states into basically three buckets, one
6:16
Speaker 2: being people who've shown up in the last four elections.
6:20
Speaker 2: And what we know about people who show up in
6:23
Speaker 2: election after election is they're going to show up in
6:26
Speaker 2: this election, right? If you voted in four out of
6:28
Speaker 2: the last four elections, there's a 90-plus percent chance you're
6:32
Speaker 2: showing up in this election, as long as you're physically
6:35
Speaker 2: able to do so. The next— and by the way, that
6:39
Speaker 2: group of voters, that's somewhere around 60 percent of the electorate, right?
6:43
Speaker 2: So they're the biggest share, but, you know, just over
6:48
Speaker 2: a majority. And then another 30-ish percent fall into the category.
6:53
Speaker 2: They voted in anywhere from one to three of the
6:56
Speaker 2: last four elections. And then the final bucket, which is
6:58
Speaker 2: the smallest bucket, are people who said they've registered since 2022.
7:03
Speaker 2: So they weren't able to vote in any of those
7:05
Speaker 2: four elections. Now, the one consistent from May through this
7:11
Speaker 2: last poll we did in September is those most engaged
7:14
Speaker 2: voters were voting for the Democrat, whether that's Biden or Harris,
7:17
Speaker 2: by four points. And that goes to kind of the
7:23
Speaker 2: makeup of that electorate, which we know is it's an
7:27
Speaker 2: older group. It is whiter than average, right? It's less
7:31
Speaker 2: diverse than the overall electorate. And it's probably going to
7:37
Speaker 2: be more college-educated than the overall electorate. And these are
7:42
Speaker 2: the voters that are propelling and have propelled Democrats to
7:46
Speaker 2: success in 2018. in 2020, but certainly most, I think,
7:54
Speaker 2: most notably in 2022. And if those were the only
7:59
Speaker 2: voters that turned out in this election, that would be
8:01
Speaker 2: pretty good news for Kamala Harris to be ahead by
8:04
Speaker 2: four points in the battleground states, right? This isn't nationally,
8:07
Speaker 2: this is a battleground state. But then you put in
8:09
Speaker 2: those low propensity voters and Trump has about a seven
8:13
Speaker 2: point lead with those voters. His lead among them has
8:17
Speaker 2: varied between 5 and 10 points. And those voters, again,
8:22
Speaker 2: not surprisingly, younger, they are going to identify more as independent,
8:30
Speaker 2: more diverse in terms of the electorate. And what's funny, Dan,
8:33
Speaker 2: is when you and I came up in politics, we
8:35
Speaker 2: would look at that group of voters, we'd say younger,
8:38
Speaker 2: more diverse. Those are Democrats. You just need to get
8:43
Speaker 2: them out to vote. Right now, they're leaning more to Trump. Now,
8:49
Speaker 2: I don't know. I think a big piece of his
8:53
Speaker 2: success has been, really from the very beginning, from 2016,
8:58
Speaker 2: is turning out people who are not traditional voters, right?
9:02
Speaker 2: People who are either tuned out of politics or who
9:06
Speaker 2: are really cynical about politics. And so if we think about,
9:14
Speaker 2: all right, what's motivating those voters and how does Harris
9:20
Speaker 2: sort of chop into that group of voters, you know,
9:24
Speaker 2: some of them are going to be motivated by something
9:29
Speaker 2: that she does or says that also feels like it's different,
9:34
Speaker 2: like she is going after the status quo as well,
9:38
Speaker 2: that she's skeptical of, you know, a lot of the
9:42
Speaker 2: institutions out there. And so her message, when I see
9:49
Speaker 2: her message on things like, you know, we're taking on
9:53
Speaker 2: price gouging, we're taking on big pharma, right? It is
9:58
Speaker 2: aimed at a lot of the vote out there who
10:02
Speaker 2: are in that camp of, yeah, I'm the little guy,
10:06
Speaker 2: I'm getting picked on by the big guy. Where Trump
10:09
Speaker 2: wins them over, of course, is by saying, I am
10:12
Speaker 2: the great disruptor. I'm not beholden to anyone or anything.
10:16
Speaker 2: I am unlike any other politician, and that makes me
10:20
Speaker 2: able to do things that no other politician's been able
10:24
Speaker 2: to do.
10:26
Speaker 1: It's very interesting you say, like the reversal in the parties.
10:28
Speaker 1: I was interviewing, which is an awkward experience for me,
10:31
Speaker 1: but I was interviewing David Plouffe last week, and he
10:33
Speaker 1: was making this case about it. And it is like
10:37
Speaker 1: an out-of-body experience because that was the Obama coalition. That
10:40
Speaker 1: was the argument against Obama's electability, both in the primaries
10:43
Speaker 1: and the general, was relying on all these young people.
10:45
Speaker 1: Young people never vote. But what is interesting, though, is
10:49
Speaker 1: we knew that challenge, and we built a campaign to
10:51
Speaker 1: account for that, a massive volunteer-driven field organization we had.
10:55
Speaker 1: We had organized everywhere. And the Trump folks are taking
10:58
Speaker 1: a very different approach. That's right. They don't have a
11:02
Speaker 1: traditional food organization. They've outsourced it to Elon Musk and others.
11:06
Speaker 1: I'm sure you're hearing plenty of concerns, as everyone does
11:09
Speaker 1: from Republicans, about the status of that. What have you heard?
11:11
Speaker 2: That's right. You know, I do hear that. It's not
11:16
Speaker 2: as loud as, say, it was in 2020 when there
11:19
Speaker 2: was a lot of hand-wringing about the fact that Trump
11:22
Speaker 2: was actively discouraging people from doing mail-in voting. You know,
11:26
Speaker 2: I would talk to folks in Pennsylvania who were like,
11:30
Speaker 2: you know, the mail-in vote piece, we're trying to put
11:34
Speaker 2: a mail-in vote program in place, but we are getting
11:37
Speaker 2: pushback from the very people who are supposed to be
11:40
Speaker 2: helping us institute it because— Trump told them that it
11:45
Speaker 2: was rigged, right? So they are now doing more of a,
11:51
Speaker 2: and outside groups are doing more of a mail-in process
11:55
Speaker 2: with their voters. Now, does that mean they're picking up
11:58
Speaker 2: those low propensity voters with the mail-in program? I don't know.
12:02
Speaker 2: That is a very, that is very, very good question. And,
12:08
Speaker 2: you know, it also comes back to, look, how much
12:10
Speaker 2: do you believe that the reason that, say, Trump did
12:17
Speaker 2: better in 2020 than many expected was because they did
12:21
Speaker 2: doors and traditional field and Democrats did not.
