WaPo/ABC Poll: Biden Ahead of Trump 55% to 40%Last week there was a Quinnipiac University Poll with Joe Biden leading Donald Trump by 15 points. Now a Washington Post/ABC News poll came out yesterday with the same 15-point lead for Biden. In May, this poll had Biden ahead by 10 points. In March it was 2 points. The poll was among registered voters, but among those who say they are certain to vote, Biden's lead is 11 points. Among likely voters it is just a tad lower, at 10 points.
Let's put this in perspective. Biden's lead is greater than that of any challenger since Bill Clinton seized the lead over George H.W. Bush in 1992 after Ross Perot dropped out in July (before dropping back in again in October). At this point in 2016, Hillary Clinton led Trump by 3 points. At no point in 2016 did her lead go above 8 points, and it reached 8 only briefly. Also, Biden is above 50%. That means even if all the undecideds break for Trump (which is extremely unlikely), Biden will still win the popular vote. Clinton wasn't above 50% at any point in 2016.
Many pollsters have asked about enthusiasm, but this poll finally asked the right question: What are you excited about? Here are the results:
The cat is now out of the bag. Trump voters want to reelect Trump. Biden is just collateral damage. On the other hand, Biden voters want to defeat Trump. Electing Biden isn't really a priority. The Democrats could have nominated Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) or a can of tuna fish and it wouldn't have had a lot of effect on Democratic voters, although it might have had some effect on the 21% of Trump supporters who a primarily motivated by their dislike of Biden. This implies that there is relatively little Biden could do, short of transmogrifying into Trump, to blow this lead. Trump's only real hope now is cheating one way or another (e.g., voter suppression, shutting down the Postal Service in October, etc.).
Another interesting question is on whether Trump has united the country or divided the country. A full 35% said he has united the country and 61% said he has divided the country. Surely Trump voters know very well that Trump is trying to divide the country, as Fox News tells them daily how awful the liberals are and how Trump is doing his best to squash them like bugs. Are they just trolling the pollsters? It makes one wonder.
By double-digit margins, voters think that Biden has the temperament to be president (+26), would better unite the country (+24), better understands people (+17), is more honest (+14), better represents their values (+12), and has a better idea of what America should stand for (+10) than Trump. The only personality point where Biden doesn't win is on who is a stronger leader, where it is tied at 45%.
On the issues, Biden wins on race relations (+25), the virus (+20), and crime (+9). Asked whether the top priority should be stopping the virus (even if that hurts the economy) or restarting the economy (even if that lets the virus spread), 63% want to stop the virus and 33% want to restart the economy. Presumably this 33% consists primarily of people with no job and no money and who see a restarted economy as their only hope.
Partisan Gap Is Huge and Favors the DemocratsOne of the questions pollsters often ask is: "Which party do you identify with?" According to Gallup, the answer to that question has moved sharply toward the Democrats since January, as shown by this graph:
The current gap of 11 points is historically large. It's happened before, but it is not common. The Democrats led by more than 10 points after Barack Obama's second election win, after Bill Clinton was impeached, and during George H.W. Bush's last summer as president in 1992. The Republicans have never led by more than 10 points at any time since Gallup began asking the question in 1991.
The implications are fairly clear. Since only 39% of Americans are Republicans, there is no way Donald Trump can get reelected in the absence of a strong third-party candidate (sorry, Howie, Jo, and Kanye, you don't qualify), unless large numbers of Democrats sour on their candidate and vote for him. So far polling doesn't show any major group of voters about to desert Joe Biden in favor of Trump.
Biden's Strategy: Do No HarmWhile some pundits are mocking Joe Biden for hiding in his basement and not taking positions on many controversial issues, it might be just what the doctor ordered. After a tumultuous 3½ years of Donald Trump, many voters just want things to calm down and Biden is Mr. Calm. While young Democrats would prefer a much more dynamic candidate or one with progressive ideas, many of them hate Trump so much they will go to the polls to defeat Trump (see above), and a vote to defeat Trump is indistinguishable from a vote to elect Biden.
