Dems Fight RFK Jr.

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.

 Voters are not happy about having to choose between Trump and Biden.  Trump allies are trying to boost RFK Jr. in an effort to split the anti-Trump vote.

 Elena Schneider at Politico:

The coalition of Democratic groups that pressured No Labels out of the 2024 contest is now turning its sights on Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Billboards funded by the Democratic National Committee have begun popping up outside Kennedy’s events. Trackers paid for by American Bridge, a Democratic super PAC, are following him with cameras. And another super PAC, founded exclusively to take on third-party threats, is message-testing ads on Kennedy in coordination with Future Forward, the flagship pro-Biden super PAC.

It’s a widespread effort among Democratic donors and strategists to neutralize Kennedy’s third-party threat to President Joe Biden’s reelection.

And Biden’s allies are now considering going even further, with a coalition of major Democratic groups privately discussing running a negative ad campaign against Kennedy.

Talks are preliminary, and the size and scope of the campaign — and even if it will go forward — remain unclear. But should it get the green light, the effort would likely be spearheaded by Future Forward; Clear Choice, another super PAC founded to stop third-party candidates; and American Bridge, another Democratic super PAC, according to two people involved in the effort who are not authorized to talk about it publicly.

If they cannot keep him off the ballot, they might try to drive antivax Trump voters into the RFK camp.

 

Joe Biden should run some ads about how he and Donald Trump don't agree on much, but they do agree that the COVID-19 vaccine Trump shepherded to completion and Biden successfully distributed to hundreds of millions of Americans was a modern miracle that saved lives. https://t.co/aUof7YrgN2

— Matthew Gertz (@MattGertz) April 30, 2024

Abortion Opinion

Our 2020 book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good. Abortion was a big issue in the 2022 midterm. It will be a big issue in 2024.

PRRI:

Nearly two-thirds of Americans support abortion legality in all or most cases; partisans remain deeply divided. 

• More than six in ten Americans (64%) say abortion should be legal in most or all cases; by contrast, 35% of Americans say abortion should be illegal in most or all cases.
• Just 9% of Americans believe that abortion should be illegal in all cases.
• Republicans and Democrats are deeply divided on abortion, with a 50-point gap between them: 86% of Democrats say abortion should be legal in all or most cases, compared with 36% of Republicans. Just 15% of Republicans believe abortion should be illegal in all cases.
• While Republican attitudes on abortion legality remain largely unchanged since 2010, Democratic support for abortion legality increased from 71% in 2010 to 86% in 2023; Support for abortion legality has also increased among independents over time, from 54% in 2010 to 67% in 2023.

...

A majority of residents in most states say that abortion should be legal; in no state do more than 16% of Americans support a ban on abortion.

• A majority of residents in most states say that abortion should be legal in all or most cases; there are only five states where a minority of residents support abortion legality.
• Roughly one in ten residents in most states say abortion should be illegal in all cases. This belief is most common in Kentucky and North Dakota (both 16%).
• Majorities of residents in blue states (70%) and red states (57%) and nearly two-thirds (64%) of residents in battleground states (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin) say that abortion should be legal in all or most cases.

Abortion has become a more salient voting issue in the last five years; Democrats continue to prioritize abortion as a voting issue compared with Republicans, as do women and younger voters.

• Over one-third of Americans (36%) say they would only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion. In 2018, a notably lower number of Americans (21%) said they would only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion.
• Democrats (47%) are more likely than Republicans (34%) to say that they would only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion; in 2018, about one-fourth of both Democrats (23%) and Republicans (25%) said they would only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion.
• Women (40%) are more likely than men (32%) to say that they would only vote for a candidate who shares their view on abortion.
• More than four in ten young Americans ages 18 to 29 (43%) say they will only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion; 53% of Democrats 18 to 29 report that they would only vote for a candidate who shares their views, compared with 41% of Republicans in that age group.

In battleground states, Democrats and women prioritize abortion as a voting issue more than Republicans and men.

• Democrats are 12 percentage points more likely than Republicans in battleground states to say that they will only vote for a candidate who shares their abortion views (46% vs. 34%).
• Women in battleground states are 9 points more likely than men (41% vs. 32%) to say that they will only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion.
• Half of Democratic women in battleground states (50%) say they will only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion, compared with 42% of Democratic men in battleground states.
• Similarly, Republican women are more likely than Republican men in battleground states (38% vs. 30%) to say that they will only vote for a candidate who shares their views on abortion.

