ould Have Been Worse // John Hinderaker
Just kidding. We saw the worst of all possible outcomes. Everyone was stunned by the GOP’s inability to make progress, even Democrats.
What happened?
* Fantasy or Reality? It turns to be that many voters don’t care about the traditional issues that were considered crucial: crime, inflation, illegal immigration, poor schools, etc. Despite these facts, many millions of Democrats didn’t decide to vote for someone else when confronted with them. They seem to have thought, “My team is in trouble!” This is why I must support my team. This election saw issues being subordinated to party loyalty to an extraordinary extent.
Abortion. While Dobbs was clearly right as a matter constitutional law, Justice Alito along with his colleagues probably cost Republicans control over Congress. I thought the Democrats were wasting money by spending countless millions of dollars over the summer pounding Republicans about abortion. The consensus, which I agreed with, was that the issue would likely drive turnout, but not win over any undecided voters or middle-of-the-road voters. Driving turnout was decisive. Liberals flooded the polls, while in many places, Republican turnout was lower than it should have been.
Donald Trump. I thought that Democrats’ incessant yammering about democracy and fascism was incredibly stupid, born out of desperation and would be ignored. Partly, I was right. Those themes were stupid and were born out of desperation. They were effective, however. One example: A young woman I know posted an Instagram photo of herself at the polls with the caption, “I’m against fascism.”
Contrary to what some might think, she isn’t an idiot. Donald Trump was code for “Our democracy” or “fascism”. Trump is now a huge anvil around the neck for the Republican Party. Trump is absolute poison in many areas, most likely in most. Trump is a loser. He has done a lot of damage to the Republican Party, the United States and the Republican Party in the past two years. He teased that he would make a big announcement in the coming days. I hope he will announce that he is moving from the US to Bulgaria.
An off-year election is usually a referendum on the president. This is why the out-party almost always wins. I thought the Democrats were crazy when they tried to make this year’s election a referendum against Donald Trump. Trump is not eligible for office, and he was not on the ballot. How could this work? It worked, and Trump, with his inimitable poor judgment, collaborated fully and openly with the Democrats to put himself front and center. The results were disastrous.
Florida was the exception to last night’s doom. Marco Rubio and Ron DeSantis won stunning victories there. Why? One explanation is that Trump was not on the ballot in Florida. Ron DeSantis was also on the ballot.
* Polls. Republicans have come to accept the fact that polls tend to underestimate Republican performance. It seemed that the usual pattern was being followed when liberal pollsters reported more favorable numbers for Republicans during the days leading up to the election. However, this year the polls may have underestimated Democratic support and not Republican. To give an example, the 26-point swing of suburban women towards the GOP led Steve to call this the “Desperate Housewives Election”. They were desperate to vote for Donald Trump and not for abortion. How could so many polls be wrong?
Although I don’t know why it happened, I do know that it wasn’t just major public polls that were off target. I had access to private poll data in Minnesota and it showed far more support for Republican legislative candidates that actually turned out at polls. Why? I don’t know. I think that Trump voters who aren’t consistent voters or aren’t attached to the Republican Party weren’t there. Liberals who believed they were voting for Donald Trump and not for abortion turned out in large numbers.
Trafalgar was one pollster with a good record in recent cycles. Robert Cahaly, who runs Trafalgar believed that his poll, which attempted to reach hard-to-reach conservatives and assess Republican support, understated Republican support. This was wrong. On Saturday, I will moderate a panel about the election at David Horowitz’s Restoration Weekend in Phoenix. Cahaly is part of my panel and I will ask him his thoughts. It should be interesting to find out the answer.
There are many more things that could be said but I will stop there.
