Progressives Chat reader The_Fixer asked me for my response to a video posted by Jamarl Thomas about Quinnipiac University’s most recent polling for both the primaries and general election of 2020.
I considered posting a response this past Friday [June 14, 2019]. But, due to the birthday of current and 45th U.S. president Donald Trump, the timing was not quite right.
There is another consideration: I have a lengthy response. (It is a lot to read.) So, combining two topics into one would not have been appropriate.
I want to post the video first.
Here it is:
Here is a link to the poll from Quinnipiac:
I will highlight parts of the poll with screen shots followed by my comments.
Here is a screen shot of party support, for the primaries, according to age and income (the latter is not a part of my focus):
I do not think this poll will jibe with what will play out in 2020. If you’re badly wanting Donald Trump unseated, you should not want this. According to the primaries poll, Joe Biden leads Bernie Sanders nationally by +11. Since the 50 states participating in Democratic presidential primaries, dating back to 1976, this margin is comparable to 1988 Michael Dukakis (who won by +13) and 2016 Hillary Clinton (who, for however much of it you believe, won by +12). And they both lost in the general election.
One example, which I don’t believe, is telling me those in “DemLn” (Democratic leaning), which are really independents who are willing to participate voting in the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries, the person who is in the lead is Joe Biden. I don’t buy into it. Biden is ahead of Bernie Sanders by +5. The 50+ voters are where Joe Biden is leading, well ahead of second-place Elizabeth Warren, by +26. Now, I don’t think Sanders would get only 5 percent from 50+ voters. Basically, that says Biden is ahead of Sanders, with 50+ voters, by +45 points. Well, that was nearly the level by which Hillary Clinton won the oldest age group, 65+ voters, in the 2016 Democratic presidential primaries. (Hillary did not carry 45–64 voters by that level.) Sanders also won by nearly that level with the youngest voting-age group, those 17–29. (Meaning, when it came down to a two-person race, Hillary won 65+ voters with at least 70 percent, as did Bernie having won the 17–29 primaries voters. That left the second-place results just under 30 percent with each.) Here, with 18–49, Sanders is ahead of Biden by +14. That really combines with the second age group, those 30–44.
I sense there still remains a divided Democratic Party for the bookends of those age groups. That 17–29 and 65+ are on opposite ends. That 17–29 are more on the left and 65+ are more on the right specifically in the Democratic Party. Why? Experience. The 65+ voters are the ones who marveled at Bill Clinton unseating George Bush in 1992 and, with winning re-election in 1996, being the first Democratic U.S. president elected to more than one term since Franklin Roosevelt from 1932, 1936, 1940, and 1944. (Forty years prior to Clinton, the 1952 and 1956 elections of Republican U.S. president Dwight Eisenhower made him the first from his party to win more than one term since William McKinley from 1896 and 1900.) So, I think this age group is aligning with the party establishment of the 1990s—looking at them as the gold standard—with its philosophy to make sure to not move the party significantly and meaningfully to the left. This age group, especially 65+ voters, has bought into Clintonism. They loved Bill. They loved Hillary. They may love Biden.
A part of the problem I have with the poll is the age breakdowns are too broad. There are four commonly recorded voting-age groups in general elections: 18–29 (you can be 17 in the primaries as long as you are 18 on Election Day); 30–44; 45–64; and 65+. (I was 44 in the 2016 Democratic presidential primaries and 45 in the general election. So, it is interesting to transition between those in-between age groups.) In the last two presidential election cycles, 2012 and 2016, Democrats carried the younger half while Republicans carried the older half in the general elections. A problem with the party’s Hillary-vs.-Bernie, in the 2016 Democratic presidential primaries, was that he won the younger two groups while she won the older two groups. Hillary Clinton, as the official nominee, went into the general election with party-age support that is won in general elections by the Republicans. She moved into the general election without the party support that delivered the 2012 U.S. Popular Vote to a re-elected Barack Obama. (In the general election, 18–29 voters were key to her losing Wisconsin. 2016 Hillary went down from 2012 Obama’s margin of +23—a match for his national support when he won the state by +6.94 and the U.S. Popular Vote by +3.86—to carrying them with a thin margin of +3 as she lost the state, to Trump, by –0.76.)
