I've read 15 books about the 2020 election...Ask me anything!

[Pres Mike]

Here they are....

Lucky: How Joe Biden Barely Won the Presidency
Jonathan Allen

Battle for the Soul: Inside the Democrats' Campaigns to Defeat Trump
Edward-Isaac Dovere

Peril
Bob Woodward

Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside Story of How Trump Lost
Michael C. Bender

Joe Biden : the life, the run, and what matters now
Evan Osnos

Growing Up Biden: A Memoir
Valerie Biden Owens

A Return to Normalcy?: The 2020 Election that (Almost) Broke America
Larry Sabato

Landslide
Michael Wolff

Betrayal : the final act of the Trump show
Jonathan Karl

Divided We Stand
Andrew Busch and John Pitney

I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year
Carol Leonning and Philip Rucker

This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America's Future
Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns

The Fighting Soul: On the Road with Bernie Sanders
Ari-Rabin-Havt

The Long Alliance: The Imperfect Union of Joe Biden and Barack Obama
Gabriel Debenedetti

The Fight of His Life: Inside Joe Biden's White House
Chris Whipple

[Pres Mike]

1) Why did Bernie Sanders do worse in 2020 than in 2016, despite having four years to prepare, near-universal name recognition, and being viewed very positively by Democratic primary voters?
2) What was Kamala Harris's plan after her "that little girl was me" confrontation with Biden in that debate, if any? The attacks on Biden on busing never made much sense, because at some point she would have had to argue that busing was good and should be brought back, which is a position that maybe 10% of the population holds, and the policy was never very popular even in the Black community.
3) Why did polls show a bigger lead for Biden than the final results? The polling miss was even bigger than in 2016, they just got the winner right. By contrast, the polls in 2018 were much closer to the mark (though still of in a few key races), and 2022 had an error in the other direction

1. Bernie Sander's campaign expected to lose some support from 2016 to 2020. Some support would be lost to Warren, a fellow progressive. But not a lot because Sanders mostly competed with Biden for voters. Both Biden and Sanders were "beer" while Warren was "wine". They also expected to lose some votes to Biden because of name recongition and some to youth support to "flavor of the month" candidiates. They also acknowledged that Sanders in 2016 had some support because some Democrats just wanted a male or protested Hillary. Some of Bernie's 2016 support just wanted Biden and Bernie was a place holder.

Sanders campaign knew the only way to win was by winning a pluratiy and than a contested convention.

2. Kamala's plan from the start was to be VP. If she became the nominee the better. The "that little girl was me" actually took her campaign by surpise, they weren't expected such a reaction. Thus could not build from that. The Harris campaign was a s*** show behind the scenes and was never going to become a successful operation. So basically no plan.

3. Both the Biden and Trump campaigns knew the polls over performed for Biden. The Biden campaign knew they weren't going to win Florida from internal polls. The Biden campaign final predictions were pretty close, they were only wrong about North Carolina.

Why were the polls wrong again? I don't think any of the books go into great detail. Some things about Trump voters not picking up the phone to Democrats being more likely to stay home.

[Pres Mike]

Why do you think Biden was unable to carry NC? What lessons need to be learned for Dems to finally win the state in 2024?

Mostly Cal Cunningham for reasons....

Another factor was the slight movment of African American, Hispanic and Native American men towards Trump.

Considering how close it was, any combination of the above reasons might have lost NC for Democrats

[Pres Mike]

I've read that some people around Trump knew it would be an uphill battle for them, is that true and was Trump being told that or was he just completely left out of the dark?

At no point was Trump told he was winning the election. Several people around him desperatly tried to get him to change course. At one point, Trump legit thought there was no point in changing course, because Democrats were planning to replace Biden with Andrew Cuomo or Michelle Obama.

Trump was told throughout the campaign by several people that polls would underestimate him again. And that he didn't need to be above water in polls to win.

In the final week, internal polls showed real movement for Trump. The Biden internal polls showed the same thing.

The last 24 hours of the campaign, the internal polls showed Trump close enough. Not winning, but a 2016 poll error coudl get him across the finish line. When the Florida results were reported, the Trump campaign thought that what was exactly happening. Only until Arizona was called for Democrats that ruined everything.