Trump Interview and a NATO Kicker

Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  The 2024 race has begun.  Biden is calling Trump a threat to democracy.

 Former President Donald Trump sat down for a wide-ranging interview with TIME at his Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fla., on April 12, and a follow-up conversation by phone on April 27.

You would use the military inland as well as at the border?

Trump: I don't think I'd have to do that. I think the National Guard would be able to do that. If they weren't able to, then I’d use the military. You know, we have a different situation. We have millions of people now that we didn't have two years ago.

Sir, the Posse Comitatus Act says that you can't deploy the U.S. military against civilians. Would you override that?

Trump: Well, these aren’t civilians. These are people that aren't legally in our country. This is an invasion of our country. An invasion like probably no country has ever seen before. They're coming in by the millions. I believe we have 15 million now. And I think you'll have 20 million by the time this ends. And that's bigger than almost every state.

...

Let’s shift to the economy, sir. You have floated a 10% tariff on all imports, and a more than 60% tariff on Chinese imports. Can I just ask you now: Is that your plan?

Trump: It may be more than that. It may be a derivative of that. A derivative of that. But it will be somebody—look when they come in and they steal our jobs, and they steal our wealth, they steal our country.

When you say more than that, though: You mean maybe more than 10% on all imports?

Trump: More than 10%, yeah. I call it a ring around the country. We have a ring around the country.

...

Mr. President, in our last conversation you said you weren't worried about political violence in connection with the November election. You said, “I think we're going to win and there won't be violence.” What if you don't win, sir?

Trump: Well, I do think we're gonna win. We're way ahead. I don't think they'll be able to do the things that they did the last time, which were horrible. Absolutely horrible. So many, so many different things they did, which were in total violation of what was supposed to be happening. And you know that and everybody knows that. We can recite them, go down a list that would be an arm’s long. But I don't think we're going to have that. I think we're going to win. And if we don't win, you know, it depends. It always depends on the fairness of an election. I don't believe they'll be able to do the things that they did the last time. I don't think they'll be able to get away with it. And if that's the case, we're gonna win in record-setting fashion.

Trump claims that when he was president, he told the leader of a NATO ally that he wouldn't defend them from Russia unless they "paid up." In other words, he encouraged Russian aggression. pic.twitter.com/wgDFQoPxgq

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 1, 2024

Super PACs, Door Knocking, and Coordination

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses party organizations and campaign finance.

David Drucker at The Dispatch:

The Federal Election Commission, in a little-noticed decision that could radically reshape campaign politics, is giving candidates the greenlight to coordinate with super PACs and other outside groups on door-to-door voter turnout activities.

Under the Texas Majority PAC advisory opinion the FEC issued on March 20, candidates for Congress and the White House are permitted to work directly with allied groups on the expensive, labor-intensive work of door-to-door voter canvassing. That includes giving strategic direction to supportive super PACs and other politically active organizations, as well as sharing preferred messaging. Additionally, the FEC’s advisory opinion also permits candidates to access the voter data collected from an allied group’s door-knocking—as long as their campaigns pay for it.

Political operatives on both sides of the aisle describe this development as consequential, saying it could change how candidates—especially presidential candidates—manage field operations. Some Republican insiders worry Democrats will gain yet another fundraising and infrastructure edge heading into November. “We’re concerned that it gives the Democrats an advantage because their outside groups are better funded and their people are easier to canvas,” a GOP election lawyer said, requesting anonymity to speak candidly.

Meanwhile, there are a few legal caveats.

The FEC’s Texas Majority PAC advisory opinion does not apply to phone banking, text messaging, or direct mail, crucial components of any get-out-the-vote effort. In other words, campaigns must still honor the ban on coordinating with outside groups vis-a-vis those activities. Additionally, election lawyers believe groups that coordinate door-to-door canvassing with candidates are going to have to “firewall” that effort from the rest of the organization, to ensure communications with the campaign, and the data gathered, are not used in advertising or messaging.

Until the FEC rendered this interpretation of campaign finance law, candidates were prohibited from communicating with outside groups—no exceptions.