The 2020 Democratic presidential primaries can play out similarly to 2016. The 65+ primaries voters, if they are once again a polar opposite of those between 17–29, can be more the determining factor for who wins the nomination. In the 2016 Democratic presidential primaries, the older block of 45–64 and 65+ voters combined for a size of the vote just over 60 percent. The younger block of 17–29 and 30–44 voters combined for a size of the vote just under 40 percent. In general elections, it is more like 53 to 47 percent rather than, say, 61 to 39 percent. (This is going by exit polls.) That is what helped with Hillary in 2016. So, the younger half needs to turn out a lot more with participating voting in presidential primaries, to cast a larger size of their vote state-to-state and nationwide, because in 2016 they were outweighed by the older half. And, keep in mind, the primaries from 2016 were not numbers representing a united party. If this essentially repeats in 2020, it can very well lead to an implosion in the Democratic Party—which may actually be necessary—and re-election for Republican incumbent U.S. president Donald Trump.
In general elections, there is this reality: If you are a winning Republican or a winning Democrat, you can claim two out of three age groups nationwide. You will likely not win the bookends. Republicans will not win nowadays voters 18–29 nationwide while Democrats will not win voters 65+ nationwide; well, not unless you’re winning nationwide by more than +10, perhaps closer to +15, percentage points. Win with enough of a popular-vote margin, you can take the second to the first or last groups. 2004 re-elected Republican incumbent George W. Bush, whose margin in the U.S. Popular Vote was +2.46 percentage points, won voters 30–44 to go along with 45–64 and his party’s base 65+. 2008 Democratic presidential pickup winner Barack Obama, whose margin in the U.S. Popular Vote was +7.26 percentage points, flipped voters 30–44 and 45–64 to go along with his party’s base 18–29. But, in 2012 and 2016, the margins for Obama (+3.86) and Hillary (+2.09) were at a level leaving a result of splitting the electorate for the U.S. Popular Vote. Now, I will say something else—later on—about that general-election margin for Hillary as to what would have applied to Trump had 2016 been more normal. (So, stay tuned.)
Quinnipiac University also reported polling on theoretical general-election matchups for 2020.
Here is a screen shot:
Also in its polls, Quinnipiac University reports: “In the Trump–Biden matchup, women back Biden 60–34 percent, as men are divided with 47 percent for Biden and 46 percent for Trump. White voters are divided with 47 percent for Trump and 46 percent for Biden. The Democrat leads 85–12 percent among black voters and 58–33 percent among Hispanic voters.”
What do I make of this?
It does not jibe with reality.
In 2016, the national support from white voters were Trump +21. Mitt Romney, the losing Republican nominee from 2012, carried whites nationally by +20. This poll report has Trump winning whites nationally by only +1. That is a 20-point Democratic shift. (The last winning Democrat to nationally carry whites was 1964 Lyndon Johnson.) But, look at the poll numbers for blacks! In the 2008 Democratic pickup year for Barack Obama, he won blacks nationally by +91. (It was 95 percent for Obama to 4 percent for losing Republican John McCain.) With re-election in 2012, Obama carried blacks by +87. (He went down to 93 percent to the 6 percent for Romney. Remember: Obama underperformed his second-term re-election compared to his first. Typically, presidents re-elected to a second term win with increased numbers including their electoral-vote scores.) In this report, with the combined percentages amounting the two-party vote to 97 percent (which was in the same range from 2004, 2008, and 2012), Biden polls with black support by +73. In 2016, with the presidency having flipped Republican (and the two-party vote combining for nearly 94 percent), losing Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton carried blacks nationally by +81. (She received 89 percent to the 8 percent for Trump.) And, among Hispanics, Obama won them nationally by +36 (in 2008) and +44 (in 2012). Hillary won them by +38 (in 2016). So, the quoted numbers of non-whites for Biden, with him also winning Hispanics by +25, are underperformances of 2016 Hillary Clinton. Get this: For the gender vote, Biden takes Hillary’s national carriage of women, by +13, and wins them by +26 (a 2016-to-2020 national shift of +13), and he wins a Democratic pickup of men by +1 (following Hillary’s loss of –11, that would be a national shift of +12.) In terms of the racial demographics, Biden is a candidate for whites—even though whites are the first to get carried nationally by Republicans—while he underperforms with blacks and Hispanics, down by –8 and –13 points (from 2016 Hillary Clinton), while winning the U.S. Popular Vote, and with it a Democratic pickup of the presidency by a landslide U.S. Popular Vote margin of +13.