[Pres Mike]

Who were the 8 million voters Trump gained?

The vast vast majority of the 8 million votes Trump gained were already Trump supporters, just people who never voted before. The voter turnout in 2016 was 55%, similar to past elections in the 21st century. It rose to 66% in 2020.

There was some movment with black and hispanic men towards Trump. Men who voted for Obama, stayed home in 2016, than voted for Trump. It wasn't a huge number though. These voters like incumbents and canididates that project strength. For hispanics, especially Texas, it was in support of natural gas and oil.

[Pres Mike]

Here they are....

Lucky: How Joe Biden Barely Won the Presidency
Jonathan Allen

Battle for the Soul: Inside the Democrats' Campaigns to Defeat Trump
Edward-Isaac Dovere

Peril
Bob Woodward

Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside Story of How Trump Lost
Michael C. Bender

Joe Biden : the life, the run, and what matters now
Evan Osnos

Growing Up Biden: A Memoir
Valerie Biden Owens

A Return to Normalcy?: The 2020 Election that (Almost) Broke America
Larry Sabato

Landslide
Michael Wolff

Betrayal : the final act of the Trump show
Jonathan Karl

Divided We Stand
Andrew Busch and John Pitney

I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year
Carol Leonning and Philip Rucker

This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America's Future
Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns

The Fighting Soul: On the Road with Bernie Sanders
Ari-Rabin-Havt

The Long Alliance: The Imperfect Union of Joe Biden and Barack Obama
Gabriel Debenedetti

The Fight of His Life: Inside Joe Biden's White House
Chris Whipple

2 Questions.

1.) I'm currently leading- Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside Story of How Trump Lost and I LOVE it. Bender does a great job being neutral and I love timeline books. What would you recommended me to read after? I want another timeline book that goes through a lot of the backroom decisions, inside scoops kinda. Preferably as least bias as possible.

2.) Who were the demographics that Trump lost the most support from in May/June of 2020? It appears that is when he fell apart and could never recover.

1. Battle for the Soul: Inside the Democrats' Campaigns to Defeat Trump
Edward-Isaac Dovere
I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year
Carol Leonning and Philip Rucker
Peril by Bob Woodward

are the best ones on the list. Hope you enjoy!


2. Independents. There were polls December 2019-Febrarury 2020 that showed Trump even with independents. Covid and BLM made Trump rely solely on his base.

[Pres Mike]

Did the Biden or Trump campaign actually think Texas could flip blue?

Why did Biden target Iowa and Ohio when he didn't even need them?

Neither Trump nor Biden expected Democrats to win Texas. Some Democrats wanted more investment in Texas because they thought a landslide was possible. The Biden campaign did spend some money. But they even thought Florida was a waste of time.

Same with Iowa and Ohio. The Biden campaign did not expect to win them but the national party wanted an investment. Especially with the Iowa senate race. Some polls had Greenfield elading Ernst

[Pres Mike]

Was anyone warning Trump about potentially losing Georgia? It seems his campaign treated it much the same as Hillary 2016 treated Wisconsin, whereas Biden was sending Harris and Obama down there during the final week.

Both campaigns internal polls showed Georgia within the margin of error. Trump assumed the polls were wrong and he would easily carry the state.

[Pres Mike]

Was Minnesota won by a bigger margin than expected?  How did the Biden and Trump campaigns feel about Minnesota?

Trump hoped to win Minnesota in the 2017-2019 period, since it was so close in 2020. Same with New Hampshire. But after Biden won the nomination, it was considered out of reach. I think the margin of victory was fairly close to expected. Perhaps slightly more. Neither campaign thought MN was a close state. The Biden campaign did spend money to be safe. Trump never bothered, even pulled out of Michigan.

[Pres Mike]

Probably a dumb question, but why did Nevada take longer than other states to count the votes?

Outside of Vegas and Reno, Nevada is entirely rural. Votes were handcounted by elderly volunteers. And no one expected the final election call to be Neavda so no one was prepared.

[Pres Mike]

How did Trump feel about Virginia?

