Would party fatigue have impacted Biden were he the nominee?

[History505]

If Joe Biden was the Democratic Nominee in 2016, do you think it would be much more difficult for him to win given that the last time Democratic Presidents were elected back to back was prior to the Civil War?

[Lord Admirale]

No? What destroyed Hillary was that she ran a terrible campaign and she seemed very corrupt to much of the American populace.

[Virginiá]

If Joe Biden was the Democratic Nominee in 2016, do you think it would be much more difficult for him to win given that the last time Democratic Presidents were elected back to back was prior to the Civil War?

What about FDR->Truman? I know that he basically became an incumbent, but he still held his own in 1948 after 16 years of Democratic rule. That is as good a test for the idea of party fatigue as any. But, I think Party 'fatigue' is less of a problem than maybe some people think it is, but all things considered, Biden would have a much easier time taking on Trump than Hillary, who was getting hit with extraordinary levels of negative media attention in relation to her emails, in addition to endless self-made scandals coming home to roost. She was far from an example of an "average" candidate with an average number of issues.

[Mr. Smith]

Yes. He probably would've won by roughly the same percentage, but just barely gotten over the line in The Rust Belt to hold the EV up.

Even in 1988 was party fatigue a factor. It just so happened that the insider floor was much higher, the nation less polarized, and the Jackson/Gore split allowed a robot to the top. [aka 2016 if Jeb! had somehow won]

@Ginny: Truman didn't hold his own, Dewey just happened to sabotage himself thinking it was in the bag. If Dewey had bothered to campaign like he did in '44, he would've flipped California, taken the whole Manufacturing Belt and won the election.

[Rookie Yinzer]

It would have impacted him but he still would have won.

Biden keeps the Rust Belt but Trump still flips Florida because black turnout would have dropped regardless with Obama gone.

I believe Biden would have received the same amount of resistance from the extreme left as Hillary did. He has a lot of problematic things in his past that would infuriate purists. However, it would have been easier for the candidates who hated both Trump AND Clinton to pull the lever for him instead of third party or choosing who they disliked less (Trump).

[100% pro-life no matter what]

Yes, but he could have overcome it against someone like Trump.  Against most Republicans, though, no Democrat could have won.

[uti2]

Yes. He probably would've won by roughly the same percentage, but just barely gotten over the line in The Rust Belt to hold the EV up.

Even in 1988 was party fatigue a factor. It just so happened that the insider floor was much higher, the nation less polarized, and the Jackson/Gore split allowed a robot to the top. [aka 2016 if Jeb! had somehow won]

@Ginny: Truman didn't hold his own, Dewey just happened to sabotage himself thinking it was in the bag. If Dewey had bothered to campaign like he did in '44, he would've flipped California, taken the whole Manufacturing Belt and won the election.

To be fair, Rubio is a better comparison for Dukakis (& Dewey). They were superficial candidates that were running on 'electability' (their arguments were that they were qualified because of superficial attributes) and had similar immigrant background narratives. Both were seen as shoo-ins for entirely superficial reasons as well. Not to mention the 'robotic' factor.

[uti2]

Yes, but he could have overcome it against someone like Trump.  Against most Republicans, though, no Democrat could have won.

Let's look at what happened. Romney got destroyed by Obama, Kerry came far closer to winning electorally than Romney ever did, and Gore won the popular vote in 2000, and barely 'lost' the EV.

One party constantly underperforms the general trend.

The only weakness Dems have is when they court republicans instead of their own base which is what Gore & Hillary tried to do. It is ironic, because Hillary only adopted that GOP strategy in the context of Trump, she changed from her previous strategy of running an Obama '12-esque campaign.

[Pericles]

It was going to be a challenge for whatever Democrat, and parties rarely win three times in a row. The fundamentals of the election favored Trump-in fact based on just the fundamentals Clinton did better than she should have. However it wasn't an insurmountable obstacle and the Democrats could have done well regardless if they had a better candidate and campaign(Bush 1988 won in a landslide for example).

[uti2]

It was going to be a challenge for whatever Democrat, and parties rarely win three times in a row. The fundamentals of the election favored Trump-in fact based on just the fundamentals Clinton did better than she should have. However it wasn't an insurmountable obstacle and the Democrats could have done well regardless if they had a better candidate and campaign(Bush 1988 won in a landslide for example).

Dems outperformed the fundamentals in 2000 and 2004, while the GOP underperformed in 2008 and 2012.

Bush's margin of victory was 120k votes in OH, similar to Trump's 80k votes in the rustbelt.

[Da2017]

I think Biden would of done better. Trump did not run that good of a campaign. His message was not coherent until the finals weeks of the campaign. Hillary actually outperformed the fundamentals. Any democrat was considered to be an under dog going in to the 2016 election. Biden would take some of votes away from Trump. He is more likable than Hillary.

Biden holds the rust belt+Florida. Ohio could either way.