This does not pass my smell test.
Now, as for those general-election margins for those Democratic candidates: Since at least 1932, every time the White House switched parties, the Republican and Democratic pickup winners won an average net gain of, say, +1 to +1.5 states with each percentage point nationally shifted in their direction (from the previous election cycle). 2000 Republican pickup winner George W. Bush—who flipped 11 states with a popular-vote margin shift of +8.00—won a net gain average of +1.37 states. 2008 Democratic pickup winner Barack Obama—who flipped 9 states (and the 2nd Congressional District of Nebraska; Omaha and surrounding areas) with a popular-vote margin shift of +9.72—won a net gain average of approximately +1 state.
In 2016, Republican pickup winner Donald Trump lost the U.S. Popular Vote by –2.09 because, in reality, California went from Obama +23.09 to Hillary +29.99, a Democratic shift of +6.90 in a presidential election in which Democrats were the incumbent White House party and the presidency flipped Republican. (For 2016 Hillary, her raw-vote margin from California was 150 percent her national support. For 2012 Obama, his raw-vote margin from California was about 60 percent his national support.) In other words, this was not in line with normal voting pattern. So, I figure, with Romney’s loss in the U.S. Popular Vote by –3.86, had Trump won a 2016 Republican pickup of the U.S. Popular Vote, his electoral-map outcome with Republican pickups—Top 10 populous states Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan, No. 20-ranked Wisconsin, No. 31-ranked Iowa, and the 2nd Congressional District of Maine (Bangor and surrounding areas)—would have nationally shifted +6.00 to +6.50 percentage points. Trump’s winning margin would have been +2.15 to +2.64.
For estimating the electoral map for Election 2020, I work with +2/–2 and reach a compromise: Even. Yes, +0. Trump, with his –2.09, can win the Electoral College with –1 and +0. (I don’t know how California—approximately 12 percent the entire nation—will trend with shifting its 2016-to-2020 margins.) There is also the possibility Trump can lose one or two states with a popular-vote margin of –3 and still get re-elected. But, a popular-vote margin of –4 makes Trump lose all of the Rust Belt trio: Michigan (his No. 30 best state), Pennsylvania (his No. 29), and Wisconsin (his No. 28 and the tipping point state of 2016; my hunch is that state may again be the tipping point in 2020). Another reality is this: There have been only three presidential elections in which the winner carried less than half the states: 1824 John Quincy Adams (corrupt election in which he won 7 of 24 states; 29 percent); 1960 John Kennedy (22 of 50 states; 44 percent); and 1976 Jimmy Carter (23 of 50 states; 46 percent). It is likely we will see it continue and the next Democratic pickup winner will carry at least 26 states.
So, what do I figure? In 2008, Obama’s Democratic pickup was his winning the U.S. Popular Vote by +7.26 and having carried 28 states, the 2nd Congressional District of Nebraska (one-third that state’s vote), and District of Columbia. With re-election, in 2012, Obama won by +3.86 and carried 26 states and District of Columbia. Had a normal voting pattern aligned in 2016 with the U.S. Popular Vote, rather than +2.09, Hillary Clinton would have lost with a margin of –2 with her carriage of 20 states and District of Columbia. So, in state counts, prevailing Democrats may be on course nowadays to carry +22 states in excess of their whole number [estimate] of their U.S. Popular Vote margins.