In Wisconsin, for example, Biden is already way ahead of where Hillary Clinton was, even without much effort. The state used to be part of the "blue wall," but it flipped in 2016. It could very well flip again in 2020 because voters who hated Hillary Clinton don't see Biden as threatening. His being milquetoast is actually a plus with many moderates, especially in the suburbs of Wisconsin and other states. Many older voters, in particular, are not interested in breaking down barriers with historic candidates like Barack Obama and Clinton. They just want someone who won't cause any damage. Biden fits that description well.
Groups that the Biden campaign is targeting include seniors, suburban voters, and even rural voters in a state like Wisconsin. These are groups that are not interested in Bernie Sanders' revolution, or anybody else's revolution for that matter. They just want all the screaming to stop. Biden is their man. How about this as a campaign pledge:
America's present need is not heroics, but healing; not nostrums, but normalcy; not revolution, but restoration; not agitation, but adjustment; not surgery, but serenity; not the dramatic, but the dispassionate; not experiment, but equipoise; not submergence in internationality, but sustainment in triumphant nationality.While it fits Biden's style well, he would be advised not to use it, since he has previously been tarred for plagiarism. This was Warren Harding's basic platform in 1920. Harding summed it up by saying he was for a "return to normalcy." And while Harding didn't hide in his basement during the whole campaign, he basically didn't leave his front porch in Ohio the whole time. It's kind of the same thing ±8 feet. And it worked. Harding beat James Cox (D) 60% to 34%.
North Carolina Makes Early Voting EasierOn Friday, the North Carolina Board of Elections, which has a 3-2 Democratic majority, issued a new rule that requires polling places during early voting to serve no more than 20,000 voters. For example, Wake County (Raleigh) has 460,000 registered voters, so it must have at least 23 polling places. North Carolina will not copy the Wisconsin primary, in which Milwaukee, a city of 600,000 people, had a single polling place.
For rural areas with far less than 20,000 voters, nothing will change, but for all towns and cities with more than 20,000 voters, extra polling places will be added. This helps the Democrats far more than it helps the Republicans. Republican state Sen. Ralph Hise immediately complained, saying that it wasn't fair that areas with many Democrats would get more polling stations and those that are predominantly Republican would not. He also asked who would pay for the extra polling stations. Of course, there is nothing prohibiting rural areas from having as many polling stations as they would like and there was money in the CARES Act to pay for extra voting costs during a pandemic.
Chris Wallace Fact Checks Trump on Fox NewsNot all Fox News interviewers are in the tank for Donald Trump. One who isn't is Chris Wallace. An interview Wallace did with Trump was broadcast yesterday (outdoors, but with neither one wearing a mask). In the interview, Trump lied repeatedly and Wallace confronted him repeatedly. For example, Trump claimed that U.S. COVID-19 mortality is the lowest in the world. Wallace didn't accept that and told Trump that not only is it not the lowest, it is the seventh highest.
Trump also claimed that Joe Biden wants to defund the police. Wallace pointed out that Biden has specifically rejected that position. When the subject of polling came up, Wallace brought up the Fox News poll showing Biden ahead by 8 points. Trump simply said it was fake news. Wallace was not impressed.
Trump also said that the coronavirus was nearly contained. Actually, the Friday total of 77,000 new cases is an all-time high, so the virus is anything but contained. When Wallace pressed Trump on his lack of a national plan for handling the virus, Trump blamed the governors. Trump also defended the Confederate Battle Flag and whined about not being allowed to hold big rallies in states with Democratic governors.
This is the first Sunday morning news show interview Trump has given in a year (after all, there's golf to be played) and the first one with Wallace in 2 years. Given the President's performance yesterday, no doubt new campaign manager Bill Stepien is going to tell Trump to avoid all interviews with folks not named Hannity or Carlson until after Nov. 3. But Trump does not take direction well, so we'll see.
Biden Opens Wide Leads In Midwestern StatesA new Fox News poll from three battleground states:
Michigan: Biden 49%, Trump 41%
Minnesota: Biden 51%, Trump 38%
Pennsylvania: Biden 50%, Trump 39%
“In each state’s head-to-head matchup, the president underperforms both his 2016 vote share and his current job approval rating — and Biden’s edge is larger than the survey’s margin of sampling error.”