12:26
Speaker 4: I don't know.
12:27
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not here to say that field doesn't
12:29
Speaker 2: matter or that all those people who are working really
12:32
Speaker 2: hard on both sides, on the ground, going to doors,
12:36
Speaker 2: that it doesn't make a difference. What I wonder, though,
12:40
Speaker 2: is whether what Trump has shown time and time again
12:44
Speaker 2: is his ability to infiltrate into areas of the electorate
12:50
Speaker 2: that nobody else can, no traditional politician can, is what
12:54
Speaker 2: allows him to get turnout among voters, even without the
13:01
Speaker 2: quote-unquote traditional field programs.
13:05
Speaker 1: It's really interesting because in 16 and 20, well, 16
13:08
Speaker 1: in particular, his turnouts sort of his turnout boost was
13:12
Speaker 1: primarily among white, non-college educated, primarily rural voters who are,
13:16
Speaker 1: who are profiled, they come from Republican parts of the country. They,
13:18
Speaker 1: they profiles Republican. They had just not, there were people
13:21
Speaker 1: who found Mitt Romney to be not someone who could
13:23
Speaker 1: speak to them. And Trump could, we can probably spend
13:26
Speaker 1: six years trying to understand why that is, but that
13:28
Speaker 1: is the case here. He's trying to do something a
13:30
Speaker 1: little bit different. He's trying to get people who, who
13:35
Speaker 1: come from Democratic parts of the country in some cases,
13:37
Speaker 1: who have agreed with Democrats on some issues to do it.
13:41
Speaker 1: So it's interesting. We're obviously not going to know until afterwards.
13:43
Speaker 2: No, it's really– I know it. And this is the
13:45
Speaker 2: really fascinating question, right, which is– I mean if you–
13:49
Speaker 2: I was just looking through today the support that Trump
13:54
Speaker 2: is getting from black voters, right? And he's getting somewhere
14:02
Speaker 2: like– 20% of black men. Now, that's nationally. I don't know,
14:08
Speaker 2: you'd have to get into some of the crosstabs of
14:12
Speaker 2: these other polls to see how he's doing in states
14:14
Speaker 2: like Georgia, et cetera. But essentially what the polls seem
14:18
Speaker 2: to be telling us and the reason that Trump is
14:21
Speaker 2: doing better in Georgia, let's say, than in Pennsylvania or
14:26
Speaker 2: in Wisconsin is that exact thing, Dan, is that he's
14:30
Speaker 2: doing that much better with Black voters, and I would
14:33
Speaker 2: assume that it's going to be with Black men. The
14:35
Speaker 2: thing that I keep coming back to, and I know
14:37
Speaker 2: your conversation with David Plouffe kind of centered on this too,
14:42
Speaker 2: is this idea of, you know, looking at Trump's vote
14:46
Speaker 2: share rather than focusing on the margin. So I was
14:51
Speaker 2: just looking at, for example, the Pew poll out from
14:58
Speaker 2: early October. And if you look at the support that
15:03
Speaker 2: Donald Trump is getting from, say, men under 50. OK,
15:09
Speaker 2: in 2020, Biden won those voters by 10 men under 50.
15:15
Speaker 2: And right now, Trump is only losing them by one.
15:19
Speaker 2: So that's, you know, a nine point swing. But if
15:22
Speaker 2: you look just at the share of the vote that
15:25
Speaker 2: Trump is getting from those voters, it's not any different.
15:28
Speaker 2: I can't remember the exact number. Let's call it let's
15:31
Speaker 2: call it 39%, okay? And now he's getting 40% of
15:35
Speaker 2: those voters. So what you have is a whole chunk
15:37
Speaker 2: of younger voters who are sitting out there who are
15:41
Speaker 2: not committed to Trump, but they're not giving their votes
15:44
Speaker 2: to Harris yet either. And that goes to this point
15:47
Speaker 2: about who would you rather be in this scenario? Would
15:51
Speaker 2: you rather be the Harris campaign, who's basically then it
15:55
Speaker 2: seems like their challenge is getting those voters to come
16:01
Speaker 2: out for them rather than sitting at home instead of
16:05
Speaker 2: worrying about whether those voters are going to actually go
16:08
Speaker 2: to Donald Trump. In other words, he is looking stronger
16:12
Speaker 2: with those voters in part because Harris's numbers look that
16:16
Speaker 2: much weaker than where Biden was at the end of 2020.
16:20
Speaker 2: And so that's the thing that I keep sort of
16:24
Speaker 2: grappling with to your point about like, well, what does
16:26
Speaker 2: this really, really look like? And how many of these
16:29
Speaker 2: people actually do come out and go to the polls?
16:33
Speaker 2: So I think there is a real underperformance for Harris
16:38
Speaker 2: at this moment. But what we don't know is if
16:42
Speaker 2: that's going to result in an overperformance at the end
16:47
Speaker 2: of the day by Trump.
16:48
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is such a confusing election in so many ways.
16:54
Speaker 1: But one of the ways is that I think in
16:56
Speaker 1: order to adjust for the anti-Trump polling error last time
17:02
Speaker 1: is everyone is trying to, most, I would say most
17:04
Speaker 1: people are trying to model their, the, their vision of
17:09
Speaker 1: the 2024 electorate based on the 2020 electorate. Right.
17:11
Speaker 2: Exactly.
17:12
Speaker 1: We're getting into the very esoteric debate about whether you
17:14
Speaker 1: wait your poll based on the how people voted, voted
17:19
Speaker 1: in 2020. And that, that could be right. That could
17:22
Speaker 1: be wrong, but that was in itself a black Swan
17:26
Speaker 1: election because of the pandemic and And the changes in
17:29
Speaker 1: voting behavior, turnout was so high. And so it's just
17:33
Speaker 1: the margins and the vote share in Hallis actually looks
17:35
Speaker 1: as there is this feeling. And I've never seen an
17:38
Speaker 1: election where so few people are confident in saying anything
17:41
Speaker 1: about what could possibly happen because we're all on a
17:46
Speaker 1: very rickety ledge with how we're looking at it. It's
17:48
Speaker 1: possible that how we're thinking about it and how we're–
17:53
Speaker 1: and it's been so long. Like even 16 was a
17:55
Speaker 1: very bizarre election too, low turnout relative. huge third-party participation
17:59
Speaker 1: that tilted these states. Then you have 2020, and now
18:02
Speaker 1: here we are with a brand new candidate who started
18:04
Speaker 1: four months ago. There's never been a less known candidate
18:09
Speaker 1: this close.