Was never seriously contested. At the end, the Trump campaign plan was to aggressively fight for Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. They expected to win Florida, Georgia and North Carolina. They wrote off Michigan and Arizona. Nevada was a toss up.

[Pres Mike]

Weirdest results for some slices of the population?

How much of the leftward swing seems to be simply anti-Trump?

Why does Arizona take so long to count votes?

1. None of the books really get into electoral trivia. One mentioned Arkansas moving towards the right when the rest of the country moved left was unusual and probably ancestoral Clinton voters

2. Biden locked down the "stay home" voters from 2016. And ate most of the Liberterrean and Green Party support from 2016. Combined with 18-22 aging into the electorate, Biden's victory can be entirely drawn from anti-Trump voters who did not vote for Hillary in 2016. Almost no one "switched sides" or were a Trump-Biden voter. Biden's victory in Arizona came from demographics and people moving from California. Georgia came from Atlanta exploding in recent years and Stacy Abram's turnout machine.

Biden was able to get Romney voters that did not vote for eithe side in 2016.

So yes, anti-Trump

3. Thats just how Arizona is. A very large state with far flung rural counties and Native reservations. No one expected for Arizona to be the deciding state. 2018 senate race wasn't called for days

[Pres Mike]

1) Why did Bernie Sanders do worse in 2020 than in 2016, despite having four years to prepare, near-universal name recognition, and being viewed very positively by Democratic primary voters?
2) What was Kamala Harris's plan after her "that little girl was me" confrontation with Biden in that debate, if any? The attacks on Biden on busing never made much sense, because at some point she would have had to argue that busing was good and should be brought back, which is a position that maybe 10% of the population holds, and the policy was never very popular even in the Black community.
3) Why did polls show a bigger lead for Biden than the final results? The polling miss was even bigger than in 2016, they just got the winner right. By contrast, the polls in 2018 were much closer to the mark (though still of in a few key races), and 2022 had an error in the other direction

1. Bernie Sander's campaign expected to lose some support from 2016 to 2020. Some support would be lost to Warren, a fellow progressive. But not a lot because Sanders mostly competed with Biden for voters. Both Biden and Sanders were "beer" while Warren was "wine". They also expected to lose some votes to Biden because of name recongition and some to youth support to "flavor of the month" candidiates. They also acknowledged that Sanders in 2016 had some support because some Democrats just wanted a male or protested Hillary. Some of Bernie's 2016 support just wanted Biden and Bernie was a place holder.

Sanders campaign knew the only way to win was by winning a pluratiy and than a contested convention.

2. Kamala's plan from the start was to be VP. If she became the nominee the better. The "that little girl was me" actually took her campaign by surpise, they weren't expected such a reaction. Thus could not build from that. The Harris campaign was a s*** show behind the scenes and was never going to become a successful operation. So basically no plan.

3. Both the Biden and Trump campaigns knew the polls over performed for Biden. The Biden campaign knew they weren't going to win Florida from internal polls. The Biden campaign final predictions were pretty close, they were only wrong about North Carolina.

Why were the polls wrong again? I don't think any of the books go into great detail. Some things about Trump voters not picking up the phone to Democrats being more likely to stay home.

For # 3, why didn’t the Biden campaign warn downballot Dems (especially the DCCC) that the polls were over performing for Democrats and they needed to play more defense in certain seats?

The Biden campaign knew polls over performed for Democrats at the presidential level, not congressional level. The internal polls for both the DCCC and RCCC had Democrats making gains. Besides, it was Pelosi and Schumer in charge of congressional races, the Biden campaign main focus was winning the election and not having Trump seize power

[Pres Mike]

Which state was the biggest surprise? Biden not winning NC??

Which book was the best? Do you recommend it?

Why did Trump gain in LA country, Chicago, NYC?

The Biden campaign accuratly predicited 49 states, with the only state they were wrong was NC. Even than, they viewed it as a toss up. The biggest surprise was the margin in Florida.

Lucky: How Joe Biden Barely Won the Presidency, Battle for the Soul: Inside the Democrats' Campaigns to Defeat Trump and Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside Story of How Trump Lost were my favorites. The early books were the best, the latter ones were just repeating the eariler ones.