Democrats Now Favored to Take Back the SenateThe Cook Political Report forecasts a net gain of five to seven U.S. Senate seats for Democrats, which would give the party the Senate majority.
“Ultimately, every day that Trump stubbornly refuses to change course is another day that it becomes increasingly likely he may not only tank his own re-election bid but could be on a kamikaze mission to take the Republican-held Senate down with him. At this point, a net gain of five to seven seats for Democrats looks far more probable than the one to three seat gain that would leave them shy of a majority.”
Trump Tried to Pressure U.K. into Holding the British Open at His Golf Club in ScotlandDonald Trump promised to break old norms and once again he has apparently done so. And not in a good way. Up until now, most presidents didn't use the power of their office to line their own pockets. Yes, the administration of Warren Harding was corrupt, but Harding himself didn't seek to profit personally in the Teapot Dome scandal. That was Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall's little project. Even Richard Nixon, who was certainly very corrupt in many ways, didn't see the U.S. government as a personal profit center. Trump seems to be breaking new ground here.
First, we had Trump encouraging foreign governments to hold big events at his hotel—and pay the full rate. Then we had Trump visit his golf clubs over 275 times, with each visit requiring many Secret Service personnel to rent rooms and golf carts to the tune of $105 million so far, all of it a direct transfer from the Treasury to Trump's personal bank account.
But now a new scandal has arisen. According to the New York Times, Trump asked his friend and ambassador to the U.K., Woody Johnson, to pressure the U.K. into holding the British Open at his failing golf club, Turnberry, in Scotland. The club has been losing large amounts of money for years, and a major golf tournament there would not only bring in a huge amount of money directly from fees and people staying there, but in addition its prestige would zoom up and possibly save the club from going under.
Johnson has zero diplomatic experience and his only qualification for one of the top diplomatic posts is being a major Trump donor. Naturally, Johnson tried to please his patron, so he talked to his deputy, Lewis Lukens, about the project. Lukens advised him not to do it, saying it would be unethical for a president to use the presidency for private gain. But Johnson didn't listen and brought the idea up with the U.K. government's Secretary of State for Scotland, David Mundell. Mundell didn't take the bait.
The episode left Lukens deeply unsettled, so he e-mailed other officials at the State Dept. telling them what had happened. A few months later, Johnson forced Lukens out. This is a pattern we have seen before (see: Vindman, Alexander).
Federal law makes it a criminal offense for any government official—except the president and vice president—to use his office to promote private businesses. However, the Constitution forbids the president from receiving emoluments, which in the 18th Century meant "payments," from foreign governments. Getting the British government to hold a big event at Trump's personal property would seem to qualify.
Getting Johnson to ask for a favor is hugely unethical because it compromises him. At some time in the future, the British government could come to him and say: "Remember that time you asked us for a favor? Now we would like to ask you for a favor." No experienced diplomat would even consider making such a request. So indeed, Trump is carrying out his campaign promise and smashing norms.
Barr Could Be DisbarredFour past presidents of the D.C. Bar Association have signed a letter to the Bar Association's Office of Disciplinary Counsel asking for AG William Barr to be investigated and potentially disbarred. The letter points to four specific actions that the authors allege violate the D.C. Bar's ethical rules, to wit:
His deceitful behavior in absolving the President of the obstruction of justice that Robert Mueller found
Attacking an inspector general's report using half-truths, mischaracterizations, and concealment of facts
Maligning FBI officials who have not been indicted for a crime, making a future fair trial impossible
Ordering an unconstitutional attack on peaceful protesters at Lafayette Square
The summary ends with: "We don't have an attorney general now. We have an additional lawyer for the President."
The letter is 40 pages long and gives a detailed brief for each of the counts of Barr's violating bar association rules. There are 23 signatories in addition to the four past presidents.
Bar associations can take years to process complaints and they do it in secret. This isn't even the first time bar association leaders have said Barr is unsuited for the job. Last month, the president of the New York City Bar Association sent Congress a letter calling him "unfit" for the job of attorney general. Note that admission to the bar—or, for that matter, a law degree—is not a prerequisite for the Attorney Generalship, and so disbarment would not automatically lead to the Trump administration being dis-Barred.
