Trump hurt, did not help, other GOP candidates
A surprising consensus is developing among political observers and operatives of both parties that Donald Trump, while losing the presidential race, helped Republicans hold back the blue wave and even gain some ground.
This is a serious misanalysis, particularly here in Arizona.
The belief that Trump helped rather than hurt other Republican candidates is grounded in the extent to which he motivated marginal GOP voters to turn out.
That he certainly did. Trump received around 9 million more votes in 2020 than he did in 2016.
But that was not his only effect. He also increased turnout and votes against him, by more than he in
creased turnout and votes for him.
Joe Biden received 11 million more votes in 2020 than Hillary Clinton did in 2016. Trump’s popular vote deficit increased from a little under 3 million to over 5 million.
It’s just common sense that if a Republican wins in a jurisdiction that Trump lost, the Republican has to get votes from at least a slice of people who opposed Trump. In other words, Trump being at the top of the ticket was something the Republican had to overcome, not that assisted him or her.
A deeper dive offers support for this commonsense observation.
Polls should be viewed with a healthy degree of skepticism these days. Nonetheless, the exit polls indicate some broad trends that plausibly explain the dynamics of this election.
Nationally, there was very little crossover Republican vote for Biden. Trump increased GOP turnout and it stayed loyal to him.
The notable change was among independents. In 2016, independents actually broke, however slightly, for Trump. They were willing to take a chance on his shake-things-up approach.
By 2020, they had had enough. In this election, independents went for Biden by a decisive 54% to 41% margin. And that explains the election.
The same is true for Arizona. In 2016, Trump carried the state by around 3.5 percentage points. Independents in the state tilted slightly toward him.
In 2020, Trump lost the state by a whisker. Independents had turned against him by roughly the same margin as nationally.
Now, often when the independent vote breaks strongly one way or the other at the top of the ticket, that carries forward to down-ballot races. That didn’t seem to happen in this election. Maricopa County offers a vivid illustration of that.
Republicans outnumber Democrats in Maricopa County by roughly100,000 registrants. In an 80% turnout election, that would translate into a turnout advantage of around 80,000 votes, if both parties turn out at an equal rate. In almost all elections, Republicans turn out at a higher percentage than Democrats, so the usual built-in GOP advantage would be even greater.
Nevertheless, Trump lost Maricopa County by 45,000 votes — 125,000 votes behind what the natural GOP advantage would produce if independents split their ballots down the middle.
Despite Trump losing Maricopa County by a prodigious margin, Republicans did fairly well in races for county offices.
As of this writing the only one they were losing was for sheriff, and that one comes with a gigantic Arpaio asterisk.
For the most part, these were low-visibility races, where party identity usually determines the outcome. Independents now hold the balance of power in Maricopa County. There are actually more registered independents in the county than Democrats.
Maricopa County independents obviously tilted strongly against Trump and gave him a thumping that caused him to lose the state. But they apparently didn’t hold Trump against other Republican candidates, either skipping the downballot races or voting for the Republicans in sufficient numbers to allow them to prevail.
The one county office for which there were big bucks spent, all on behalf of the Democrat, was county attorney. Despite the Trump thumping and a huge funding disadvantage, the Republican, Allister Adel, prevailed by a healthy 38,000 vote margin.
The story of this election isn’t that Trump helped other Republicans by boosting GOP turnout. It is that independents didn’t hold Trump against downballot Republicans as much as might be expected or would be customary.
The difference is important as Republicans feel their way toward a post-Trump era. Trump is an electoral liability, not an asset. And particularly so here in Arizona, and in Maricopa County.