The following, in accordance to Quinnipiac University’s polling report, is where the map would be for a prevailing Democrat with a popular-vote margin of +5 to +13. Those at +5, a 2016-to-2020 net gain of +7 states for carriage of 27 states, are in light blue to indicate they would be pickups. Anything beyond that appears in yellow (meaning, states 28 to 35; you can see the list of the 2016 margins, and where states came in for Trump–vs.–Hillary here: Election 2020’s Key Bellwethers: The Rust Belt Trio Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan). Those are the states subject for pickups going all the way up to that margin of +13, in the U.S. Popular Vote, for the carriage of 35 states. From Hillary Clinton’s column of best-performed states, Nos. 21 to 35, were: 21) Michigan; 22) Pennsylvania; 23) Wisconsin (tipping point); 24) Florida; Nebraska #02; 25) Arizona; 26) North Carolina; 27) Georgia; 28) Ohio; 29) Texas; 30) Iowa; Maine #02; 31) South Carolina; 32) Alaska; 33) Mississippi; 34) Utah; and 35) Missouri. (Indiana, at No. 36, was a half-point more Republican than Missouri.) For those listed (and starting with Hillary’s losing map): Cory Booker and Pete Buttigieg, with 27 states, flip from Michigan to Georgia (350 electoral votes); Elizabeth Warren, with 29 states, flip from Michigan to Texas (406 electoral votes); Kamala Harris, with 30 states, flip from Michigan to Iowa (and, I would add, the 2nd Congressional District of Maine; 413 electoral votes); Bernie Sanders, with 31 states, flip from Michigan to South Carolina (422 electoral votes); and, most special of all, Joe Biden, with 35 states, flip from Michigan to Missouri (447 electoral votes).
Do I buy into this?
No.
At 270 to Win, the site from which I filled in the above map, it provides links to well-trusted polling outlets The Cook–Political Report and Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball [University of Virginia]. Neither are offering up scenario electoral maps which show the 2020 Democrats in position to flipping the presidency to the tune of carrying 27 to 35 states. (They’re not even reaching a potential 25.) Sabato’s site has Michigan leaning as a Democratic pickup but long-established bellwether Florida leaning as a Republican hold. (My sense is that Rust Belts Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, as well as Florida—a 2016 margins spread of just under a full percentage point—will carry the same.) The two pollsters both have Georgia as a lean Republican hold. Excuse me! But, if 2020 ends up a Democratic pickup of the presidency, it is not likely the pickup winner gains only three or four states (Rust Belts Michigan, Pennsylvania, and tipping point Wisconsin, as well as one of Florida or Arizona; possibly as well the 2nd Congressional District of Nebraska). It would be likely a 2020 Democratic pickup winner would gain at least +6 states. I think The Cook–Political Report and Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball, without saying so, are leaning Election 2020 to a Republican hold and re-election for Trump.
These recent poll numbers, including from Quinnipiac University, are getting self-identified Democrats excited. They figure they will have no problem unseating Donald Trump. But, during the 20th century, only once did we get two consecutive presidential elections of switching the White House party: 1976 (Democratic pickup for Jimmy Carter) and 1980 (Republican pickup for Ronald Reagan). In other words: When the nation flips the White House party, it doesn’t often welcome back in the very next cycle the party the voters booted out. So, the history suggests more a favorable pattern of a 2020 Republican hold with re-election for Trump. If that actually plays out, I can imagine the 2020 Democrats nominating yet another corporatist, like Joe Biden, losing to a re-elected Trump, and then avoiding looking back at a poll like this to reminded them what fools they turned out to be.
I sense the Democratic Party Establishment wants to make sure, No. 1, the 2020 presidential nominee will not be an actual progressive—Bernie Sanders or Tulsi Gabbard—and a poll like this, plus other ones making noise, are designed to get self-identified Democrats (and independents who lean toward the Democrats) to vote the nomination to Joe Biden. Right now. If it wasn’t Biden, specifically, it would be someone else comfortable with the party establishment. (I do not trust Elizabeth Warren.)
This reminds me of an idea I had. If I could change the party-animal logos of the Republican and the Democratic parties, I would go with the following: with the Republicans, they would go from the elephant to the pig; with the Democrats, they would go from the donkey to the sheep. Polls lately pushing for Biden—and let us keep in mind no member of Congress who voted for wars in Vietnam or Iraq was elected U.S. president; and no former U.S. vice president unseated an incumbent U.S. president—is a way for the corporate Democratic Party Establishment, and their allies (and I wouldn’t put it past pollsters), to herd the sheep.
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