18:10
Speaker 2: To the end. Yeah, and we have an election where, again,
18:14
Speaker 2: you know, growing up in politics, you always say, well,
18:18
Speaker 2: all right, what's a presidential election about? Do you want
18:21
Speaker 2: to stay the course or do you want to go
18:22
Speaker 2: in a different direction? And what's fascinating about this election
18:26
Speaker 2: is we have The guy who is the challenger, so
18:29
Speaker 2: the different direction, is the semi-incumbent, right? This is not
18:34
Speaker 2: brand new to anybody about what direction he wants to
18:36
Speaker 2: go in and what it would be like to have
18:39
Speaker 2: a term with him in office. And then you have Harris,
18:43
Speaker 2: who's also new. As you said, there's still a lot
18:48
Speaker 2: to fill in about her, and yet she's the incumbent
18:51
Speaker 2: and having to defend the status quo. Right. You can't
18:55
Speaker 2: really put either one of them cleanly into that. I'm
18:58
Speaker 2: the change candidate. They are both trying to grab onto that.
19:02
Speaker 2: And then they both have their past, their past votes,
19:05
Speaker 2: their past behaviors that are tethering them to this idea
19:10
Speaker 2: that they're really not change. So I think that's what's
19:14
Speaker 2: also hard about it because you're right. If you were
19:17
Speaker 2: in a cave, Dan, for the last 10 years– or
19:22
Speaker 2: maybe let's not call it a cave. Let's say you
19:23
Speaker 2: were just in a luxurious, wonderful place for 10 years.
19:26
Speaker 2: You knew nothing about our politics. The last campaign you
19:30
Speaker 2: did was 2008. And you came out and you said,
19:34
Speaker 2: and I told you, there's an incumbent president, not running again,
19:37
Speaker 2: but with an approval rating in the 40s. And we're
19:41
Speaker 2: coming off really high inflationary period where people are still
19:44
Speaker 2: pretty frustrated about the state of the economy. Oh, and
19:50
Speaker 2: 70% of people think the country's headed in the wrong direction.
19:53
Speaker 2: Do you think that incumbent party would win? You'd be like, no,
19:56
Speaker 2: probably not. I mean, I'd rather be the out party.
19:59
Speaker 1: Right. If that was a Poli Sci 101 test and
20:02
Speaker 1: you wrote, yes, the incumbent party would win, you would fail.
20:04
Speaker 1: And I think that's just an... No one knows what's
20:07
Speaker 1: going to happen, but there is this– you can hear
20:09
Speaker 1: it in some of the critiques that's happening. Like this
20:11
Speaker 1: is a race that Kamala Harris should be running away with.
20:12
Speaker 1: Now put aside that bespeaks a real misunderstanding of how
20:17
Speaker 1: polarization works and how the electoral college works. But even then,
20:20
Speaker 1: on paper, this is Trump's election to lose.
20:24
Speaker 2: That's right. Just based on– there we go.
20:27
Speaker 1: Everything right there. And she's being asked to do something
20:30
Speaker 1: unprecedented to go from a standing start to– running against,
20:34
Speaker 1: not just some random schmo nominated by the Republican Iowa caucus,
20:38
Speaker 1: but by the former incumbent president of the United States
20:42
Speaker 1: running again. And so it's just, I think a lot
20:45
Speaker 1: of sort of the framework of analysis that's come to
20:49
Speaker 1: this election, I think is off because Trump is such
20:51
Speaker 1: a unique figure. But when you do the fundamentals, and
20:54
Speaker 1: it's interesting because the fundamentals of the political environment massively
20:58
Speaker 1: favor Trump for all the reasons you said. You can
21:00
Speaker 1: put aside the fact that Unemployment is at a historic low,
21:03
Speaker 1: but because of inflation, because of Biden's approval rating, because
21:06
Speaker 1: of the wrong direction number. But the fundamentals of her
21:08
Speaker 1: candidacy favor her, right? She's more popular. And in general,
21:13
Speaker 1: in a normal world, she's significantly more popular. You would
21:16
Speaker 1: say undecided's break for the better-liked candidate. You would say,
21:21
Speaker 1: who has more money? Who has a better campaign and
21:24
Speaker 1: a better organization? So it is like these two forces
21:29
Speaker 1: going against each other, right? Between- the political environment for
21:32
Speaker 1: Trump and the candidacy and the candidate skills for her.
21:35
Speaker 4: Yeah.
21:36
Speaker 2: And that, and that makes right. That makes it all
21:39
Speaker 2: the harder to figure out where these last batch of
21:43
Speaker 2: people who are not yet committed to voting slash committed
21:49
Speaker 2: to a candidate are going to, you know, what is
21:53
Speaker 2: it that's going to push those voters over the edge? And, um,
21:58
Speaker 2: You know, again, in the old days, you'd say, well,
22:00
Speaker 2: there's going to be, you know, what is it? What
22:02
Speaker 2: are we what's the issue environment going into the last
22:06
Speaker 2: three weeks of this election again? And who is that
22:09
Speaker 2: going to favor? So, I mean, there's a lot that's happened, Dan.
22:14
Speaker 2: We've had two assassination attempts on one candidate. We have
22:19
Speaker 2: a growing war in the Middle East today. We've got,
22:25
Speaker 2: you know, let's see, major disasters, natural disasters in North
22:30
Speaker 2: Carolina and Florida. None of those things alone are making
22:37
Speaker 2: much of a dent in terms of the race, in
22:41
Speaker 2: terms of just the overall polling or the sense that, oh,
22:44
Speaker 2: this is a political environment that is going to be
22:47
Speaker 2: beneficial to one candidate or the other.
22:50
Speaker 1: There's so much conversation about the October surprise. What's the
22:52
Speaker 1: October surprise going to be? Maybe we already had it
22:54
Speaker 1: when we had two hurricanes on the first week of October.
22:57
Speaker 1: But what's different now is not only do we have
23:01
Speaker 1: this small group of voters who are going to sign
23:04
Speaker 1: the selection, but the media environment is so different now.
23:07
Speaker 1: I think all the time about 2004 and the last
23:09
Speaker 1: weekend when that audio tape of bin Laden came out
23:13
Speaker 1: and leading every newspaper, every news story was about bin
23:17
Speaker 1: Laden pledging to attack America again. And I don't know
23:20
Speaker 1: whether John Kerry would have won if that had not
23:22
Speaker 1: come out, but that definitely puts in people's head an
23:26
Speaker 1: issue in the environment that's in favor of Bush.
23:27
Speaker 2: This is a security election. Exactly.
