All about Trump: Is he the midterm goat or hero?
“What’s your prediction?” Pundits pride themselves in answering that question. But it’s a fool’s errand.
Election forecasting was once performed with laser-like precision. But now, accurate predictions are going the way of the dodo, as traditional assumptions and historical precedents have gone out the window. The result is uncharted territory.
The reasons are many: A hyper-partisan society;
24/7 news coverage; unprecedented mobilization via social media; and the all-important “Trump” phenomenon – where certain candidates and issues (such as Brexit) under-poll but outperform.
Let’s be honest: Despite those who “knew” that Mr. Trump would win (a broken clock is right twice a day) virtually no one, including Trump himself, thought he would prevail. The lesson: Surprises are the new norm.
There will still be non-competitive races where the fun is guessing how embarrassing the margins will be. So will Pennsylvania Republicans Scott Wagner (governor’s race) and Lou Barletta (U.S. Senate) lose by 10, or
18? Popular incumbents are factors in who wins, but so too are inept challengers.
This column went to press before the polls closed, so we’ll start with quick predictions, just for fun, since admittedly I don’t have a clue how the tight races will turn out. More important, we’ll analyze critical election issues.
1) Republicans will increase their Senate majority, picking up seats in Missouri, Indiana and North Dakota; retain Tennessee and Nevada; lose Arizona; and come up painstakingly short in Florida and Montana.
The House is tougher. The GOP could eke out a majority, but more likely Democrats will gain power by a small margin. Why? Of the 23 net seats they need, both sides acknowledge they’re more than halfway there, which includes picking up at least four in Pennsylvania (courtesy of unconstitutional redistricting by the state Supreme Court). After that, it’s simple math: Republicans would have to virtually run the table on the remaining 30 tossups. To reiterate: Possible, but not probable.
2) Historical precedence is useful, but not all-telling. The president’s party almost always loses seats in midterm elections, but those numbers vary: presidents with approval ratings above 50 percent lost an average of 14 seats. But that number soars to 37 when a commander-in-chief falls below that threshold. Reagan, despite his massive 44-state victory in 1980, lost 28 House seats; Clinton lost 53; and Obama lost a staggering 63. All had approval ratings in the 40s.
Donald Trump’s “official” approval rating, for much of his term, has hovered near all-time presidential lows. What does that mean? Not much, since there is little chance he’ll suffer losses like presidents Clinton and Obama. And if the GOP adds to its Senate majority, Trump may yet have an unusually successful night.
That said, if Trump loses the House (even if he outperforms historical averages), bank on the media incorrectly trumpeting that result as a repudiation of the president. And Nancy Pelosi, as House Speaker, would undoubtedly allow calls for impeachment to gather steam – the worst thing for America, as the nation’s gulf would grow exponentially wider.
3) Trite as it sounds, the sole factor in determining tight races is who’s better at turnout. Easy to plan, but much harder to execute.
It’s one thing when 30,000 people attend a Trump rally. But how many will actually vote, given that the president isn’t on the ballot? In other words, will Trump’s pitch that “voting in the midterm is the same as voting for me” manifest at the ballot box? No one knows, as one of the least transferable commodities is popularity.
Likewise, vehement antiTrumpers will definitely vote. The question is how many “regular” Democrats and Independents (those who don’t live and breathe politics, and who don’t harbor an irrational hatred of the president) will show up.
Interestingly, midterms have historically been low-turnout affairs dominated by college-educated voters (who aren’t a strong Trump constituency). However, blue-collar voters who propelled Trump to victory look poised to turn out in record numbers.
Another X-factor (which terrifies the left) is the president’s traction with traditionally Democratic constituencies: Blacks, Latinos, gays, labor and Jewish voters. Whether those inroads prove decisive remains to be seen.
Add in inclement weather, and polls that don’t necessarily reflect reality (all bets are off when the curtain closes), and you have the recipe for a long night.
Above all, let’s remember two things: 1) Despite political ads and election coverage saturating airwaves, a majority still won’t vote, and 2) When the economy is bad, it is the only issue; when it’s good, something else is the issue. Will that axiom hold for this election?
4) Democrats often claim “voter suppression.” In some respects, they are correct. First, felons who served their time should have their voting rights restored. Once rehabilitated, they shouldn’t be denied that right.
More egregious is the voting disenfranchisement of some Native Americans because they lack traditional addresses on their reservations. Sorry, but that should not be reason enough to strip them of voting rights. We put a man on the moon 50 years ago, so it can’t be that hard to enact a system where identities and addresses can be verified.
Is it a coincidence that Republicans in North Dakota spearheaded this effort? That many Native Americans vote Democratic? And that Democratic incumbent Heidi Heitkamp’s victory in 2012 was only by 3,000 votes? This author would love to think yes, but experience says otherwise.
Our hallowed right to vote should never be politicized! If one side can’t win on the issues, shame on them. Throw in the towel, or go back to the drawing board, but don’t suppress an American’s right to vote because a party can’t sell its ideas.
Regarding Voter ID, the claim that it disenfranchises people is ludicrous. In a society where people must show ID to enter office buildings, airplanes, trains and even buy antihistamine, it’s time to give the same importance to voting. Government-issued IDs are free of charge, so let’s cut the crap. No ID, no vote. End of story.
5) Early voting should be abolished. Not only does this practice add considerable expense to local governments, it is also unnecessary.
From a common-sense perspective, what happens when a citizen casts a vote weeks before election day, and subsequently learns something distressing about his candidate?
Same for straight-ticket voting. Americans have become far too complacent when it comes to voting and, as a result, are reaping the consequences of a corrupted system. Good policy should never come down to just a “Democrat” or “Republican” onesecond level pull. Instead, making citizens vote for individuals over party may yet inspire them to take a more avid interest in who will represent them.
6) Both sides need a lesson in messaging.
Democrats ran a campaign bereft of ideas save one: Vote against Trump. It may prove enough to win the House, but as a long-term strategy, it’s a disaster. Just ask Republicans who did the same thing to Obama, thus ensuring his re-election.
On the Republican side, it’s clear the president understands campaign messaging, as everyone knows his platform: Hardline on immigration; lower taxes; tough on China; fewer regulations. But he’s not running.
Instead, the GOP had Senate leader Mitch McConnell stating, mere weeks before the election, that Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid needed to be cut. That may be necessary, but who in their right mind says that before an election, especially one where your party is already facing difficult odds? Truly baffling.
And the GOP got the worst of both worlds when it voted to remove pre-existing condition protections from the Obamacare repeal bill – but never passed it. They ended up getting hammered for something that never saw the light of day. Brilliant.
The Republicans refused to run advocacy ads during the last year outlining their vision and what they’ve done. Instead, they chose the cookie-cutter approach of running mostly ineffective ads during the white noise of campaign season. The result of that error will be several seats lost that could have been salvaged with a little political common sense. It will sting that much more if, when the dust settles, those seats are the difference between majority and minority status.
It just goes to prove that, Donald Trump notwithstanding, the more things change in Washington, the more they stay the same.
2020, here we come.