So, even though super PACs can raise unlimited cash versus strict donor limits placed on campaigns, the inability to coordinate strategy and messaging—and to share in the trove of data—made relying on such groups for voter turnout risky. Further, it was usually ineffective. Exhibit A: Ron DeSantis and his 2024 president bid. The Florida governor delegated his ground game to a super PAC, Never Back Down. The effort devolved into infighting and produced a 30-point loss for DeSantis in Iowa’s caucuses.

With the barrier to coordinating on door-to-door canvassing lifted, farming out this key aspect of voter turnout to cash-flush super PACs and other resource-rich outside groups becomes eminently more feasible, strategically, since some of the problems that plagued DeSantis are less likely to emerge. Indeed, knowledgeable Republican sources tell Dispatch Politics that former President Donald Trump, the presumptive GOP nominee, and the Republican National Committee, are planning to cede door-knocking efforts to various outside groups.

RFK & AIP

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.

 Voters are not happy about having to choose between Trump and Biden.  Trump allies are trying to boost RFK Jr. in an effort to split the anti-Trump vote.

Jenavieve Hatch at The Sacramento Bee:

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Monday that he has officially made the California presidential ballot after the far-right American Independent Party offered to nominate him as their candidate.

Kennedy, who announced Bay Area tech entrepreneur Nicole Shanahan as his running mate last month, celebrated the AIP nomination Monday in a five-minute YouTube video.

He acknowledged that “ironically” the AIP was originally the party of segregationist and former Alabama Gov. George Wallace, “but it’s had its own rebirth before I came along.”

The AIP’s contemporary platform is staunchly conservative — its members are strong proponents of small, limited government and taxation, Christian conservative values, the Second Amendment and secure borders. In California, there were 825,981 AIP voters as of October 2023 — just under 4% of the state’s registered voters.

The counties with the highest percentage of AIP voters are rural Lassen, Modoc and Calaveras counties.

 From the latest available platform of the AIP:

The Protection of Life, and the Duties and Rights of Families

We believe in protecting all human life however weak, defenseless, or disheartened; we endorse the family as the essential bulwark of liberty, compassion, responsibility, and industry; and declare the family's right and responsibility to nurture, discipline, and educate its children. We maintain that all humans are persons from the beginning of their biological development and especially deserve our love and nurture when they are weakest and most dependent.

Marriage Between a Man and a Woman

We insist that marriage is between a man and a woman and assert the role of the law in establishing and reinforcing the mutual rights and obligations of that God-ordained contract.

The Individual and Common Defense

We assert the absolute, concurrent Second Amendment guaranteed individual right to self defense against impositions by other citizens or our government, coupled with a strong common defense, a common defense which requires a national sovereignty not damaged by imprudent or un-Constitutional treaties.

Fake Elector Update

Our 2020 book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses the state of the parties. The state of the GOP is not good.

Rashad Rose at CNN:

Arizona state Sen. Jake Hoffman, one of the so-called fake electors charged in the Arizona 2020 election subversion case, announced Saturday that he’s been elected as a Republican National Committee national committeeman for the state.

“I’m humbled and honored to have been elected as the next RNC National Committeeman for Arizona!,” Hoffman said in a post on X Saturday.

His selection comes just days after a grand jury in Arizona handed up an indictment against former President Donald Trump’s allies, including Hoffman, over their efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss.

CNN previously reported that Hoffman sent a two-page letter to former Vice President Mike Pence on January 5, 2021, asking him to order that Arizona’s electors not be decided by the popular vote of the citizens, but instead by the members of the state legislature.

...

Boris Epshteyn, a former White House aide who remains one of Trump’s closest advisers; former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows; and Rudy Giuliani are also among those who have been indicted, according to a source familiar with the investigation.

While Trump is not among those charged in Arizona, the details in the indictment suggest he is “Unindicted Coconspirator 1.”

Yvonne Wingett Sanchez at WP:

Also charged are the Republicans who signed paperwork on Dec. 14, 2020, that falsely purported Trump was the rightful winner, including former state party chair Kelli Ward, two state senators and Tyler Bowyer, a GOP national committeeman and chief operating officer of Turning Point Action, the campaign arm of the pro-Trump conservative group Turning Point USA.

 

RNC: It Takes a Fief

Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun. The nomination phase has effectively ended. Trump has begun turning the RNC into his personal fiefdom. 

David M. Drucker, Charles Hilu and Michael Warren at The Dispatch:

The Republican National Committee was poised to open and staff 40 satellite campaign offices across key battlegrounds when former President Donald Trump, now the presumptive GOP nominee, abruptly replaced RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel and her deputies with fresh leadership.