23:29
Speaker 1: Let's take a quick break. We'll be right back. Let's
23:45
Speaker 1: move into the Senate. The narrative is that the Democratic
23:49
Speaker 1: chance of holding the Senate has gone way down. This
23:52
Speaker 1: was spurred in large part by your publication, the Cook
23:56
Speaker 1: Political Report, moving Jon Tester from a toss-up race to
24:00
Speaker 1: a lean Republican race. How do you see the overall
24:03
Speaker 1: Senate map right now? And I assume you agree with
24:05
Speaker 1: that assessment.
24:05
Speaker 2: About our chances. Yeah, it is. You know, look, this
24:09
Speaker 2: was always going to be a challenging map for Democrats.
24:12
Speaker 2: We've known that since the very beginning of the cycle.
24:15
Speaker 2: So holding on to three red states in a presidential
24:18
Speaker 2: year is tough. Tester's challenge in Montana is even a
24:24
Speaker 2: little bit harder than, say, Sherrod Brown's challenge in Ohio
24:31
Speaker 2: because Trump is going to win the state of Montana
24:35
Speaker 2: by probably twice as much as he will win Ohio.
24:39
Speaker 2: So for Tester to win, he's going to need to get,
24:42
Speaker 2: you know, one in five Trump voters or something like that.
24:46
Speaker 2: I think there was a time, again, going back, I
24:48
Speaker 2: feel like this old person now, back in my day, but,
24:52
Speaker 2: you know, where Montana was a more parochial place and
24:55
Speaker 2: where you could be a Max Baucus, a John Tester,
25:00
Speaker 2: where you're a Montana Democrat. You are distinguished by people
25:05
Speaker 2: in that state from national Democrats, in part because of
25:09
Speaker 2: your voting record, but also how you look and act, right?
25:13
Speaker 2: The farmer and the buzz cut and the whole deal,
25:17
Speaker 2: which in an era of more nationalized politics and in
25:21
Speaker 2: a state that is growing really, really quickly, I think
25:26
Speaker 2: the number now is only half the people who are
25:29
Speaker 2: in Montana right now were actually born there. And so
25:33
Speaker 2: that makes it really hard for Tester to outrun the
25:38
Speaker 2: national environment like he was able to do in previous years.
25:42
Speaker 2: I think the remarkable thing to watch, though, is how
25:44
Speaker 2: well Sherrod Brown has been holding on in a state
25:48
Speaker 2: that Trump's probably going to carry by 10 points. And
25:52
Speaker 2: I think some of that is Brown's own brand. But
25:58
Speaker 2: the fact that he has been able to outspend and
26:01
Speaker 2: in fact, went on the air early. And his Republican
26:05
Speaker 2: opponent was dark for a good chunk of the summer,
26:09
Speaker 2: allowing Brown to really control the narrative around this race. Now,
26:14
Speaker 2: at the end of the day, Moreno may be able
26:16
Speaker 2: to just count on a strong Trump performance to pull
26:20
Speaker 2: him up over the line. So it's not as dangerous
26:24
Speaker 2: to be trailing an incumbent like Moreno is right now
26:32
Speaker 2: or be tied with an incumbent as it would be
26:34
Speaker 2: in a purple state or a bluer state. But so
26:38
Speaker 2: you put those three states in, you know, really dangerous territory.
26:44
Speaker 2: That means that Democrats are going to have to find
26:46
Speaker 2: two states. Or if we just say Montana is the
26:50
Speaker 2: only one that flips, they've got to pick up one
26:53
Speaker 2: state and Harris win the presidency in order to hold
26:56
Speaker 2: the Senate. And if we look at the map, we
26:59
Speaker 2: see Texas coming in there. Nebraska has been quite the surprise,
27:04
Speaker 2: even though he is not technically a Democrat. He's an
27:07
Speaker 2: independent who hasn't said who he's going to caucus with.
27:11
Speaker 2: But it would definitely make the politics of the Senate
27:15
Speaker 2: even more interesting should you have another independent in there.
27:20
Speaker 2: But look, I think Colin Allred has run a very,
27:24
Speaker 2: very strong race in Texas. driven in part by the
27:28
Speaker 2: fact that it is, as we've seen since 2018, if
27:32
Speaker 2: you're a Democrat running against Ted Cruz, you can raise
27:36
Speaker 2: a lot of money. Ted Cruz raises you a lot
27:39
Speaker 2: of money just out of, you know, sheer spite. People
27:44
Speaker 2: like to donate to people running against Cruz.
27:48
Speaker 1: People generally don't like.
27:49
Speaker 2: Generally don't like. Right.
27:51
Speaker 1: Exactly.
27:51
Speaker 2: So it's, you know, I'm not taking anything away from him,
27:57
Speaker 2: but If you're running against Ted Cruz, there's a lot
28:00
Speaker 2: of money sitting out there from people who just don't
28:02
Speaker 2: like Ted Cruz. But that's still a tough, that's a
28:06
Speaker 2: tough haul to get from, you know, 46, 47% as
28:12
Speaker 2: a Democrat to 50 in the state of Texas. Every
28:15
Speaker 2: 1% is just brutal.
28:19
Speaker 1: And it's going to depend a lot on what happens
28:22
Speaker 1: with a Latino vote, right? Are we snapping back some?
28:27
Speaker 1: to where we were before 2020? Are we staying at 2020?
28:30
Speaker 1: And is there erosion? Back in my day, it was
28:33
Speaker 1: Texas was on its inexorable path to be a blue
28:36
Speaker 1: state because of the margins Obama and then Hillary were
28:39
Speaker 1: getting with Latino voters. Then that changed after 2020. And
28:44
Speaker 1: now we are in a much different place. Would you
28:46
Speaker 1: have a feel for Nebraska? I've never seen a race
28:50
Speaker 1: for people. There's been such conflicting polling. And like, there
28:53
Speaker 1: are some polls that show it incredibly close. I've seen
28:55
Speaker 1: polls that not the highest of quality polls. I'll make
28:57
Speaker 1: that have shown, uh, uh, they've shown the Democrat had
29:00
Speaker 1: shown Dan Osborne ahead, seeing polls that have shown huge
29:04
Speaker 1: leads for Fisher. I think you guys have Fisher as
29:06
Speaker 1: a lean Republican or is that right?
29:09
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think, uh, we haven't in likely right now. Yeah.
29:14
Speaker 3: Yeah.
