The “Who is running in 2020?” tea leaves thread, Part 3

[Calthrina950]

Why are so many Democrats running? Such a fractured field may only end up helping Trump.

[Calthrina950]

Why are so many Democrats running? Such a fractured field may only end up helping Trump.

I mean the 2016 Republican primary was quite fractured as well. It didn’t seem to hurt Trump in the slightest.

It actually did but he won in spite of it. If by magic you remove all the intraparty disputes in the 2016 Republican Primaries, Trump has a real shot at winning New Hampshire and Minnesota as well at the very least. There was a small percentage of the electorate who voted for McMullin, Johnson, and Hillary who might very well have voted for Trump were it not for the grudges they hadn't let go of when he beat their favored GOP candidate.

There is a possibility that we see that same phenomenon cost the Democrats a victory in 2020. For instance, a small percentage of the electorate may opt to vote for non-major party centrist candidates or even Trump himself if someone like Bernie wins. You can also have the opposite scenario where a small percentage of the electorate may opt to vote for the Green Party or other non-major party progressive candidates if someone like Biden wins. Even if it's someone who isn't quite a centrist like Kamala or Beto, the dynamics of the campaign process could lead to them being too tainted by what they had to do to beat Bernie. There were Bernie supporters who stayed home rather than vote for Hillary in 2016 and while those same people are probably less likely to do the same in 2020 if the candidate isn't Bernie, don't discount the possibility of that happening again. Don't also discount the possibility of the #NeverBernie crowd refusing to united behind him even if he is their best chance at unseating Trump.

This is a good analysis.

[Calthrina950]

Why are so many Democrats running? Such a fractured field may only end up helping Trump.

I mean the 2016 Republican primary was quite fractured as well. It didn’t seem to hurt Trump in the slightest.

President Ford's second term agrees with this too!

.

He was an incumbent president challenged in the primary this new situation has nothing to do with that

I think they're referencing the fact that Carter emerged from a very crowded Dem field and that didn't hinder his chances in the general.

It might not have hurt Carter's chances, but by nominating Carter the process handed the Democrats a much weaker nominee than they might have had otherwise - not to mention a trainwreck of a presidency that was bad for the country and even worse for the party. Somethong similar happened to the Republicans in 2016.

I don't think a similar result is out if the question here. The historical record, brief that it is, suggests that competitive primaries produce stronger presidents than coronations, so long as they aren't clown cars. This might be worth more discussion in another thread.

I think that if this were a competitive primary between Harris, Booker, Warren, and Klobuchar, Democrats would be in better shape. Sanders and Biden are too old, while Gillibrand has no traction. And that is to say nothing of Gabbard, or Castro, or Buttigieg, or Delaney, or Inslee, or Hickenlooper, etc.

[Calthrina950]

Great profile on Bennet from the Atlantic:

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/03/senator-michael-bennet-weighing-run-president/583993/

POLK CITY, Iowa—Sitting under a framed ticket from an old Obama town-hall meeting, down in the basement of a farmhouse surrounded by snowy fields of corn and soybeans, I tell Michael Bennet that an Iowa Democrat who’d come to hear him speak compared him to pea soup. Good pea soup, hearty. But still pea soup, in a 2020 primary field that has sizzling fajitas and cake on the table.

...

Bennet is on edge. He has been warning of the destruction of democracy for years. He thinks he’s more Cassandra than the boy who cried wolf, as he points out when I remind him that in October 2017, he warned that Trump’s decision to cancel the protections for Dreamers needed to be fixed immediately. It hasn’t been. “These issues are tearing at the heart of who we are,” he says.

If Bennet were somehow to obtain the Democratic nomination, I wouldn't have a problem voting for him. He, along with Hickenlooper, Biden, Bullock, Klobuchar, and Brown, would all receive my vote over Trump. However, none of the ones that I listed (except for Biden), has any shot at getting the nomination.

[Calthrina950]

Great profile on Bennet from the Atlantic:

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/03/senator-michael-bennet-weighing-run-president/583993/

POLK CITY, Iowa—Sitting under a framed ticket from an old Obama town-hall meeting, down in the basement of a farmhouse surrounded by snowy fields of corn and soybeans, I tell Michael Bennet that an Iowa Democrat who’d come to hear him speak compared him to pea soup. Good pea soup, hearty. But still pea soup, in a 2020 primary field that has sizzling fajitas and cake on the table.

...

Bennet is on edge. He has been warning of the destruction of democracy for years. He thinks he’s more Cassandra than the boy who cried wolf, as he points out when I remind him that in October 2017, he warned that Trump’s decision to cancel the protections for Dreamers needed to be fixed immediately. It hasn’t been. “These issues are tearing at the heart of who we are,” he says.

If Bennet were somehow to obtain the Democratic nomination, I wouldn't have a problem voting for him. He, along with Hickenlooper, Biden, Bullock, Klobuchar, and Brown, would all receive my vote over Trump. However, none of the ones that I listed (except for Biden), has any shot at getting the nomination.

Would you vote for Trump over Bernie? Or Trump over a progressive candidate who you think needs to be stopped, or because you don't want a Democratic President with a Democratic congress?

I would have voted for Sanders back in 2016, if he had won the nomination then. But in 2020, I would probably go third-party. I will definitely vote third-party if Warren, Harris, Booker, or Gillibrand obtain the nomination. I also forgot to mention Buttigieg, Gabbard, and Delaney, all of whom I would vote for if they somehow became the nominee (which they won't). I would go third-party with Castro, though.