Trump Is Not Strong, Or Winning - No Red Waving 2024 Please

In every possible way I would much rather be us than them

Feb 22, 2024

Happy Thursday all. Got a few things for you today:

It Is Wrong To Say Trump Is Winning The Election, Or Is Somehow Favored. He Is Weak, Not Strong - In 2022 a narrative developed about the election - that a red wave was coming - that commentators just couldn’t shake even though there was plenty of data suggesting the election could end up being a close competitive one. I feel like that we are beginning to enter a similar moment in 2024 with the various assertions of Trump’s strengths. The “red wave” over estimated Republican strength and intensity, discounted clear signs of Democratic strength and intensity and was it would be ridiculous, given what happened in 2022, for us to do this all over again this year.

Let me say it plainly - Donald Trump is not ahead in the 2024 election. He is not beating Joe Biden. He is not in a strong position. Signs of Trumpian and broader GOP weakness is all out there for folks to see - if they want to see it. Let’s dive in a bit:

Trump is not leading in current polling - For Trump to be “ahead” all polls would have be showing that. They aren’t. The last NYT poll had Biden up 2, the new Quinnipiac poll has Biden up 4.

Given the spike in both junky, low quality polls and GOP-aligned polls the averages can no longer be relied on - this was a major lesson of 2022. Remember using the averages Real Clear Politics predicted that Republicans would end up with 54 seats. They have 49.

Stripping out GOP aligned polls, and less reliable polling, we find the race clearly within margin of error, which means the election is close and competitive. In a recent analysis, “Trump’s lead over Biden may be smaller than it looks,” The Economist broke down recent polling by pollster quality and found the race dead even among the highest quality pollsters:

Asserting that somehow Trump leads is pushing data beyond what it can tell you. With margin of error a 1-2 point lead is not an actual lead - it signifies a close, competitive election.

It is also early, and Democrats have not had a competitive primary. Lots of folks are not engaged. Look at this chart from Morning Consult. If the Democratic coalition starts coming home as Biden ramps up and Trump becomes the R nominee he will jump ahead by a few points. To me that is the likely scenario in the coming months.

We learned in 2022 that centering our understanding of American politics around wobbly polling and polling averages was risky. No reason we should be doing it again this cycle. Lots of other things we can throw into the strategic blender to understand where we are.

Trump is far weaker than 2020, the GOP party itself is in shambles, and they’ve grown far uglier, extreme and dangerous. Right now the Republican is an unprecedented shitshow - I mean, c’mom:

Trump is campaigning from the courthouse this time, not the White House. He is facing 91 felony indictments. He and Rudy owe $700m. He keeps losing in court, badly. He raped E. Jean Carroll in a department store dressing room. He oversaw one of the largest financial frauds in American history. His criminal trial for cooking the books to pay off a porn star starts in a few weeks. He stole America’s secrets, lied to the FBI about it, shared these secrets with others. He tried to overturn the 2020 election, led an armed insurrection against the US government, and has promised to end American democracy if he somehow gets into the Oval Office again. He and his family have corruptly taken more money from foreign governments than any political family in history. He is singularly responsible for ending Roe and stripping the rights and freedoms away from more than half the population.
His campaign and his party are in shambles. He is spending more money than he is taking in (just holy shit). Nikki Haley outraised him in January. 93% of registered Republicans in Iowa choose to not vote for him. 43% of Haley voters in Iowa said they would vote for Biden. He underperformed public polls in NH by 10-15 points. Polling in these early states found 20-30% of the GOP eletorate could flee if Trump is convicted (which has already happened btw). The RNC is broke. It’s leadership has been ousted. His daughter in law may take over the RNC (LOLOL) because she may be the only member of his family legally allowed to serve in a leadership role in a non-profit. Dozens of Republican Party leaders in the battleground states have been indicted for various electoral crimes, including trying to overturn the 2020 election. MAGA-led state parties are crashing across the US. GOP state party chairs in both Arizona and Florida just resigned in epic scandals. The GOP House is arguably the worst in American history, and House Republicans are retiring and abandoning ship in record numbers. Despite his “wealth,” Trump is somehow forcing the Republican Party to pay for his outrageous legal bills, draining the party of resources he and other Rs need against a well funded Biden/DNC operation. The hard side of Republican politics has collapsed, something that deserves far more discussion.
Trump’s performance on the stump is far more erratic, delusional and disturbing than ever before. He is making damaging, impulsive traditional political mistakes like coming out against the ACA which are the kind of mistakes losing candidates make. He wears more make-up than a drag queen, attendance at his rallies is way off, and his wife and daughter are refusing to campaign with him. The thrill is gone, baby.
His agenda is far more radical and dangerous than it was in 2016 or 2020. He wants Putin to win, the West to lose. The border to be in chaos, and migrants to keep flowing into the country. The economy to crash. Women, people of color to lose more freedoms and rights. The planet to warm faster. 10 year olds to carry their rapist's baby to term, and for more women to die on an operating room table. Tens of millions to lose their health insurance. More dead kids in schools. Verified rapists in positions of authority. A restoration of pre-Civil Rights era white supremacy. Big tax cuts for their donors, higher deficits and less for everyone else. Books banned across the US. Seniors to pay more for insulin and prescription drugs. Foreign governments free to pollute our daily discourse and harass our citizens. Teenagers to work night shifts in meat packing plants and not go to school. The minimum wage to stay at $7.25. Mass arrests and mass deportations of immigrants long settled in the US. Insurrectionists to get pardoned. 10% tariffs which would blow up the global economic order and punish American consumers. To end American democracy for all time. Good luck selling all this to the American people who have rejected a milder MAGA in 2018, 2020, 2022, 2023 and early 2024, and already rejected him.