29:14
Speaker 2: Um, and, uh, This feels, in some ways, it feels
29:19
Speaker 2: somewhat familiar. We've seen this in other Plains states. We
29:23
Speaker 2: saw it in Kansas, right, with Pat Roberts, where an
29:26
Speaker 2: independent candidate who was really a Democrat but ran as
29:29
Speaker 2: an independent, it got very close until it wasn't close
29:34
Speaker 2: at all. And so there's a formula here for a
29:39
Speaker 2: Republican candidate. you know, you just have to make the
29:41
Speaker 2: case that this person who calls themselves an independent is
29:44
Speaker 2: actually aligned with the Democrat, make it a national partisan race,
29:49
Speaker 2: and you pull out a win. I think Osborne has
29:52
Speaker 2: been successful for a couple of reasons. The first is
29:55
Speaker 2: he just doesn't look or act like your typical politician.
29:58
Speaker 2: The fact that he's not aligned with the party, I think, helps.
30:01
Speaker 2: He's a former labor leader and has a good story
30:06
Speaker 2: to tell. And Fisher, I think, is not as particularly
30:09
Speaker 2: well-known and not well-defined in that state. So he kind
30:14
Speaker 2: of snuck up on her. It's hard to sneak up
30:17
Speaker 2: on a senator, right, about six years to prepare for
30:20
Speaker 2: this thing. It's hard to sneak up on anybody in
30:23
Speaker 2: politics these days, but he did just that. And so...
30:28
Speaker 2: You know, look, at the end of the day, it
30:29
Speaker 2: is still Nebraska. But the fact that this race is
30:35
Speaker 2: where it is, it's also notable that his last name
30:38
Speaker 2: is Osborne. Now, you may remember there was a very
30:42
Speaker 2: famous football coach named Tom Osborne, the football coach for
30:46
Speaker 2: the University of Nebraska. He had an E at the
30:49
Speaker 2: end of his name. This Osborne does not. who was
30:52
Speaker 2: also a member of Congress. So the name Osborne in
30:55
Speaker 2: Nebraska is actually a, it's a good name. It's a
30:58
Speaker 2: good brand to have. So I don't know how much
31:01
Speaker 2: of it he's, he's been, how much he's benefiting there,
31:05
Speaker 2: but it is, it is clear that he's, he's picking
31:08
Speaker 2: up some level of support, um, from people who are
31:12
Speaker 2: also voting for Donald Trump, right? The kinds of people
31:15
Speaker 2: who I think would say, um, Yeah, I like Donald
31:18
Speaker 2: Trump because he shakes it up and he's not one
31:21
Speaker 2: of the insiders. This guy seems like a not insidery
31:25
Speaker 2: kind of guy to me, too, and she's part of
31:27
Speaker 2: the system and part of the establishment, so to speak. So, yeah,
31:33
Speaker 2: every year you've got one of these races. There's usually
31:36
Speaker 2: one in the House, too, where an incumbent that nobody
31:38
Speaker 2: was paying attention to all of a sudden looks like
31:42
Speaker 2: they are in a lot of trouble. Yeah. you know,
31:47
Speaker 2: the money is starting to flow to her, but he's
31:49
Speaker 2: been able to raise an incredible amount of money. And
31:53
Speaker 2: this is where the nationalization of politics actually helps candidates
31:58
Speaker 2: because a candidate in Nebraska is now able to raise
32:01
Speaker 2: money from people around the country in a way you
32:03
Speaker 2: couldn't back in the pre, you know, pre-internet, pre, yeah.
32:09
Speaker 1: There's no grassroots money for a Nebraska Senate candidate. You're
32:12
Speaker 1: just counting on Yes. PACs to decide whether your side
32:16
Speaker 1: was going to be.
32:16
Speaker 2: The majority or not. Exactly.
32:19
Speaker 1: So let's talk about the House. In all the various
32:23
Speaker 1: models I've seen, Democrats have a slight or slight favorites
32:28
Speaker 1: to take the House. I find the House fascinating because
32:31
Speaker 1: we spent some time talking about the red states there,
32:33
Speaker 1: but the Senate map mostly overlays over the presidential map.
32:37
Speaker 1: And so the same trends are affecting Kamala Harris in
32:40
Speaker 1: Wisconsin or affecting Tammy Baldwin in In Wisconsin, same thing
32:43
Speaker 1: for Bob Casey. In Pennsylvania, so there's a lot of that.
32:46
Speaker 1: The House is very different. There are obviously some battleground
32:49
Speaker 1: House districts in Pennsylvania and states like that, but it's
32:52
Speaker 1: really going to be decided in New York and California,
32:56
Speaker 1: two states which kind of underperformed in 2022. What are
32:58
Speaker 1: you guys seeing in the House?
32:59
Speaker 2: Well, I'm really glad you brought up New York and
33:02
Speaker 2: California because the one thing we're noticing in both of
33:05
Speaker 2: those states, which you're right, if you look at, if
33:08
Speaker 2: I told you that Look, Democrats' chances run through California
33:12
Speaker 2: and New York. In a presidential year, normally you'd say, well,
33:15
Speaker 2: that's great for Democrats because those are two great states
33:18
Speaker 2: for us. And certainly we'll have higher turnout than we
33:22
Speaker 2: did in 2022, which was a weird year. And you
33:25
Speaker 2: had an unpopular governor in New York and a not
33:28
Speaker 2: very inspired top-of-the-ticket race in California. And so we had
33:32
Speaker 2: really low turnout. At the same time, we're seeing, at
33:36
Speaker 2: least right now, that– there's still some sign that that Republican,
33:43
Speaker 2: I don't know if I would call it momentum, but
33:46
Speaker 2: Republican success in New York and California wasn't just about
33:51
Speaker 2: low turnout in 2022. This is especially true if you're
33:55
Speaker 2: looking at the districts that Democrats need to pick off
33:59
Speaker 2: in California, where you have a significant Latino population. It
34:02
Speaker 2: goes back to that question of how well will Trump
34:07
Speaker 2: and Republicans do with Latino voters in a presidential election
34:12
Speaker 2: cycle compared to, say, an off year. Again, in the
34:18
Speaker 2: not so distant past, you would say, oh, if it's
34:21
Speaker 2: an overwhelmingly Latino district, it will perform better for Democrats
34:26
Speaker 2: in a presidential year than in a midterm year. But
34:29
Speaker 2: you can't take that to the bank now, not certainly
34:32
Speaker 2: with where we've seen some of these trends with Latino
34:34
Speaker 2: voters going. And in New York, you know, the redrawing
34:41
Speaker 2: of the map that Democrats did didn't really do much
34:45
Speaker 2: to harm Republicans. It shored up a couple of their Democrats, which,
34:51
Speaker 2: you know, playing defense is important too. But, you know,
34:56
Speaker 2: there still are signs that Long Island and some of
34:59
Speaker 2: the places– in upstate slash Hudson Valley are just not,
35:04
Speaker 2: they're not gonna perform as well for Harris as they
35:08
Speaker 2: did for Biden, at least they're not right now. Again,
35:11
Speaker 2: it doesn't mean Harris loses these places. It's just that
35:14
Speaker 2: instead of winning them by 10 or 12, it's six
35:20
Speaker 2: or four. And that means that these challengers You know,
35:27
Speaker 2: they have a bit of a head of a tailwind,
35:30
Speaker 2: but not as strong of a tailwind as you would expect.