Trump gained in large areas like NYC and LA because of a combination of incumbency, law and order and minorities moving rightwards slightly. Also because Hillary maxed out in urban areas in 2016.

[Pres Mike]

How did the Trump and Biden camps feel about Maine's 2nd District?

Both campaigns expected Trump to hold it

[Pres Mike]

In general, what did you think of Battle for the Soul and how much stock do you put into the various bits that are more editorial than factual? Personally I found most of the potential biases to be easy to detect and account for, and I quite enjoyed what this added. There was just the slightest touch of gonzo to it, which is really all you need.

I enjoyed it. I think it was my favorite actually. It actually starts from Trump winning in 2016 and Democrats trying to take back congress in 2018 and the general resistance. Goes into dept how democrats rebuild from pity losses in state houses.

For the most part, I found the personal thoughts and feelings very insightful. Most of whoch were well known. Did it have gonzo? Yeah. The last book had how Biden felt about Harris as VP. I really think its an aggregation

[Pres Mike]

1) Why did Bernie Sanders do worse in 2020 than in 2016, despite having four years to prepare, near-universal name recognition, and being viewed very positively by Democratic primary voters?
2) What was Kamala Harris's plan after her "that little girl was me" confrontation with Biden in that debate, if any? The attacks on Biden on busing never made much sense, because at some point she would have had to argue that busing was good and should be brought back, which is a position that maybe 10% of the population holds, and the policy was never very popular even in the Black community.
3) Why did polls show a bigger lead for Biden than the final results? The polling miss was even bigger than in 2016, they just got the winner right. By contrast, the polls in 2018 were much closer to the mark (though still of in a few key races), and 2022 had an error in the other direction

1. Bernie Sander's campaign expected to lose some support from 2016 to 2020. Some support would be lost to Warren, a fellow progressive. But not a lot because Sanders mostly competed with Biden for voters. Both Biden and Sanders were "beer" while Warren was "wine". They also expected to lose some votes to Biden because of name recongition and some to youth support to "flavor of the month" candidiates. They also acknowledged that Sanders in 2016 had some support because some Democrats just wanted a male or protested Hillary. Some of Bernie's 2016 support just wanted Biden and Bernie was a place holder.

Sanders campaign knew the only way to win was by winning a pluratiy and than a contested convention.

2. Kamala's plan from the start was to be VP. If she became the nominee the better. The "that little girl was me" actually took her campaign by surpise, they weren't expected such a reaction. Thus could not build from that. The Harris campaign was a s*** show behind the scenes and was never going to become a successful operation. So basically no plan.

3. Both the Biden and Trump campaigns knew the polls over performed for Biden. The Biden campaign knew they weren't going to win Florida from internal polls. The Biden campaign final predictions were pretty close, they were only wrong about North Carolina.

Why were the polls wrong again? I don't think any of the books go into great detail. Some things about Trump voters not picking up the phone to Democrats being more likely to stay home.

For # 3, why didn’t the Biden campaign warn downballot Dems (especially the DCCC) that the polls were over performing for Democrats and they needed to play more defense in certain seats?

I'm also curious about this. Wasserman and co. kept insisting that Democrats were on track for at least a 10 seat net gain in the House, but a lot of the seats that they insisted were going to be super-tight (AR-02, NY-24, TX-03) ended up being double digit Republican wins. And he supposedly has access to actual internals from the DCCC and NRCC, not just the BS push polls.

What gives?

Everyone was wrong about house races. Internal polls for the DCCC and NRCC were both wrong. None of the books really describe why. My guess there were a lot of people who voted for Biden and Republican down ballot, but were concentrated in select districts

[Pres Mike]

1) Why did Bernie Sanders do worse in 2020 than in 2016, despite having four years to prepare, near-universal name recognition, and being viewed very positively by Democratic primary voters?
2) What was Kamala Harris's plan after her "that little girl was me" confrontation with Biden in that debate, if any? The attacks on Biden on busing never made much sense, because at some point she would have had to argue that busing was good and should be brought back, which is a position that maybe 10% of the population holds, and the policy was never very popular even in the Black community.
3) Why did polls show a bigger lead for Biden than the final results? The polling miss was even bigger than in 2016, they just got the winner right. By contrast, the polls in 2018 were much closer to the mark (though still of in a few key races), and 2022 had an error in the other direction