The Republican Party Itself Is On A Historic Electoral Losing Streak - Republicans have lost the popular vote in America in 7 of the last 8 elections, the worst popular vote run for a political party in our history. In the last 4 elections Democrats have averaged 51%, Rs 46% - the worst performance of the GOP over 4 elections since FDR’s Presidency. Over these last 8 elections Republican have only gotten higher than 48% a single time, in 2004. They only won in 2000 with a dramatic and I think deeply misguided intervention by the Supreme Court; and only won in 2016 with the dramatic and dangerous intervention by Russia and the FBI.

Republicans are in the midst of one of the worst performances by the party out of power in modern American history. In 2022 Democrats picked up a Senate seat, governorships and state legislative chambers. We overperformed our 2020 results in AZ, CO, GA, MI, MN, NH, PA. We got to 59% in CO, 57% in PA, 55% in MI, 54% in NH. We won the Kansas abortion ballot initiative by almost 20 points and in 5 House special elections after Dobbs we outperformed our 2020 results by an average of 7 points. Democrats did better in the battleground state early vote than we did in far better elections in 2018 and 2020, a sign of organizational muscle and heightened intensity. We kept the House close enough to deny Rs ideological control, and make it far more likely we win it back this year.

In 2023 Democrats again outperformed expectations, and Republicans struggled. We flipped a WI Supreme Court Seat, winning 56% of the vote, and ended Wisconsin’s extreme gerrymander. We flipped two of the largest GOP held cities in America, Colorado Springs and Jacksonville. We got to 57% in two Ohio ballot initiatives and took away the 6 week abortion ban. Despite Youngkin’s high approval rating and huge spend we flipped the VA assembly, damaged a GOP rising star and ended the fantasy of the 15 week abortion ban as a political escape hatch. We gained seats in the New Jersey legislature, Andy Beshear grew his victory margin, and we won municipal school boards all across the country. In dozens of state legislative special elections across the US we outperformed our 2020 results by 5 points. Despite low Biden approval it was a blue wave year all across the US in 2023 - Democrats overperformed, Republicans struggled.

In 2024 we began the year flipping a critical state house seat in Florida despite being heavily outspent. We dramatically outperformed public polls in NY-3 last week. Biden is leading a unified party. He got a higher percentage of the vote in NH than Trump did as a write in candidate. We are raising far more money of all kinds than Rs and have far more cash on hand. Our Senate candidates even in red states have good polling numbers. Consumer sentiment is rising, sharply. Our hard-dollar grassroots operations are the strongest they’ve even been, and we have more volunteers and better campaigns than we’ve ever had.

So Republicans, right now, are both on one of the worst popular runs by an American political party and one of the worst party out of power runs in modern American history. We just keep winning, and they keep losing.

The Orange Emperor Has No Clothes/We Cannot Red Wave 2024 - Donald Trump and the Republican Party are weak, not strong. This is the ugliest American political party since the Democratic Party of the 1850s. Their nominee is the most unfit a major American political party has ever produced. They are broke and in the midst of a historic electoral losing streak. Their party has already splintered, and is likely splinter further as it moves further away from the electorate and it’s ugliness escalates. Let’s be clear about this - what we are looking at is an unprecedented political shitshow, and we all have to stop pretending the orange Emperor is wearing any clothes or will be a strong candidate this November.

The Democrats, on the other hand, are in the midst of the one strongest electoral runs in modern US history. Joe Biden is a good President, and the country is far better off today. He fulfilled his central promise to us in 2020 and got us to the other side of COVID, successfully. Despite historic Republican sabotage, the economy may be stronger right now than any time since the 1960s. We’ve made extraordinary investments in our future that will create opportunities for our people for decades to come. He has done more to counter climate change and accelerate the energy transition than perhaps any other person in the world today. The uninsured rate is the lowest in American history. Real wages are rising faster than any time in decades. He is leading an inspiring and necessary fight to preserve democracy here, and around the world. I could go on and on - but the bottom line is that we have a very strong record to run on this year and a unified and winning party behind our President.

Yes, Biden is old. But our country’s recent success, and our progress, have come about because of his age, wisdom and experience not in spite of it. And please tell me that somehow this 91 times indicted, rapist, fraudster, traitor, human wrecking ball is somehow more fit to serve than Biden. With Trump you can paint his face, die his hair, strap a girdle around him (and a diaper too) and pump him full of speed and he will never look an American President ever again.

So stop it with the Trump/Rs are strong. It’s ridiculous and red wavy. Are we where we want to be right now? No. We have a lot of work to do to get 55 and win this election by high single digits, something I think is possible. Our coalition has wandered a bit and we need to go get them back. What we have to do to win is within traditional political physics, it is doable work. Trying to somehow package this ongoing, unprecedented Republican shitshow I think is impossible political work, something that would require an extraordinary set of events to take place. Given that the Supreme Court’s dramatic intervention in 2000 and Russia and Comey’s in 2016 anything is possible. But it is not likely.

I go deeper into why I am so optimistic about our chances in November, below. And please no red waving 2024. After the 2022 red wave debacle, folks should be very slow to go there, again.

Why I Am Optimistic About Winning This November -Have two great new video interviews for your viewing pleasure this week. First, here’s my sit down with Leigh McGowan, better known as PoliticsGirl:

Next up, I had a terrific discussion with Rick Wilson and Joe Trippi last night on Resolute Square’s Strategy Center:

Hopium Chronicles By Simon Rosenberg

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