35:34
Speaker 2: To me, it's also like, you know, you've got some
35:38
Speaker 2: quirky races in there, too. We've got Democrats holding on
35:44
Speaker 2: in red places and they look. pretty strong now, Marcy
35:48
Speaker 2: Kaptur in Toledo, who was supposed to be.
35:51
Speaker 1: Toast years ago.
35:53
Speaker 2: Absolutely. They drew her a terrible district, and she's still
35:56
Speaker 2: holding on. And you've got in the Lehigh Valley, Matt Cartwright,
36:04
Speaker 2: in another district that has shifted dramatically to the right,
36:10
Speaker 2: He's still holding on. Jared Golden, I haven't seen any
36:15
Speaker 2: data up there recently, but, you know, up in Maine.
36:18
Speaker 2: So the incumbent Democrats in those red districts are holding on, too.
36:26
Speaker 2: And so to me, it's really where Democrats are defending
36:30
Speaker 2: some of these open seats, like in Michigan. Yeah, what's
36:34
Speaker 2: the Slotkin seat? Those are those two, the Slotkin seat
36:37
Speaker 2: and the— The Kildee seat up there, those are going
36:41
Speaker 2: to be critically important. Abigail Spanberger's district in Virginia. Normally,
36:48
Speaker 2: these races, the closest races all break one way. So
36:52
Speaker 2: you see our toss-up category, usually, I think we have
36:57
Speaker 2: 24 in there, and usually 70% of the races would
37:00
Speaker 2: go one direction or the other. So that still may
37:04
Speaker 2: happen in this case. But you're right, they're all in
37:08
Speaker 2: different areas. So you could see something like, yeah, the
37:11
Speaker 2: New York races go one way, the California races go
37:14
Speaker 2: one way, but North Carolina and Ohio and Michigan go
37:20
Speaker 2: a different way. So it makes for a really, really close,
37:28
Speaker 2: close call on who has an advantage here. And if...
37:34
Speaker 2: these things play out the way they have in recent
37:37
Speaker 2: years where the top of the ticket is as important
37:43
Speaker 2: as the, it's, it's not more important, but it is
37:46
Speaker 2: incredibly important to what happens below, you know, the races
37:51
Speaker 2: below it, you know, outrunning your presidential nominee becomes really challenging.
37:57
Speaker 1: And it's interesting because in the Senate, in a lot
38:00
Speaker 1: of the races, you're seeing semi-democratic candidates outrun Harris. Now,
38:04
Speaker 1: I think that's narrowed some.
38:05
Speaker 2: It's definitely narrowed some.
38:07
Speaker 1: In Wisconsin, Pennsylvania in particular. And I think there's kind
38:10
Speaker 1: of unique situations in Arizona.
38:12
Speaker 2: Arizona and Nevada.
38:13
Speaker 1: In particular. And in Nevada. And a little bit in Michigan,
38:17
Speaker 1: I think, because Mike Rogers is not. He has some
38:21
Speaker 1: challenges in reinventing himself as a Trump Republican. CNN contributor
38:27
Speaker 1: to Trump Republican is a tough pivot over the course
38:29
Speaker 1: of a couple of years with a way station and
38:31
Speaker 1: living in Florida, I think, to get there. But you're
38:34
Speaker 1: seeing them come together. And so I guess you would
38:38
Speaker 1: say the most likely scenario is the winner of the
38:40
Speaker 1: presidential wins the House as well. That's probably what you
38:42
Speaker 1: would expect.
38:42
Speaker 2: That's what we have seen forever and ever and ever.
38:47
Speaker 2: But wouldn't this be the right year for that to
38:49
Speaker 2: be upended? And so we have a whole bunch of
38:54
Speaker 2: this has never happened before scenarios that could happen, which
38:58
Speaker 2: is a double flip, right? The Senate and the House
39:00
Speaker 2: going different ways, right? You could see that the presidential
39:06
Speaker 2: goes one way and the House goes the other, which, again,
39:11
Speaker 2: haven't seen. I think the last time the House flipped
39:14
Speaker 2: control in a presidential year was in the 1950s. So
39:19
Speaker 2: Eisenhower was president the last time that happened. I think
39:22
Speaker 2: the one thing we can feel somewhat confident in is
39:26
Speaker 2: that we're not going to get an answer on election night.
39:30
Speaker 2: or the day after the election or maybe two days
39:33
Speaker 2: after the election.
39:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, it could be weeks, frankly, as it was in 2018.
39:38
Speaker 2: Yeah. And then if it's really close, then we're going
39:41
Speaker 2: to have recounts and yeah, and on top of recounts.
39:45
Speaker 2: So that should be quite something.
39:48
Speaker 1: Well, I think it's a great place to leave it there. Amy,
39:50
Speaker 1: thank you so much for joining us.
39:51
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me.
39:52
Speaker 1: Always smarter after I read you or hear you talk.
39:55
Speaker 2: Oh, you're so nice. Thank you. Appreciate it.
39:57
Speaker 1: Good luck for these last two and a half weeks here.
39:59
Speaker 2: Thanks. You too.
40:01
Speaker 1: Let's take a short break. But before we do, I
40:02
Speaker 1: have an ask. If you're listening to this podcast, you're
40:05
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40:07
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40:09
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41:05
Speaker 1: Now I'm joined by Polar Coasters producer Caroline Reston to
41:08
Speaker 1: answer your questions from our subscriber discord. Caroline, take it away.
41:12
Speaker 4: Dan, I'm happy to be here on Pod Save. I
41:14
Speaker 4: was told by Elijah to downplay my banter by 50%.
41:17
Speaker 4: So if you guys want full.
41:18
Speaker 1: I mean, you know what that means? I want you
41:20
Speaker 1: to double your banter. Do not. Elijah's just trying to
41:22
Speaker 1: stem everyone's growth here because he wants, he likes to
41:24
Speaker 1: be the positive America producer celebrity.
41:26
Speaker 4: He does. And I get it.
41:28
Speaker 1: Fame is a toxic drug. So I get it.
41:31
Speaker 4: OK, so we have a few questions here from the discord.