1. Bernie Sander's campaign expected to lose some support from 2016 to 2020. Some support would be lost to Warren, a fellow progressive. But not a lot because Sanders mostly competed with Biden for voters. Both Biden and Sanders were "beer" while Warren was "wine". They also expected to lose some votes to Biden because of name recongition and some to youth support to "flavor of the month" candidiates. They also acknowledged that Sanders in 2016 had some support because some Democrats just wanted a male or protested Hillary. Some of Bernie's 2016 support just wanted Biden and Bernie was a place holder.

Sanders campaign knew the only way to win was by winning a pluratiy and than a contested convention.

2. Kamala's plan from the start was to be VP. If she became the nominee the better. The "that little girl was me" actually took her campaign by surpise, they weren't expected such a reaction. Thus could not build from that. The Harris campaign was a s*** show behind the scenes and was never going to become a successful operation. So basically no plan.

3. Both the Biden and Trump campaigns knew the polls over performed for Biden. The Biden campaign knew they weren't going to win Florida from internal polls. The Biden campaign final predictions were pretty close, they were only wrong about North Carolina.

Why were the polls wrong again? I don't think any of the books go into great detail. Some things about Trump voters not picking up the phone to Democrats being more likely to stay home.

For # 3, why didn’t the Biden campaign warn downballot Dems (especially the DCCC) that the polls were over performing for Democrats and they needed to play more defense in certain seats?

I'm also curious about this. Wasserman and co. kept insisting that Democrats were on track for at least a 10 seat net gain in the House, but a lot of the seats that they insisted were going to be super-tight (AR-02, NY-24, TX-03) ended up being double digit Republican wins. And he supposedly has access to actual internals from the DCCC and NRCC, not just the BS push polls.

What gives?

Everyone was wrong about house races. Internal polls for the DCCC and NRCC were both wrong. None of the books really describe why. My guess there were a lot of people who voted for Biden and Republican down ballot, but were concentrated in select districts

Weird. I'm actually surprised there hasn't been any sort of public deep dive about why all the House polls were so bad. It would definitely be an interesting project to explore...

House polls were accurate in 2010-2018 (2012 being somewhat of an exception)

My guess, its hard to properly poll elections with multiple races when both sides have high turnout. 2020 and 2022 had high turnout for both sides.

[Pres Mike]

What was the point of the Buttigieg campaign? Was there ever a point where he thought he could actually win, or was he just angling for a VP or cabinet spot?

The Buttigieg campaign was trying to win from the start. They never thought about being VP because it was unlikely Biden/Sanders/Warren would pick him.

The goal was to do a media blitz and create "Mayor Pete mania"

Lis Smith was his campaign manager. She is (in)famous in the political world having run 20 campaigns. She worked for Obama in 2016 as media director. She also had an affair with New York governor Eliot Spitzer

Her plan was to put Boot-Edge-Edge on everything. Every magazine cover, every talk show. To recreate the magic JFK, Bill Clinton and Obama had as young canididates.

The Buttigieg campaign really did think they could win. Their moment was Sept-Nov 2019 when Sanders was declining and Warren briefly became the front runner. They hoped they could steal the youth vote from Bernie and completely wrote off Biden from the start. They hoped to win Iowa and recreate the "Obama magical night wins Iowa 2008" to win the nomination.

Buttigieg even went on "Good luck America" and said the race was between him and Warren lol.

The campaign was furious when the networks did not call Iowa for Buttigieg until days later. They blamed the networks for causing them to lose New Hampshire.

(The Buttigieg campaign was able to kill the Des Moines Registar/Selzer Poll the week before the caucus. The poll had Sanders winning. One random pollster forgot to mention Buttigieg and that argument alone killed the poll. No argument that it influenced the end results. Just goes to show how much the media favored Buttigieg. That said, the campaign had zero appeal outside the beltway. So zero support in real life.)

