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294

Trump is winning big with his base, but there’s no sign that he's broadening support (apnews.com)

submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/politics

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[–] jordanlund 177 points 4 months ago (7 children)

He doesn't have to broaden support to win. Biden just has to lose support.

In 2020, Biden won 81,283,501 to 74,223,975.

But the popular vote doesn't count.

What put him over the top were:

Georgia - 2,473,633 to 2,461,854 = 11,779 votes. Pennsylvania - 3,459,923 to 3,378,263 = 81,660
Michigan - 2,804,040 to 2,649,852 = 154,188 Wisconsin - 1,630,866 to 1,610,184 = 20,682
Arizona - 1,672,143 to 1,661,686 = 10,457

Biden didn't win by 7,059,526 votes. All those extra votes in places like California and New York didn't count.

He won by 278,766 votes in 5 key states. That's it.

Now, since we aren't pushing hard on vote by mail this year, how many voters do you think will disengage and not vote?

[–] phoneymouse 64 points 4 months ago (1 children)

God that’s fucking depressing! Thanks for putting it in perspective.

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[–] givesomefucks 53 points 4 months ago (12 children)

Biden won because of the youth vote, millennials and gen z out numbered boomers and silent generation for the first time.

But this year he's only up 4 points in the 18-34 demo.

It's fucking insane seeing so many people insisting we can't talk about these issues while there's still time to fix it.

Biden just doesn't want to actually do things that would get him votes. Even something basic like doing interviews, it's like the 2024 Biden campaign is just going to be hiding him in a closet while the media talks about how bad trump would be and all of Bidens aides claim he's a completely different person off camera

I really don't think it will be enough this time. And it's fucking terrifying

[–] [email protected] 24 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (8 children)

Just a note that polling of Millenials and younger is known to be wildly inaccurate since we don't follow traditional news media, so extrapolating a sample to a state or national value is functionally guesswork.

This is why polling stated Obama wasn't going to be re-elected and everyone was expecting a big Romney win.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago (5 children)

Not sure where you're getting that. FiveThirtyEight's presidential model doesn't solely rely on polling, but it's the prominent factor, and it was bang on that year.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/nov/07/nate-silver-election-forecasts-right

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[–] jordanlund 20 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Saying things like "Well, they're totally different off camera" sank both Dole and Clinton as well.

Pics or it didn't happen.

Add to that the lack of will to do debates...

[–] givesomefucks 8 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Neither are doing primary debates, and there's no way a general debate happens.

We won't see either even attempt to answer a difficult question, and they'll both still fuck up the easy ones.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (5 children)

The same youths who helped him win in 2020 will be needed this year. And I'm not 100% sure that a senile moderate is enticing enough to bring out the required votes, even if the other guy is a senile fascist-wannabe.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago

The game isn't to be the best person to fix America. The game is not fucking up.

They tell people what they think online and on tv, you don't need a debate. The only thing that can happen to old men like Trump and Biden on a debate stage is them fucking up.

A massive win on stage wouldnt change their base or sway people more than pundits hammering your point eloquently for you, but a fuck up would end them, so they don't go.

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[–] gmtom 24 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Which is why you suddenly see all these sockpuppet accounts posting about how bad Biden is.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 months ago (4 children)

I have to let this out, and your comment was the trigger. Lucky you.

Three things are pissing me off in this election in particular.

Undecideds. There's supposed to be this huge center (well, 30%) of unaffiliated "undecided" voters. Who TF are these people, who look at the modern Republican party and at Trump, and go: "hmmm. I just don't know. Do I vote for the bland old guy, or the fascist, philandering, traitorous tax-avoiding old guy who's under inditement in several states? I just don't know!"
Primaries. Lots of liberals - myself included - are furious with Biden about his support of Israel in this ethnic cleansing. The primaries should be the place where we can express our displeasure, and is almost the only forum we have to exert (generally) direct electoral pressure. But we can't, because doing so harms Biden's chances in the general election by sowing discord - c.f. the very relevant Bernie Bros, who refused to vote for Hillary even after Bernie threw in with her.
Biden's cabinet. Whoever is in charge of his PR is doing a shit job. I learn more on Lemmy about Biden's accomplishments than I do in the general news. Biden's doing a good job in many areas, but Joe Public doesn't know because Biden's PR staff have their heads up their asses.

It's utterly insane; the electoral college needs to be dumped, there's no doubt about that, and adoption of approval voting, or ranked choice -- almost anything would be better. But even with these issues, the US managed to work for 200 years, until the past few election cycles, and it's just gotten insane.

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[–] Bytemeister 9 points 4 months ago

The problem is, I don't believe they are all sock puppets. It would be foolish to think that people on the left aren't as susceptible to disinfo as people on the right. Plus the complaints are totally valid. Biden is too old, he is supporting Israel's genocide, he is just barely a centrist, and he will just enable the status quo instead of affecting real positive change in the country. What's at stake is much more dire. I'm willing to wait another 4 years to try again for a more progressive candidate rather than gamble now on a less than 1% chance of a slightly better candidate and a 99% chance of trump and the likely end of free and fair elections.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 4 months ago (9 children)

All true. In the US, you don't have to win a majority to win the election.

But I highly doubt that Democrats are going to sit this one out.

And if they just show up to the same degree as in 2020, Trump still needs to broaden support in the key swing states to actually win them. If he's not doing it nationally, chances are he's not doing it in the battlegrounds.

