The Most Likely Scenarios Where It’s NOT Biden Versus Trump
The Most Likely Scenarios Where It’s NOT Biden Versus Trump
The sequel might not be a rematch...
Please join our 2WAY via Zoom episode today at 4pm ET, where Melissa DeRosa, Noah Rothman and I will lead a conversation like no other on the prospects that Joe Biden, Donald Trump – or both! – won’t be the major party nominees in the fall.
Good and appropriate day to have this talk, I would say.
Log onto the Zoom here at 4pm ET today.
Meeting ID: 894 1864 4651
Add the episode to your calendar here.
Everyone is welcome to be a part of our timely conversation; please share the link with anyone you wish.
As always, we will be taking your questions and eager to hear your comments.
To become part of the 2WAY community and learn about future events, please sign up here for free.
****
Wednesday morning, on FOX Business, Karl Rove said this about the prospect of Not Biden ‘24:
Somebody is going to wake up on that side, Jill Biden or maybe his sister, Valerie Biden Owens and say, ‘You know, Joe, this is not the way for you to go down in the history books. Step aside, let somebody else be chosen at the convention and let somebody else go into the lists against Donald Trump in the in the fall.’ I just think the Democrats are not going to allow this to continue.
About an hour later, I got an email from John Podhoretz, who regularly sends me crazy hypotheses that he knows are crazy, with the subject line “So here’s my new theory”:
> On Feb 7, 2024, at 10:11 AM, John Podhoretz <xxx@gmail.com> wrote:
The polling stays where it is or it gets worse for another six weeks. Let's just say [Republican] Pilip wins the special [House race on Long Island for the Santos seat].
Obama and Schumer and Jeffries come out together and say Biden has saved America and there needs to be a new candidate, and the decision will be made at the convention. The DNC writes new rules for the convention.
Or something.
I just don't see how if every poll from now until April 1 shows Trump winning, there's no reaction. I just can't figure out what the reaction will be. But that will be like 45 polls that show Trump ahead nationally and in the battlegrounds.
To which I responded:
On Wed, Feb 7, 2024 at 10:36 AM Mark Halperin <xxx@gmail.com> wrote:
The flaws in your plan are
A. Biden thinks only he can beat Trump.
B. Harris won’t step aside.
C. The other options besides Shapiro are overrated.
D. There will always be some polls showing it close.
E. Biden doesn’t care what Chuck Schumer thinks about presidential politics.
F. They think abortion and “democracy” are silver bullets.
Besides that list, I’m right there with you.
So two of the smartest people I know both think the political logic is simply too strong against Joe Biden being the Democratic nominee for Joe Biden to be the Democratic nominee.
[I, for one, still believe that only some combination of what I call the “2 Hs” (health and Hunter) could take Biden off the ballot.]
Still, we have never had a presidential race like this, where there is reasonable speculation — with realistic specifics! — that the two major party nominees presumptive could be goners (politically or, uhm, otherwise) before the election.
Among the matters in the air for our 4pm ET 2WAY conversation:
1. Today’s and the coming-soon pair of Trump cases before the Supreme Court, where the nine Justices, including the Trump 3, could surprise us all and kick Trump off the ballot or help get him convicted before the election (or before the convention).
2. The latest Biden “gaffes” – resurrecting on Wednesday Helmut Kohl chronologically and Strom Thurmond thematically, among them, as he this afternoon takes questions in private from House Democrats at their offsite, the same House Democrats who hold their tongues in public, but behind the scenes are worried about the strength (or, really, weakness) of 81-year-old coattails.
3. Ukraine aid and immigration hang in the balance on Capitol Hill, both deadly serious policy matters that are also proxy wars between Biden and Trump.
4. This essential reading Washington Post story about Democratic concerns and fresh efforts connected to other candidates besides Trump being on the ballot.
5. This essential reading Matthew Yglesias piece, with perfect pitch on expressing concern (but not overwrought panic…) that Biden is on course to lose to Trump and must change his game plan in order to win.
Joe Biden is currently on track to lose the election because he has lost the confidence of some of the swing voters who backed Trump or Gary Johnson in 2016 but then rallied to him in 2020….
Could things change between now and November? Yes. Could the polls be wrong? Sure. But there’s no particular reason to think that polling error, if any, will favor Biden. And while things could absolutely change in ways that favor Biden, they could also change in ways that hurt Biden. All we really know is that if the election were held tomorrow, Biden would likely lose. And I think more people need to understand this. Not because I’m trying to promote ill will or demoralization, but because I think people who don’t want that outcome need to understand that we are, in fact, on track for a Trump comeback, and they should consider doing things differently.
Too much of the Democratic Party seems to be suffering from complacency….
Biden’s communications strategy is risk-averse. Democrats’ political strategy continues to overwhelmingly emphasize intra-coalition peace, and insofar as Democrats worry about anything, it’s about defections from the left over Palestine. But that’s just another example of risk-aversion and the hunkering-down mentality. Tending the base is what you do when you’re winning and want to make sure nothing bad happens. Ducking a live Super Bowl interview is what you do when you’re winning and primarily interested in avoiding gaffes. When you’re losing, you go for it more aggressively on fourth down. You pull the goalie. You swing for the fences. You deliberately take calculated risks that, if they pay off, can change the game….
More:
Most of us know, personally, some ex-Republicans who are now Democrats and some GOP loyalists who don’t really like Trump and wish Nikki Haley or someone else were the nominee. We don’t know very many people who voted for Obama enthusiastically in 2008, tepidly in 2012, and then flipped to Trump in 2016. So the whole headspace of the Democratic Party is weirdly dominated by the specter of TikTok addled youth activists who need to be told about Joe Biden’s climate achievements or appeased with an Israel-Palestine ceasefire. And I do narrowly agree that it would be helpful if people who care deeply about the climate and Palestine would stop criticizing the candidate who is better on their issues and instead criticize his opponent. But there’s very little evidence that “people who would prefer it if Joe Biden were more left-wing” is a large block of people or that defections from this group are a serious problem…
[Biden] won narrowly four years ago. His best issue in that race has lost salience, and his best issue in the current race isn’t as salient as that issue was. Meanwhile, public opinion has become more conservative, and he is down in the polls as a result. I don’t think any particular solution follows in an obvious way from that analysis. But I do think it clearly implies less time stressing about unifying the base and less time projecting confidence and more time trying something different — most likely, I think, a communications strategy that involves a stronger presence of Joe Biden and other members of his administration in the media, delivering messages precision-targeted at crossover voters. Democrats genuinely did do way better in the midterms than the “in” party usually does, which was great. But I think one cost of that victory is that the White House never executed the traditional post-midterm pivot to the center. But it’s not too late!
Emphasis added there for good purpose.
Part of the reason that so many Republicans think Joe Biden won’t be the nominee – and so many Democrats worry that he will be the nominee – is that they find the notion that there is such a thing as “a communications strategy that involves a stronger presence of Joe Biden” to be laughable on its face.
Could Biden be off the ticket? Could Trump?
Join us on the 2WAY at 4pm ET via Zoom today to kick it around.
To become part of the 2WAY community and learn about future events, please sign up here for free.