 They knew it was over when Buttigieg came in third in Nevada and fourth in South Carolina

[Pres Mike]

1.) At what point exactly did plans form about attempting to overthrow the government in order to install Trump as an unelected dictator?

2.) Was there any real pushback within the Trump team to simply concede his election loss?

3.) Was there any encouragement from the Trump team for the defeated president to attend Biden's inauguration, or were they all on board with his violent transfer of power?

1. The Trump campaign and administration never expected to win the numerous lawsuits. Everyone in his administration expected to be out Jan 20. After election night, Trump was upset and privately expected to leave. But after the lunatics like Giuliani convinced him, he decided to fight it out out of pure spite. But no, they did not expect to win.

2. Several donors were done with Trump after the election, refusing to take his calls. The stated reason was the denialism.

3. No one asked him to go, no one expected him to go. Kushner and Ivanka offered to go, but it was quickly shut down.

Jan 6 was completely unplanned. Trump loved watching the chaos but nothing was planned. The White House expected the riots to be cleared.

[Pres Mike]

My questions would be:

(1) Did the Biden campaign feel that there were real tailwinds from Covid, and did any advisors think it gave them a big advantage?

(2) How did both parties feel about the expansion of vote by mail laws, especially given the early returns from primaries/specials showing how VBM had changed in terms of lean?

(3) How did both sides feel about Pennsylvania, Arizona, Wisconsin on election night?

1. In March, the Biden campaign feared the “rally around the flag” affect Trump might get. Biden himself wanted to focus on the safety of Americans, not the election. It wasn’t until May did they realize they could run against the incompetence

2. The Trump campaign did not like the idea of mail in voting, despite state party republicans urging the trump campaign to embrace it. The Biden campaign embraced mail in voting at first, but feared the election would be stolen and urged people to vote in person, early.

3. The Biden campaign expected to win all three states. Their internal polls were closer than public polls. That said, they didn’t expect to win by only 1 point. But when Biden spoke at midnight, his campaign was confident of winning even Georgia. Using AI data, they correctly predicted results to the precinct once initial results came in,

The Trump campaign internal polls also had Biden winning. But PA and WI were in the margin of error and they hoped for a 2016 poll error

[Pres Mike]

Did Trump blame Jo Jorgensen for his loss?

No

Trump never blamed anyway, because he never admitted he lost. At most, it was illegal mail voting

[Pres Mike]

1) Was Klobuchar really Biden's first choice for VP and was he forced to abandon her after the George Floyd murder?

2) What was going on behind closed doors for the Democratic establishment after Nevada when Sanders became the frontrunner for the nomination?

3) Why was Trump so staunchly opposed to even the most common sense measures against COVID like masks?

1. Klobuchar was never Biden's first choice. Biden never had a "first choice''. He is famously indecisive. Biden did really like Whitmer, I suspect she was his first choice. But most of the selection process was after George Floyd. Harris was the natural option. But Jill absoletly did not want her.

2. Obama made some calls. He told Buttigieg personally and told him it was over, dropping out meant a comfy job in the cabinet. I don't know if Klobuchar and Beto spoke to Obama but they followed Buttigieg

[Pres Mike]

Did Trump blame Jo Jorgensen for his loss?

Donald Trump admitted that he lost?

Only once. A few days after the election, he was sad and said something along the lines "After we leave". After his "team" convinced him they could win in court, never again was the possiblity of having lost was said in the White House

[Pres Mike]

From Election Night to Biden's Inauguration, was there any talk in the White House about Trump's making another attempt in 2024, or did the idea of his running again come only later?

Also:

Was any campaign, on either side, concerned about mayor Bloomberg?

1. No. The only talk allowed was Trump winning in the courts and throwing out the mail ballots. Staying in office. Trump himself made noise about getting revenge on those abaonded him and acknowledged Biden's victory (Kemp and McConnell). Privaetly Trump feared going to jail after Jan 6.

2. The Biden campaign was slightly worried it would split the moderate vote, but probably a nothing burger. Buttigieg and Klobuchar campaigns thought "the nerve of him to jump in last minute". Trump did not expect him to get the nomination, although he thought Michelle Obama or Andrew Cuomo would replace Biden