[–] jordanlund 9 points 4 months ago (11 children)

Without vote by mail, they won't show up to the same degree. Trump's vote was driven by in person votes, Biden by vote by mail.

That's not going to be true this year. And like I showed, the margins in those key states is super slim.

Georgia - Trump +6 to +9
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/2024/georgia/

Pennsylvania - Trump +2 to +5
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/2024/pennsylvania/

Michigan - Trump +2 to +3
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/2024/michigan/

Wisconsin - Trump +2 to +3
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/2024/wisconsin/

Arizona - Trump +3 to +6
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/2024/arizona/

Biden can't win without these states and if the election were today?

[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 months ago (12 children)

Whatever the polls say, do you have any idea what a mess the GOP in Michigan is? We're having a primary and two competing caucuses because we have two heads of the state party and they are bankrupt. There is a lawsuit to sell their headquarters to pay their bills. And we came out for abortion rights big time in 22, which Republicans continue to shoot themselves in the fucking head with.

There is zero ground game. I can't believe it's even possible for Trump to win here, polls be damned.

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[–] Ensign_Crab 14 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It's neat how we kept DeJoy in charge at the post office after his fuckery in the last election.

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[–] nexguy 8 points 4 months ago

Don't forget that the ROC had a catastrophic midterm. Also Jan 6th and Roe/Wade were no jokes and will continue to not be joking.

[–] GladiusB 6 points 4 months ago

It's also February. November is coming but alot can change and people can decide to vote after summer. Most people think it's a decision that can be made later.

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[–] sylver_dragon 38 points 4 months ago (22 children)

Considering current polling, his current level of support is terrifyingly close to enough. If we don't want to face down four more years of Trump, Biden really needs a lot better campaigning than, "I'm not that guy." Sure, it's still early and the predictive power of polls at this stage isn't fantastic. But, it seems like a bad place to be starting from.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 4 months ago (1 children)

We can only hope the people who said they wouldn't vote for him, due to having various final judgments against him, will have the conviction to hold to that claim.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 4 months ago

Republicans will vote for him as long as he is the nominee, just like the last two elections.

[–] samus12345 27 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

It will be people (in a few key states) who refuse to vote for Biden due to purity testing or vote third party who put him in office if it happens.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago (1 children)

That is how basically every election has worked for 30+ years. About 40% of people lean republican, 40% democrat, and 20% independent. Campaigns are mostly about getting 100% of your 40% to vote than winning independents or opponents.

[–] samus12345 9 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Way less people are Republican, but only in pure numbers, which doesn't mean shit when you use the Electoral College (or have 2 senators per state regardless of population, for that matter). The only voters who actually matter for presidents are in the 5 or so states that don't always go red or blue.

[–] whotookkarl 17 points 4 months ago

We already hit the point decades ago where GOP can't win a federal election without anti democratic institutions like gerrymandering and the electoral college. It needs to be replaced with something actually functional in leading government in policy supporting constituents to compete with DNC. I detest political parties, but the only thing worse than many parties is one party.

[–] TropicalDingdong 14 points 4 months ago (1 children)

We're in an era of populism and people are still trying to use the 2000s era to predict today.

He doesn't need to wide. his base, he just needs to motivate them. He need to to get more people excited about voting for him than Biden does those excited to vote Biden.

It's about turnout and driving a base. He's wiping the floor with Biden right now in the polls. No one is excited to vote Biden. It's not clear to me he even has a base. Instead taking heads are just trying to browbeat any one left of center into supporting Biden. It won't work at scale. Bidens got to do his own work there, because it's not currently Trump in office, it's Biden. Always harder for an incumbent, especially one who has become deeply unpopular with the coalition of voters that out him into office. No amount of blue no matter who is going to fix Biden as a candidate. Only Biden can do that.

[–] givesomefucks 9 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (5 children)

Biden and the DNC know that

It's just what excites voters pisses off big money donors. And they picked the side neoliberals are always going to pick.

And they're hoping the threat of trump is enough to scare the serfs into line.

From a psychology perspective, it's a horrible plan. Especially after it has a 50% success rate in the last two elections. 2024 is a coin flip, and it's only because we're using trump as an excuse to run someone who's first presidential primary was 2 generations ago.

Seriously. A person born the year of Bidens first primary could safely be a grandparent for this one. In some red states, a great grandparent already.

He's never been a popular candidate, just had the luck of getting the primary handed to him and getting to face the literal worst president we've ever had the general.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It’s just what excites voters pisses off big money donors.

That is so basic, yet perfectly describes the situation.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago (2 children)

It's nearly like religion and donations should be kept out of politics..

[–] MotoAsh 7 points 4 months ago (2 children)

But corporations are people, my friend, and people have freedom of speech! and oh look, would you look here, money is speech ... ugh this country is a farce.

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[–] MataVatnik 12 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

I already know three people that said they are not voting. THREE, imagine how that translates to the wider population

[–] zzx 15 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It could even be as high as FOUR

[–] MataVatnik 12 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (7 children)

CRAZY RIGHT. But seriously, three people that I personally know voted for Biden in 2020, now are thinking about not voting? That's a lot. It's also who these people are that gets me, they are your run of the mill city democrats. Not terminally online Twitter followers eating antibiden propaganda.