Trump’s new RNC team, led by Chairman Michael Whatley, Co-Chair (and Trump’s daughter-in-law) Lara Trump, and senior campaign adviser Chris LaCivita, killed McDaniel’s 2024 blueprint. Roughly six weeks later, neither the committee nor the Trump campaign has much infrastructure or personnel in the swing states that will decide the November 5 election, multiple sources in Washington and the crucial battleground states told Dispatch Politics this week.

That means few if any regional and local campaign headquarters; little to no deployed field staff; and little to no traditional voter turnout activities, such as door-knocking, phone banking, or volunteer organizing. Even after the Trump-led RNC’s reimagined field program eventually emerges, their strategy is to concentrate almost exclusively on the half-dozen states that will determine Trump’s fate. Republicans elsewhere? They’re on their own.

“The RNC was aggressively staffing up in 10-plus states and it was put on hold when Trump started to make the changes at the RNC,” a veteran Republican field operative said. “The new regime is moving quickly to get the field operation going but I expect it to be narrowly focused on presidential battleground states, as opposed to expanding operations in states like California and New York, where there are a lot of House seats in play.”

In early March, the RNC’s new leadership sacked more than 60 full-time staff across the communications, data, and political departments. As Dispatch Politics reported soon after, roughly 40 of the 60 let go were field troops.

The majority of all fired employees were immediately invited to reapply for jobs. But weeks later, the field program is lagging, especially compared to the voter turnout operation stood up by President Joe Biden. The incumbent Democrat’s campaign has opened 30 headquarters alone in Michigan and has multiple such offices in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Nevada, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, New Hampshire, and Florida.

The decision to jettison McDaniel’s preparations for a robust ground game that was similar in scope and strategy to the RNC’s efforts to boost Trump in 2016 and 2020 appears to have originated at the top. Trump repeatedly told McDaniel in conversations before he pushed her out of the chairmanship that he did not need the RNC to focus on “get-out-the-vote” activities. Rather, knowledgeable Republican sources told us, the former president informed McDaniel he wanted the committee to prioritize “election integrity” efforts.

 A key figure in the "election integrity" effort will have the major distraction of trying to stay out of prison.  Pema Levy at Rolling Stone:

The attorney running the Republican National Committee’s “election integrity” effort has been criminally charged by the state of Arizona for her efforts to help Donald Trump steal the 2020 election. This turn of events highlights the Orwellian meaning of the phrase “election integrity,” as used by Trump and the Republican Party: An effort to win at all costs.

[Christina] Bobb endeared herself to the former president as a fervent supporter who worked as both a Trump associate and a journalist as part of various efforts to help Trump overturn the 2020 results. As Mother Jones reported when the RNC hired her last month:

As a correspondent for OAN, Bobb promoted the Big Lie—enough that she was a named a defendant in Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation suit against the network. But Bobb was not just a purveyor of the Big Lie—she was also part of the operation. Weeks after the 2020 election, Trump brought in a new team of lawyers, including Rudy Giuliani, to help him subvert the results and remain in office. Though Bobb has not been charged with any crimes, she worked with that team to help coordinate the scheme to certify fake slates of electors in states Biden won, a plot that is part of both the criminal indictment against Trump in Georgia and the federal charges brought by Special Counsel Jack Smith.

Now Bobb has joined the list of Trumpists who have been charged with a crime. (Bobb’s name and charges have been redacted in the indictment until she is served, but multiple outlets have reported she is among the Trump allies charged.) Arizona charged each of the state’s 11 fake electors, which include sitting members of the state legislature and leaders in the state GOP. Arizona also charged Trump allies Rudy Giuliani, Mark Meadows, Boris Epshteyn, Mike Roman, John Eastman, and Jenna Ellis with related crimes.

 

Kristi Noem Is Going Through Some Things

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.  One remaining question is the Republican vice presidential nomination.  One contender just took a serious hit.  Trump hates dogs, but millions of voters love them, and they will not approve of this news about Kristi Noem.

Martin Pengelly at The Guardian:

Conservative pundits have condemned the South Dakota governor and possible Trump running mate Kristi Noem, amid widespread horror over her admission in a new book that she killed both an “untrainable” dog and an unruly goat during a single day in hunting season.

Alyssa Farah Griffin, a Trump White House staffer turned critic, said: “I’m a dog lover and I am honestly horrified by the Kristi Noem excerpt. I wish I hadn’t even read it. A 14-month-old dog is still a puppy and can be trained. A large part of bad behaviour in dogs is not having proper training from humans.

“Dogs are a gift from God. They’re a reflection of his unconditional love. Anyone who would needlessly hurt an animal because they are inconvenient needs help.”

The Guardian revealed Noem’s story, which is contained in a book out next month. In No Going Back: The Truth on What’s Wrong with Politics and How We Move America Forward, Noem describes her frustrations with Cricket, a 14-month-old wirehair pointer who Noem says ruined a pheasant hunt and killed a neighbouring family’s chickens.

“I hated that dog,” Noem writes, saying Cricket was “untrainable … dangerous” and “less than worthless … as a hunting dog”.

“At that moment,” Noem says, “I realised I had to put her down.”

Noem describes taking Cricket to a gravel pit on her farm and shooting her. Remarkably, Noem then describes how she also chose to kill an unruly, unnamed, un-castrated goat, first botching the job then finishing the animal off with a third shotgun shell.

The news roiled the race to be named running mate to Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, of whom Noem is an ardent supporter.

Sarah Matthews, another Trump aide turned opponent, said: “When I saw tweets about Kristi Noem murdering her puppy, I thought to myself, ‘Damn, one of the other VP contenders’ teams found some oppo,’ until I realized SHE wrote about it in HER book.“I’m not sure why anyone would brag about this unless they’re sick and twisted.”

Two Old Men

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.  It is a fight between two very old men.

Jonathan V. Last: "When people say Biden is “old” what they mean is “frail.” Trump is functionally the same age as a Biden, with a much worse BMI and cognitive functioning. But because Trump can yell at the moon like a mad dog, people see him as “vigorous” and age isn’t a problem.

But Trump's behavior at trial may change perceptions.

The voters are unhappy.  Really unhappy. Many think both are unfit.

Hans Nichols and Alex Thompson at Axios:

President Biden has introduced a change to his White House departure and return routine. Instead of walking across the South Lawn to and from Marine One by himself, he's now often surrounded by aides.

Why it matters: With aides usually walking between Biden and journalists' camera position outside the White House, the visual effect is to draw less attention to the 81-year-old's halting and stiff gait.

Zoom in: Some Biden advisers have told Axios they're concerned that videos of Biden walking and shuffling alone — especially across the grass — have highlighted his age.Weeks ago the president told aides that he'd prefer a less formal approach, a White House official told Axios. He suggested that they walk with him.... By the numbers: In March, Biden's five walks to and from Marine One at the White House were by himself, or with family members.Starting April 16, Biden was joined by staff or lawmakers nine out of 10 times he walked to and from Marine One.

...

Between the lines: Biden resisted taking steps to account for his age early in his presidency, but has shifted gears recently.Besides the different footwear, he now enters Air Force One on a lower level, taking shorter stairs than the ones used on his early trips to climb to the plane's cabin. Biden also continues to do physical therapy and stretching exercises most days.

Ryan Bort, Asawin Suebsaeng and Catherina Gioino at Rolling Stone:

Among the heavily recurring topics in Trump’s private sniping this past week — according to the source, another person familiar with the situation, and a different Trumpworld figure briefed on the matter — is the former president’s bitterness towards New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman, who reported in print, online, and on CNN that Trump was visibly nodding off while in court. “He appeared to be asleep,” she told the network. “He didn’t pay attention to a note his lawyer passed him. His jaw kept falling on his chest, and his mouth kept going slack.”

The observation immediately went viral, provoking an irate denial from Trump’s campaign and reigniting the former president’s antipathy towards Haberman, who has been reporting on him for years. The resentment lasted the entire week, the sources add. It did not help Trump’s denial that he continued to doze off while seated in the Manhattan courtroom throughout the rest of the week. “Trump appears to have fallen asleep in court again,” Haberman wrote on Friday. “His eyes were closed for extended periods and his head dropped down twice.”

In recent conversations with Republican associates, Trump has repeatedly torn into Haberman and her CNN appearances, attacked her journalistic credentials, and bizarrely insisted that she was wrong about him falling asleep. Despite his dozing being widely reported, the former president has laid much of the blame for the detail going viral at Haberman’s feet. He was even observed glaring at her on Monday as he exited the courtroom following her CNN appearance.

It’s not just Haberman who’s been inflaming Trump during the first days of his criminal trial.

Trump has also privately asked people close to him if they agree that the courtroom sketch-artist must be out to get him, two of the sources say. Trump has critiqued the sketches of him that have circulated in the media this week, and insisted some of the images were likely drawn to make fun of him. One such sketch captured Trump snoozing, with his eyes closed and head tilted.

Unhappy Voters, Continued

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.

The nomination phase is effectively over.

The voters are unhappy.  Really unhappy.  From Pew:

The RFK Effect

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.

 Voters are not happy about having to choose between Trump and Biden.  Trump allies are trying to boost RFK Jr. in an effort to split the anti-Trump vote. The tactic might be backfiring.

Hans Nichols at Axios:

A trio of recent polls shows that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s independent candidacy may be hurting former President Trump more than President Biden.

Why it matters: President Biden says his polling numbers are moving in the right direction. They look even better when the latest results for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are factored in.

By the numbers: Biden and Trump are tied 46%-46% in the latest Quinnipiac University national poll.

• Throw RFK in the mix, and it's still tied 37%-37%.
• But force RFK voters to choose and they break 47%-29% for Trump.
• That dynamic is consistent with two other polls — a Marist survey on Monday and a NBC News one on Sunday — that show Biden's margin increasing when RFK and other third party candidates are included.

Problematic Senate Candidate in Wisconsin, Continued

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses state and congressional elections. In 2024, several Republican Senate candidates are having problems.  One is Eric Hovde of Wisconsin.

At an event in Slinger, Wisconsin, GOP Senate hopeful Eric Hovde flubs the Pledge of Allegiance, forgetting “one nation, under God.”

HOVDE: “And to the Republic for which it stands. Indivisible…”

MC: “One nation.”

HOVDE: “Under God… Indivisible.” pic.twitter.com/SjYTS0IUC9

— Heartland Signal (@HeartlandSignal) April 23, 2024

Dems, Progs, and Israel

Our latest book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  The 2024 race has begun.  The Gaza war is politically dangerous for Biden. A shocking percentage of young people think that the October 7 massacre was justified.  And Arab Americans in the key state of Michigan may be turning away from the president. 

Mara Gay at NYT:

For the first time in decades, possibly since the anti-Vietnam War and environmental movements, the left wing has led the center of the Democratic Party in a new political direction on a major issue — one sharply critical of the Israeli government, impatient with the leadership of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and increasingly willing to use American leverage to curb Israel’s military plans.

In recent weeks, Democratic leaders have begun inching closer to the progressive view that it is against U.S. interests to continue sending unconditional U.S. military aid to Mr. Netanyahu’s government in an asymmetrical war that has killed thousands of innocent civilians in Gaza. And they have recognized that anger among Democratic voters — especially young voters — over the U.S. role in Gaza is a serious threat to Mr. Biden’s re-election that cannot be ignored.

Jeffrey M. Jones at Gallup:

Prevailing political patterns in Middle East sympathies remain in place this year. Republicans overwhelmingly sympathize with Israel over the Palestinians, independents tend to favor Israel, and more Democrats side with the Palestinians than Israelis. This is the case even as Democrats give Israel much higher favorable ratings than they give the Palestinian Authority. The Democrats’ movement has been recent; until 2022, Democrats were more likely to sympathize with Israel.

Among age groups, young adults are slightly more sympathetic to the Palestinians than the Israelis (after being equally divided last year), with the other groups sympathizing with Israel.

But does this sympathy translate into votes in the voting booth or on the floor?

Politico Playbook:

The Biden world counterpoint comes courtesy of the recent Harvard Youth poll, which found economic issues — not the war in Gaza — dominating the list of issues that matter to young voters. (Only 2% of respondents cited the “Israel/Palestine conflict” as their top concern.) Aides also note the campaign has launched a major youth outreach effort and that “the youth vote and the student vote are not synonymous.”

Harvard polling guru JOHN DELLA VOLPE agreed that there is little “evidence that this is on its way to being a cultural phenomenon.” But, he added: “How this evolves, who knows? … Hopefully things improve. But I would not be willing to write [the protests] off right now.”

Most House Democrats supported Israel aid on Saturday, but the nay vote was higher among Dems than Reps.

GOVTRACK: H.R. 8034: Israel Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2024

Apr 20, 2024 at 1:57 p.m. ET. On Passage of the Bill in the House.

This was a vote to pass H.R. 8034 in the House. The federal budget process occurs in two stages: appropriations and authorizations. This is an appropriations bill, which sets overall spending limits by agency or program, typically for a single fiscal year (October 1 through September 30 of the next year).

Vote Outcome

	All Votes		Republicans	Democrats
Yea	86%	366	193	173
Nay	14%	58	21	37
Not Voting		7	4	3

Passed. Simple Majority Required. Source: house.gov.

Trump Money Woes

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses party organizations and campaign finance.

Lloyd Green at The Guardian:

Donald Trump dodged financial calamity on Monday. The office of Letitia James, the New York attorney general, and lawyers for Trump reached agreement in open court on the terms governing the appellate bond posted by the former president. 

...

Trump would no longer maintain any authority over the account. In turn, James remains barred from enforcing her $454m judgment against Trump and his businesses. For those keeping score, Trump is now out-of-pocket in a neighborhood north of a quarter of a billion dollars and counting.

His pretense of being cash-rich is soiled. In March, he shelled out for a separate $91.63m bond while he appeals the $83.3m verdict in the latest E Jean Carroll defamation case. Earlier, he paid another $4m into court to block Carroll from collecting a prior defamation judgment, also on appeal.

The stock price of Trump Media & Technology Group – his eponymous meme stock, DJT – is in the doldrums. Politico also reports that Save America, a Trump-controlled Pac, has already spent $59m on his legal fees and may run shortly out of money.

Beyond that, Trump World tussles with Ken Griffin, a major Republican donor and the chief of Citadel Securities, a leading Wall Street market-maker. Last Thursday, Devin Nunes – the former Republican congressman who resigned from the House to run Trump’s media company – wrote to the head of the Nasdaq, raising the issue of “potential market manipulation” of DJT stock and blasting “naked short-selling”.

Griffin, whose wealth is estimated at a cool $37bn, quickly struck back. He branded Nunes a “proverbial loser” whom Trump “would have fired on the Apprentice”. He also accused the humorless Californian of trying to deflect blame for DJT’s lackluster stock price.

Jessica Piper at Politico:

A PAC controlled by former President Donald Trump that has devoted tens of millions of dollars to his and his allies’ legal bills could be running out of cash after spending nearly $3.7 million on legal fees in March.

Save America, Trump’s leadership PAC, has now spent $59.5 million on legal consulting since the start of 2023. It also incurred $886,000 in new legal debt in March, according to a report filed with the Federal Election Commission late Saturday. More than $1.1 million of its March spending went toward two firms representing Trump in his New York criminal hush money trial.

The total spent on legal expenses for Save America was almost as much as Trump’s campaign committee in the month of March, highlighting how legal troubles have sucked up the cash of his political operation. Trump’s official campaign committee spent just over $3.7 million in March, with travel expenses, followed by payroll, occupying its biggest expenditure categories.

That total is minuscule compared to the more than $29 million that President Joe Biden’s campaign spent in March, with the incumbent launching a major ad campaign.

Save America, Trump’s leadership PAC, was able to stay in the black in March due to another $5 million refund in March from Make America Great Again Inc., the Trump-backing super PAC. The super PAC has transferred $5 million to the leadership PAC each month going back to last July, with less regular transfers before then.

The leadership PAC initially seeded the super PAC with $60 million before he announced his candidacy. Now, MAGA Inc. can only send $2.75 million more back to Save America, raising questions about whether Save America will continue to be the vehicle to fund legal bills in several cases linked to Trump.

 

Rightward Shift Among Chinese Americans in SF

In Defying the Odds, we talk about the social and economic divides that enabled Trump to enter the White House. In Divided We Stand, we discuss how these divides played out in 2020.  Our next book will carry the story through 2024.

 Jim Carlton  and Christine Mai-Duc at WSJ:

Long a reliable voting bloc for the left, Chinese-Americans have been important drivers of a recent backlash against progressive policies in San Francisco, which has grown in support and been backed by tech industry money.

Members of the Chinese community, who make up one-fifth of this city of 810,000 and a slightly smaller percentage of registered voters, say they have been particularly incensed by incidents of anti-Asian violence, school policies they believe have emphasized equity over merit, and street homelessness. Many are also upset that property crime has long been higher in San Francisco than most other major cities, though it has dropped this year.

Chinese-Americans were among the most emphatic backers of ballot measures passed last month mandating drug screening for public welfare recipients and expanding police powers, as well as the 2022 recall of the three school board members and the district attorney, Chesa Boudin. Their margin of support for those efforts was 10 to 30 percentage points higher than the overall San Francisco voting population, according to an analysis of publicly available data by research firm Data Second. The firm is run by the husband of Marjan Philhour, a candidate for San Francisco Board of Supervisors running on a moderate platform.

...

In the past, Chinese-Americans often voted for representatives from their own community, in which political activists had close ties to left-wing political movements. That was particularly true in Chinatown, the oldest enclave of Chinese immigrants in the U.S., dating to the 1850s.

As Chinese residents climbed the socioeconomic ladder, however, they increasingly moved to the city’s western, more suburban neighborhoods and began voting for reasons other than ethnic representation, political analysts and community leaders said.

Many Chinese-American voters grew angry at the political establishment during the pandemic, when prolonged school closures and a move away from merit-based admissions at one elite high school incensed families who put an emphasis on education.

Asian Americans to Democrats: "we want safe streets, good schools and less progressive ideology." That's the message and 2024 warning from San Francisco. Footnote about our unfortunate experience at the end. @OutFrontCNN story features @JoelEngardio. Producer: @jasonkCNN pic.twitter.com/6Up96sGD5H

— Kyung Lah (@KyungLahCNN) March 23, 2023

Deepening Diploma Divide

In Defying the Odds, we talk about the social and economic divides that enabled Trump to enter the White House. In Divided We Stand, we discuss how these divides played out in 2020.  

Nate Moore at The Liberal Patriot:

We are on track for a historically large education divide among white voters. An average of recent polls finds Joe Biden winning white college-educated voters by 18 points and losing white non-college voters by 27 points—a colossal gap of 45 points. 

Compared to 2020 results, Trump’s margin with non-college whites is holding steady, while Biden has significantly improved his standing with degree-holding whites. Such Democratic improvement is certainly welcome for Team Biden, but not unexpected. College-educated white voters have been shifting blue for a decade, driven left by Trump and the GOP’s hardline cultural stances. The flip side of the demographic coin is that nonwhite voters, particularly those without a degree, are moving towards Republicans. Should current trends continue, education polarization—rather than racial—will become the defining feature of American elections. 

 

RFK Jr's Family and Associates Are Against Him

Our most recent book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. The 2024 race has begun.

 Voters are not happy about having to choose between Trump and Biden.  Trump allies are trying to boost RFK Jr. in an effort to split the anti-Trump vote. Biden supporters have noticed.

Kevin Liptak and Michael Williams, CNN:

President Joe Biden received the formal endorsement of more than a dozen members of the extended Kennedy family on Thursday, aiming to harness the legacy of a storied Democratic family while implicitly underscoring their near-universal rejection of a third-party challenge mounted by one of their own, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

The broader Kennedy family has mostly shunned RFK Jr.’s campaign, calling it “dangerous,” even as the candidate himself looks to capitalize on his last name and family history.

But Thursday’s event in Philadelphia - the same city where RFK Jr. announced his independent bid for the presidency in October - nonetheless highlights the threat Kennedy poses to Biden as he seeks to win reelection in a race where even a low-performing third-party candidate could act as a spoiler.

Aaron Pellish at CNN:

Environmental groups are condemning Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential bid and his environmental policy in new efforts on Friday, portraying him as a candidate who will increase the chances former President Donald Trump is reelected.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, a climate advocacy group where Kennedy previously served as senior attorney for 28 years, is planning to run a full-page advertisement in newspapers through its political arm in six battleground states on Sunday. According to a copy of the ad obtained by CNN, the group is calling on Kennedy to drop out of the race to prevent him from being a spoiler for Trump, who they call “the single worst environmental president our country has ever had.”

“We have spent our careers fighting to protect the planet and its people. As current and former leadership and board members of the NRDC Action Fund, as well as former colleagues of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., we have one message for him: Honor our planet, drop out,” the ad reads.

“In nothing more than a vanity candidacy, RFK Jr. has chosen to play the role of election spoiler to the benefit of Donald Trump – the single worst environmental president our country has ever had,” the ad continues.