Cell Phone Companies Reject Trump Spam...er, TextsAny campaign worth its salt should always be looking for whatever edge they can find. And new technologies and media are often fertile ground for such opportunities. So, you can't blame Trump 2020 for trying to exploit text messaging to the hilt, the way that the Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) campaign did. Over the July 4 weekend, the Trump campaign tried to send millions of text messages to supporters, in part to raise money, and in part to test the system in anticipation of sending lots and lots of "make sure to get to the polls and vote" texts in late October and early November. It did not go well, as the major cellular providers' anti-spam measures all kicked in, with the result that less than 1 million text messages reached their intended destination.
Anyone who's done product testing will immediately see that Team Trump went too far, too fast. Scaling up to the millions, and doing so on a holiday weekend, when technical support is going to be scarce, was unwise. The ultimate result was entirely predictable, and the cellular providers' explanation—that any group or organization would have triggered the spam filters if they tried what Trump 2020 tried—is entirely plausible. That did not, of course, stop Donald Trump Jr. from claiming that it's a Big Tech anti-conservative conspiracy. The campaign is now working with Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile to try to work out the kinks. And maybe they'll do it, and will pick up a little edge as a result. On the other hand, Team Trump does have the problem that, when all is said and done, the messages really are spam. That means the cellular companies have to be mindful, both of angry customers who don't want to receive (or pay for) unwanted messages, and also of federal law. So, maybe it won't get worked out by Election Day.
Trump Is Trying to Eliminate Testing for the CoronavirusSenate Republicans are working on a bill to provide $50 billion to states and federal agencies to increase testing for the coronavirus. During the weekend, administration officials worked hard to kill the bill. Senate Republicans are not happy with this pushback and the outcome is not clear yet.
Why would the administration (which, in this case, surely means the President because no other top official opposes testing) want to block testing in the middle of a pandemic? It's not hard to understand once you realize what the President's goal is. It is getting reelected. Having constant reporting in every media outlet about thousands of deaths from COVID-19 every day doesn't help achieve this one key goal. So to reduce the official count of new cases, hospitals are now required to report to the Dept. of HHS, where the numbers can be more easily fudged. Actual deaths are much harder to fudge, but by reducing testing, the people who die will not have officially died of COVID-19, so the number of COVID-19 deaths will not grow so quickly. Statisticians will see that the number of total deaths and the number of deaths from unknown causes may skyrocket, but Trump can then trumpet the news that deaths from COVID-19 are down. Problem solved.
Maybe. Senate Republicans who are up for reelection this year may decide they don't want to play this game, as their opponents would then label them as part of the cover-up. On the other hand, they also are frightened about receiving a tweet of death if they openly oppose Trump, so they have to be very careful while the sausage is being made. Another factor is that the House has to approve any new relief bills and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is not much of a fan of reducing testing in order to label the upcoming wave of COVID-19 deaths as "unknown cause."
That said, it is also clear that improvements need to be made in the testing process. Yesterday on "Meet the Press," Gov. Jared Polis (D-CO) noted that it often takes, seven, eight, even nine days to get results back. By then, an infected person can spread the coronavirus to dozens or hundreds of people without knowing it. He called the delay in getting results back a "complete disgrace."
Lincoln Project Isn't Missing a BeatDonald Trump made a big mistake by agreeing to sit for an interview with Fox News' Chris Wallace this weekend, because Wallace pulled few punches, and called the President out on numerous lies and exaggerations. The very worst sequence, quite probably, came when Trump bragged about having "aced" the cognitive test he was given (The Montreal Cognitive Assessment, or MOCA), and asserted that Joe Biden would never be able to pass the test, and also that if Wallace were to take it, he would be unable to answer the "very hard" last five questions. This means that Trump apparently admitted that, among other things, he had difficulty repeating the sentence "I only know that John is the one to help today," explaining what a train and a bicycle have in common, and naming at least 11 words that start with the letter 'F' (you can see the test here).
The Lincoln Project (LP) jumped right on it with this ad, which plucks the worst moments from the interview, including the exchange about testing, and frames them as a sitcom episode (specifically, an episode of "Seinfeld"), complete with laugh track:
