Trump is in RetreatAnd we don't mean he is spending some down time at Camp David, in Maryland's Catoctin Mountains. No, we mean that he insisted that Congress cut payroll taxes (which would save the Trump Organization a pretty penny)—but then he gave up. He restarted the coronavirus briefings that he himself had shut down after his advice to drink bleach was panned, but no one cared. He was forced to admit that the virus was going to get worse before it gets better, contradicting what he has being saying for months (namely, that it is already a nonissue). He demanded that all the schools in the country open on schedule—until he said, well, maybe not all of them. He was adamant that the Republican National Convention would go on as planned, with 20,000 people roaring their approval—until he decided a convention wasn't really needed. He notably told everyone that masks are not needed—until he started wearing them and said maybe they could be useful.
Timothy Naftali, a professor of history at NYU and the former director of Richard Nixon's presidential library, said: "The good ship Trump has sprung a leak, and it's leaking political capital." Trump absolutely hates to change positions, since that implies he was wrong the first time, but he has two problems: (1) He is sinking in the national polls and in the battleground state polls, and (2) Republican senators sense a blue tsunami on the horizon, and are suddenly willing to push back on ideas of his that they think will hurt them.
Backtracking on so many issues has long-range implications for Trump (where "long-range" may be 6 months). Once Republican senators fully figure out what Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) did many months ago—that if they stand up to him, he backs down—they are going to stand up to him much more often. Being a bully works only if your victims are scared of you. Once that fear goes away, your days as a bully are numbered. We may be approaching that point now.
The Bill Is DueWhen Congress passed the $2 trillion CARES relief act in March, the members assumed that the coronavirus would be long gone by summer, so they designed the bill and related measures to terminate then. Well, August will be upon us Saturday, and the virus is not only here, it is spreading like never before. But many of the CARES benefits are about to vanish.
A big one is the $600 per week supplemental unemployment insurance benefit, which theoretically ends on July 31, but on account of how weeks are determined, has actually already ended for most people. A lot of people are going to sorely miss that weekly $600 and will have trouble paying the rent.
Oh, and about that rent. The CARES act also imposed a moratorium on evictions until the end of July. Starting then, renters who have missed any rent payments can be evicted. Even with the $600 per week extra, many people are way behind on their rent and can now be evicted—in the middle of a pandemic. Of course, landlords have to be a bit careful. Sure, they can evict longstanding good tenants who are behind on their rent, but that means: (1) They will almost certainly never collect the back rent they are owed and (2) they have to look for a new tenants who are able to pay the rent and who have whatever security deposit they require up front. Quality tenants with a good income might not be so easy to find right now. Many states have enacted their own anti-eviction bans, but most have already expired or will expire soon.
The situation is dire. The Census Bureau reports that 9 million renters have no confidence that they can pay next month's rent and another 14 million have only slight confidence they can pay the rent. If these 23 million people are put out on the street, they will not be happy campers. The House has already passed another ban on evictions (until March of next year) from buildings with a federally guaranteed mortgage and has also allocated $100 billion for rental assistance, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has refused to bring the bills up for a vote. Rental assistance is needed because a simple moratorium on evictions just moves the problem up the food chain. About 47% of rental units are owned by individual investors, most of whom have mortgages. If renters don't pay up, many of the investors will default on their loans, which could cause a crisis situation for the banks that issued the mortgages.
If people are evicted due to their inability to pay the rent, they could become homeless. Maybe this is a good time to note that homeless people have a legal right to vote, but few of them do on account of the hassle. They can list a shelter or even a local park as their home address, which is legal, but a bit tricky. Also, many states have some kind of ID requirement in order to register and many homeless people do not have ID. Finally, many homeless people may not be aware of their rights and may consider voting a low priority.
Another cliff is not that far down the road: student loans. The CARES Act deferred student loan payments. It didn't cancel the payments, just suspended them. This benefit ends on September 30. Then the payments must restart. With massive unemployment, many people with student loans won't be able to pay. The loans will then be turned over to collection companies, which charge steep fees. It is estimated that 43 million people have student loans and some significant fraction of them are going to go into default and be hounded by the collection companies. Many of these individuals may make their displeasure known at the ballot box.
course, Congress could just kick the can down the road (one of the few things Congress does really well), and extend the $600 supplement, eviction moratorium, loan forbearance, and more until, say, Nov. 4 (to pick a random date). However, McConnell has to deal with a fractious caucus in order to put together a bill and then negotiate with Nancy Pelosi, who believes she has the upper hand since the House passed a new relief bill 2 months ago and wants the Senate to just bring it up for a vote. In short, it will take weeks, at least, for a new bill to be approved by both chambers of Congress and presented to Donald Trump to sign. And if the Democrats put in things that Trump can't stand (e.g., funding for cities to hire people to tear down Confederate statues or print absentee ballots), he could veto it, although the political price would be extremely high.
Pelosi raised the stakes yesterday when she told CBS News' "Face the Nation" that Democrats will not support a provision in a new bill that makes employers immune to lawsuits if they fail to provide safe working conditions and, as a result, essential workers who must go back to work get sick and sue. For McConnell, providing that immunity to employers is essential. A head-on collision is unavoidable, but in the battle for public opinion, Pelosi holds all the cards. A position of "If you go back to work and your employer doesn't provide a safe working environment and you get sick, you can sue" is always going to win out over "If you go back to work and your employer doesn't provide a safe working environment and you get sick, well, tough luck. You're on your own."
Poll: The Pandemic is Not Over and the Worst Is Yet to ComeA new Kaiser Family Foundation poll about the coronavirus and its effects shows that the public is not optimistic about snuffing the pandemic out. A full 60% think that the worst is yet to come while only 20% think that the worst is behind us. These overall results mask a deep partisan divide, with 79% of Democrats, 57% of independents, and only 40% of Republicans believing that the worst is yet to come. In fact, a slight majority of Republicans believe there is not much of a problem because either the worst is behind us (31%) or the virus wasn't a serious problem in the first place (23%).
The poll also found that 53% of U.S. adults feel that the stress associated with the virus has had a negative impact on their mental health. Parents are especially worried about schools, with 60% saying schools should not reopen until it is safe for the children and 34% saying schools should open on schedule so children can get services and food and not fall behind academically and parents can go to work. Interestingly enough, white parents are more eager to have schools open on schedule (41%) than parents of color (23%), despite the latter being less likely to be able to work from home and less likely to have the computers and broadband Internet needed for remote school.
Now onto the politics of the virus. Here we have 71% who think the federal government is doing only a fair to poor job of handling it while 53% think that their state government is botching the response. It would have been interesting to see a breakdown of that for Democratic- and Republican-run states separately, but that isn't shown. In short, though, having most people thinking that the worst is yet to come and the federal governing isn't doing a good job dealing with it can't help Donald Trump's election prospects much.
Poll: Country Is Headed in the Wrong DirectionAn AP/NORC poll out yesterday asked a different, but also relevant, question: "Is the country headed in the right direction or the wrong direction?" Only 20% said it is headed in the right direction and 80% said it is headed in the wrong direction. This is a record low for Donald Trump and an ominous sign for any incumbent. The graph below shows the answer to that question since Donald Trump's inauguration. Note how public opinion has cratered since March.
The poll also asked about Trump's handling of the coronavirus. Now only 32% think he is going a good job, another record low. On another topic, only 38% say the economy is in good shape, down from 67% in January. None of these numbers scream "Four more years."
Democrats See Path to Senate MajorityA year ago, Democrats had no hope of recapturing the Senate. They have 47 seats now and are likely to lose the one they currently hold in Alabama. This means they need to knock off four Republicans to get to 50 and five to get to 51. It is now becoming clear where they might get four or five, maybe even six.
To start with, Democratic challengers are now the clear favorites in Arizona, Colorado, and Maine. The Democrat is also leading in North Carolina, while Iowa and Montana are tied. Even Georgia (2x) and Kansas might be in play. Here are the polling results for the states where we know the candidates already (and excluding the Georgia special election, where anything is possible):
Arizona, Colorado, and Maine are looking very bleak for the red team right now, and North Carolina isn't so great either. The other three could go either way.
House Republicans Are Begging the RNC for MoneyNo one is willing to admit it, but it appears that the RNC has quietly done a triage and determined that the House Republicans are beyond saving and not worth supporting. Senior House Republicans are pleading with the RNC for money, but so far it doesn't seem interested, even though House Democrats have greatly outraised House Republicans.
The logic here is clear. Polls show that Democrats are more likely to expand their House margin rather than lose it, so every dollar spent on a House race is a dollar that can't be spent on Donald Trump's campaign or a tight Senate race in Montana or Iowa. Given a choice between losing control of the Senate but increasing the size of the Republican minority in the House and holding the Senate, no matter how bad the bloodbath in the House is, clearly the RNC prefers the latter.
A complicating factor is that although on paper Ronna Romney McDaniel runs the RNC, first son-in-law Jared Kushner is really calling the shots there. Kushner's top priority is getting Trump reelected, with hanging onto the Senate as #2. If Trump wins, he will need the Senate to get more judges confirmed. If Trump loses, the GOP will need the Senate to block all of Joe Biden's appointees and generally make him wish he hadn't run.
It isn't like the RNC is nearly broke and turning over every penny three times before spending it. At the start of July, they had $295 million in the bank, twice what Barack Obama had at the same point in 2012. House Republicans are privately grumbling that Trump is not a team player and is just interested in what is good for him, which tells us they've actually been paying attention for the last, oh, 50 years. They can point out that the DCCC has $94 million on hand to the NRCC's $61 million until the cows come home, but if the RNC is convinced that the House is a lost cause, it is not going to send much money over there with Trump in trouble in the polls and Democrats leading in four or five tight Senate races. McDaniel pooh-poohed any kind of internal spat, saying: "Transfer requests like these are standard every cycle and final decisions typically aren't made until after Labor Day." (English translation: If you still look hopeless in September, forget it).
Making things worse is that a number of House races are deteriorating, making it even more likely that the RNC is going to throw in the towel on the House and focus on Trump and the Senate. Larry Sabato's Crystal Ball has now changed its ratings on eight House races. Three of them are changes from "safe" to "likely," and don't mean so much, but the other five do.
The ratings are subjective and based on polls, fundraising, and the quality of the opponent. One district where the PVI isn't the story is TX-21, a badly gerrymandered district north of San Antonio that also includes a bit of Austin. It is a highly educated and diverse district and Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) had to struggle in 2018. The Democrat is Wendy Davis, who is well known due to a statewide run against now-governor Greg Abbott in 2014, and who has a substantial cash-on-hand advantage over Roy. She is a better match for the district than Roy.
Another district where the PVI isn't everything is NM-02. Rep. Xochitl Torres Small (D-NM) is a slight favorite in an R+6 district. How can this be? In 2018, Small faced former state legislator Yvette Herrell (R), who didn't run a very good campaign and Small won. This year, Herrell won a bitter primary fight to become the nominee again. But Small has $3.9 million in the bank to Herrell's $379,000. NM-02 is the largest district in the country that is not an entire state, but it doesn't have a lot of expensive media markets, just part of Albuquerque and Las Cruces.
In AR-02 and NC-08, race could play a role. Both incumbents are white and both challengers are Black. Both districts include large numbers of Black voters and large numbers of suburbanites. Neither challenger is favored, but in a blue wave, the challengers could be swept in with the tide.
A general problem the Republicans have is that the places they are raising a lot of money aren't necessarily their strongest districts. For example, the Republican challengers to Reps. Gil Cisneros (D-CA), Collin Allred (D-TX), and Lizzie Fletcher (D-TX) are all raising lots of cash, but they are running in districts Hillary Clinton won in 2016 and may not be all that competitive.
All in all, the Crystal Ball has 229 seats at least leaning Democratic, 193 at least leaning Republican, and 13 toss-ups. If we split the toss-ups 7 to 6 for the Republicans, the Democrats would have 236 seats, one more than they won in 2018. The strategists at the RNC must know all this as well, and thus be very hesitant to spend a lot of money to hold the Democrats to maybe 226 seats and lose the Senate in the process by being overspent there.
The Crystal Ball is not the only prediction site that has moved House races toward the Democrats. Charlie Cook moved 20 races toward the Democrats last week. Others agree. Prof. Thomas Schwartz of Vanderbilt University said: "I would tend to think that unless things were to change really drastically that you're not looking at a change in the House control. The real issue is the size of the Democratic majority."
On the generic poll, Democrats lead 49% to 41%. It is hard to convert that to seats since every race has its own characteristics, but when you are 20 or so seats down, being 8 points under water on the generic poll suggests that you aren't going to flip 20 seats.
