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Divided We Stand

Divided We Stand
New book about the 2020 election.

Wednesday, October 28, 2020

Unforced Errors by Trump

IDefying the Odds, we discuss the 2016 campaign. The 2019 update includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms. The 2020 race, the subject of our next book, is well underway.   It unfolds  as Coronavirus presents unprecedented challenges to public policy and the electoral process.   

During COVID, rallies mostly have to take place outdoors. In late October, therefore, attendees in many places have to wait for hours in cold weather. If a campaign is going to put supporters in that position, it must ensure their safety. 

 Tim Elfrink at WP:
By the time President Trump finished speaking to thousands of supporters at Omaha’s Eppley Airfield on Tuesday night and jetted away on Air Force One, the temperature had plunged to nearly freezing.

But as long lines of MAGA-clad attendees queued up for buses to take them to distant parking lots, it quickly became clear that something was wrong.

The buses, the huge crowd soon learned, couldn’t navigate the jammed airport roads. For hours, attendees — including many elderly Trump supporters — stood in the cold, as police scrambled to help those most at-risk get to warmth.

At least seven people were taken to hospitals, according to Omaha Scanner, which monitors official radio traffic. Police and fire authorities didn’t immediately return messages from The Washington Post early Wednesday and declined to provide reporters on the scene with precise numbers of how many needed treatment.

Under Nebraska's district system for choosing electors, the congressional district surrounding Omaha has one electoral vote.  By screwing up logistics, Team Trump may have thrown it away. 

Even without hypothermia, Trump rallies are dangerous.

Shawna Chen at Axios:

The Minnesota Department of Health has traced nearly two dozen coronavirus cases to three campaign events held last month, an official told Axios on Monday. Why it matters: The Trump campaign has come under repeated fire for being lax about mask requirements and not adhering to social distancing and other local guidelines at its events. Minnesota has also seen a surge in COVID-19 cases in recent weeks, with nearly 1,600 new COVID-19 cases reported on Monday, per MPR News

Paul LeBlanc at CNN:

President Donald Trump offered his latest appeal to suburban women Tuesday evening, promising to get their husbands "back to work" if he's reelected.
Claiming he was "saving suburbia" at a campaign rally in Lansing, Michigan, the President pitched himself as the candidate for suburban women voters because he's "getting your kids back to school" and "getting your husbands -- they want to get back to work. We're getting your husbands back to work."
While Trump focused on "husbands" during his speech in Michigan on Tuesday, the coronavirus pandemic has had a much larger effect on women in the work place.
The International Monetary Fund warned in July that the pandemic recession is hurting women more than men, and job losses during the economic downturn are happening in sectors of the economy where women are disproportionately represented. The annual Women in the Workplace report from McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.Org showed one in four women reporting they are considering downshifting their career or stepping out of the work place entirely, partly due to the demands the pandemic has placed placed on working mothers.