41:35
Speaker 4: The first one we got asked many, many times. So
41:38
Speaker 4: I'm eagerly awaiting your answer. CNN was reporting on record
41:42
Speaker 4: early voting in Georgia. And Dan, you previously have talked
41:45
Speaker 4: about that. The more people that vote, the better it
41:48
Speaker 4: probably is for Trump. What are these early voting numbers saying?
41:52
Speaker 1: Do not read anything into this early vote. is we
41:57
Speaker 1: spend a lot of time trying to parse early vote
41:59
Speaker 1: numbers and it tells us very little. Because this could
42:02
Speaker 1: mean really high turnout. Or it could mean that a
42:06
Speaker 1: lot of people who had previously voted on election day
42:10
Speaker 1: have decided that for the purposes of convenience to vote
42:14
Speaker 1: early vote. So you're not adding any new voters. The
42:16
Speaker 1: turnout may not necessarily be any higher. You're just shifting
42:19
Speaker 1: from election day voters to early voters. Also, how enthusiastic
42:23
Speaker 1: people are, they will often just vote on the first day.
42:25
Speaker 1: As early vote and vote in mail becomes more normalized
42:28
Speaker 1: in this country, you're going to have more people doing that.
42:31
Speaker 1: It could tell us something great. It could tell us
42:32
Speaker 1: something terrible. We just don't know. Over the course of time,
42:36
Speaker 1: the campaigns will be able to analyze, take the number
42:38
Speaker 1: who voted, run it through their database and determine whether
42:41
Speaker 1: these are just typical voters who were going to vote
42:43
Speaker 1: anyway and now they're voting early. Are they new voters,
42:46
Speaker 1: people who we did not think were going to vote?
42:48
Speaker 1: Are they low propensity voters that we were hoping to
42:50
Speaker 1: get to the polls? But based on what we know
42:52
Speaker 1: right now, you can't really read into it one thing,
42:54
Speaker 1: good or bad.
42:55
Speaker 4: Great answer to that question. We don't know. But don't
42:57
Speaker 4: freak out. Here's another question. I saw that Republicans have
43:01
Speaker 4: completely outpaced Democrats in voter registration in swing states. How
43:06
Speaker 4: much should we be worried about this? How much is
43:08
Speaker 4: it due to people changing their registration to match their
43:10
Speaker 4: 2020 preferences versus a legitimate operation to recruit more Republicans?
43:15
Speaker 1: It is something to worry about. Now, I would state
43:18
Speaker 1: that for a long time, people don't change their voter
43:22
Speaker 1: registration and they So they may have registered as a
43:27
Speaker 1: Democrat when Bill Clinton was president, and they've been voting
43:29
Speaker 1: Republican ever since, but they've remained a Democrat because they
43:31
Speaker 1: don't vote in primaries. And so there's no point in
43:34
Speaker 1: changing the registration. You will often see in an election
43:37
Speaker 1: where there's no primary on one side and a presidential
43:40
Speaker 1: primary on the other, the side having the presidential primary
43:43
Speaker 1: will usually gain registrants because people will register to participate
43:47
Speaker 1: in the primary through the registered independents who have always
43:49
Speaker 1: voted Republican. maybe even a few Democrats who registered Republicans
43:52
Speaker 1: to vote in that primary. And so, look, you want
43:56
Speaker 1: to have more registered voters. Democrats for a long time
43:58
Speaker 1: had a huge edge. That edge was larger than our
44:00
Speaker 1: typical edge in statewide races. So there were some people
44:04
Speaker 1: who were registered as Democrats but voting as Republicans. But
44:07
Speaker 1: it's not as bad as it sounds. But in general,
44:10
Speaker 1: you want to be gaining more registrants, not losing your advantage.
44:14
Speaker 4: Okay, people are asking very extensive questions on this Discord,
44:17
Speaker 4: which is great, but reading these are quite a mouthful.
44:19
Speaker 1: That's why you should subscribe to Friends of the Pod
44:21
Speaker 1: and join the Discord, because there's some really smart people
44:23
Speaker 1: asking smart questions.
44:24
Speaker 4: They really are. Okay, should the Democrats prioritize energizing their
44:28
Speaker 4: base rather than focusing heavily on swing voters?
44:32
Speaker 1: This is how the press portrays swing voters. The avatar
44:37
Speaker 1: of the swing voter in traditional political media narratives is.
44:43
Speaker 1: Usually a white man or woman in their 40s to
44:47
Speaker 1: 50s in Wisconsin. They go to a diner, they print
44:49
Speaker 1: out the white papers of the Republicans and the white
44:51
Speaker 1: papers of the Democrats, and they go through them to
44:54
Speaker 1: see whose policies would benefit them more. And that's not what,
44:57
Speaker 1: that's not, there are some voters like that. They're definitely,
45:00
Speaker 1: I don't know about the printing out of things anymore,
45:02
Speaker 1: but there are people choosing between Trump and Harris. Like
45:04
Speaker 1: that does exist. But the largest swath of quote unquote
45:08
Speaker 1: swing voters or persuasion targets are people choosing between your
45:10
Speaker 1: candidate and the couch. People who don't like Donald Trump,
45:14
Speaker 1: they kind of like Kamala Harris, but they don't know
45:15
Speaker 1: if politics works for them. And so that is who
45:18
Speaker 1: both campaigns are actually focusing on. Trump is not focusing
45:21
Speaker 1: on his base. He's actually there to the extent they
45:23
Speaker 1: have any sort of GOTV operation. It is to try
45:26
Speaker 1: to get low engagement voters, people who profile as Republican,
45:31
Speaker 1: but do not typically vote. And those could be young
45:34
Speaker 1: men are a huge part, including black and Latino men
45:36
Speaker 1: are a huge part of Trump's target there. Democrats have
45:39
Speaker 1: a much wider swath of voters that we're going to
45:41
Speaker 1: do that with. Also includes young voters, men and women,
45:45
Speaker 1: people who have never voted before who were trying to
45:48
Speaker 1: get registered. And so the idea that swing voters in
45:53
Speaker 1: the base are these two entirely different things, I think,
45:55
Speaker 1: is a misnomer born of some pretty lazy political writing
45:59
Speaker 1: over the years.
46:00
Speaker 4: Dan, if my memory serves me well, you once said
46:04
Speaker 4: that donating to campaigns directly is more impactful than donating
46:07
Speaker 4: to PACs. Explain further.
46:11
Speaker 1: Yes, your memory does serve you well. And let me,
46:14
Speaker 1: I'll offer some context for that. But the reason why
46:17
Speaker 1: donating to campaigns is more cost efficient and effective than
46:22
Speaker 1: donating to packs is when it comes to television ads,
46:26
Speaker 1: not digital ads, but television ads, the stations are required
46:30
Speaker 1: to offer the lowest available rate to the campaigns themselves.
46:34
Speaker 1: And they can gouge the living shit out of super
46:37
Speaker 1: packs or any pack, frankly. And so right now, based
46:41
Speaker 1: on what I've heard, super PACs are spending five to
46:44
Speaker 1: six times the amount of money per commercial as the
46:48
Speaker 1: Harris and Trump campaigns or congressional and Senate campaigns are paying.
46:52
Speaker 1: And so when it comes to actual, the sort of
46:55
Speaker 1: campaigns like super PACs and others that are going to
46:58
Speaker 1: run ads on television, donating to the campaign is much
47:00
Speaker 1: more efficient. Now, there are a lot of great organizations,
47:03
Speaker 1: many of them, we support in Votes Save America, who
47:06
Speaker 1: are PACs that do organizing. They're doing deep canvassing, they're
47:10
Speaker 1: registering voters, they're getting voters to the poll, and those
47:12
Speaker 1: groups pay the same amount of money per whatever it
47:17
Speaker 1: is they're buying as the campaign does. But for the
47:21
Speaker 1: purpose of who's spending money on television, give your money
47:24
Speaker 1: to the campaign because you're going to get much more
47:26
Speaker 1: bang for your buck that way.
47:27
Speaker 4: Okay, Dan, another question. If you could design your ideal
47:31
Speaker 4: three-week-out polling that doesn't already exist or isn't publicly shared
47:37
Speaker 4: and your only budget and scale constraints are that you
47:40
Speaker 4: cannot collect info from any true swing state, what states
47:44
Speaker 4: would you be polling and what measures and what differentials
47:48
Speaker 4: would you be watching with the greatest degree of interest?
47:51
Speaker 1: I mean– What a question. I'm going to simplify that question.
47:57
Speaker 4: Please do.
47:58
Speaker 1: Some. I think I would look at, there are two
48:02
Speaker 1: states that are not getting a lot of polling that
48:05
Speaker 1: I would like to see polled because I think they
48:06
Speaker 1: tell us something about what could be happening nationally with
48:11
Speaker 1: certain groups. And so one of them is New Mexico.
48:14
Speaker 1: This is a state that was in play when Biden
48:18
Speaker 1: was the nominee. so much so that Trump was leading
48:21
Speaker 1: in some internal campaign polls in New Mexico. From the
48:26
Speaker 1: limited polling I've seen, it has reverted back to its
48:28
Speaker 1: relatively safe status from 2020 and before. But I'd like
48:34
Speaker 1: to know that for sure. I'd like to see what's
48:35
Speaker 1: happening there. So much of the election depends on whether
48:39
Speaker 1: Trump can get to 40% of the Latino vote. Looking
48:44
Speaker 1: at New Mexico would be a very interesting place to
48:46
Speaker 1: do that. And I think looking at the Latino vote
48:49
Speaker 1: in a state that's not seeing a ton of campaign
48:51
Speaker 1: ads would be helpful to give us some sort of
48:54
Speaker 1: hint in what's happening in other parts of the country,
48:57
Speaker 1: like California and New York, where you have huge swaths
49:00
Speaker 1: of Latino vote that are going to decide the House.
49:02
Speaker 1: Then I'd like to see New Jersey. New Jersey is
49:05
Speaker 1: another state that moved towards– They moved towards Trump when
49:12
Speaker 1: Biden was the nominee. It's theoretically a snapback. There's almost
49:15
Speaker 1: no polling there. We have an important Senate race there,
49:18
Speaker 1: where Andy Kim is running to take Bob Menendez's seat
49:21
Speaker 1: as Bob Menendez heads off to prison or wherever he's going.
49:25
Speaker 1: And in 2021, a Republican almost won the governorship there.
49:30
Speaker 1: A Republican former truck driver who had no money and
49:34
Speaker 1: ran no real campaign almost beat Governor Phil Murphy. And
49:37
Speaker 1: New York has moved a little to the right. I'd
49:39
Speaker 1: like to see if that was happening in New Jersey
49:40
Speaker 1: as well.
49:41
Speaker 4: Interesting time for your last name to be Menendez. I
49:44
Speaker 4: had to get that into one episode of Pod Save America. Okay, Dan,
49:48
Speaker 4: last question, arguably the most important one. If you had
49:51
Speaker 4: to awkwardly sway on stage for 39 minutes, what song
49:56
Speaker 4: would you choose to dance to?
49:57
Speaker 1: I don't think I can answer this question.
50:00
Speaker 4: What?
50:01
Speaker 1: All of my dancing is awkwardly swaying. There's no other
50:03
Speaker 1: form that exists.
50:04
Speaker 4: But what's your ideal song?
50:05
Speaker 1: My ideal song to sway to?
50:10
Speaker 4: Yeah, and in front of a really big, awkward crowd.
50:12
Speaker 1: Is it going to be the same song for 30
50:13
Speaker 1: minutes or is it going to be a genre of music?
50:16
Speaker 4: No, it has to be. We're going to put it
50:17
Speaker 4: on repeat.
50:18
Speaker 1: One song on repeat for 39 minutes. Huh.
50:24
Speaker 4: I would say Bohemian Rhapsody because it's a long song.
50:27
Speaker 4: So you're only really getting it in like three times.
50:30
Speaker 1: I would say I prepared for the differential question and
50:33
Speaker 1: the what would my ideal poll be? I did not
50:37
Speaker 1: prepare for it. I would say in my defense. The
50:39
Speaker 1: actual question as submitted, although you edited it, was, Dan,
50:43
Speaker 1: if you had to awkwardly sway on stage to an aria.
50:45
Speaker 1: And I'm not sure I could name an aria. Ave Maria,
50:48
Speaker 1: I guess, because that's the one Trump did. But my
50:50
Speaker 1: aria knowledge is limited.
50:51
Speaker 4: OK, I didn't know what that meant. So I just
50:55
Speaker 4: slided right over it.
50:56
Speaker 1: You can't just take the questioner's questions and then change
50:59
Speaker 1: them to fit what you're interested in.
51:00
Speaker 4: I absolutely can. OK, all too well, 10-minute version would
51:04
Speaker 4: be your sway song. Thanks so much for taking Discord questions.
51:09
Speaker 4: Thank you, Discord.
51:13
Speaker 1: That'll wrap up today's episode. Thank you to Amy Walter
51:15
Speaker 1: and to our subscribers for the great questions. I'll be
51:17
Speaker 1: back in your feeds next Sunday with another one of
51:19
Speaker 1: these episodes. And if you're already a Friend of the
51:21
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