If the pandemic never happened what would the results have been?

[Person Man]

Trump most likely wins losing only MI in an election sort of like Obama won re-election in 2012 losing only IN and NC.   But without the 2020 spring/summer riots I suspect GOP would do a bit worse down-ballot than reality.

This. I can see 6 or 7 more House Democrats hanging on and Collins losing, but Purdue winning outright. I can see Warnock still eventually winning, though.

So, the Senate would still be 50-50 and the House would be 227-208 D.

[Person Man]

Biden was essentially the same kind of establishment candidate that Hillary was; if Trump had not been distracted by culture wars, he could have employed the same playbook he used against Hillary to win re-election.

Except, again, Biden was never as unpopular as Clinton. "Culture wars" like COVID-related restrictions and riots were probably the only reason the election was even this close.

He also very much did try to employ the same playbook he used against Clinton, it just didn’t stick.

And the riots probably don't happen without COVID, at least not nearly to the same extent that they did in real life.

I should add that I still think COVID overall was a net negative for Trump, but that had more to do with how his handling of the pandemic became entangled with/inseparable from his personal conduct/unpopularity. If he hadn’t acted like the narcissist he is, he could have turned it into a winning issue (or at least a neutral one) rather than one which continuously reminded everyone of his egomania.

It definitely was a winnable election for Republicans, and it’s one any halfway competent Republican President with that record would have won. Even Trump had an incumbency advantage in 2020, it just wasn’t enough against an opponent far more popular/uncontroversial than Clinton. Of course Republicans also underperformed the overall fundamentals in 2018, again under Trump — if you look back on the entire Trump presidency/candidacy, it’s entirely possible that Trump's unpopularity and unique issues as a candidate delayed/concealed a Republican realignment which is only becoming evident now (as opposed to after November 2014, if a more skilled figure had led the party and won the nomination in 2016/been reelected in 2020). This might also partly explain why Democrats seem to be struggling so much right now — the Trump elections actually made the country look more Democratic than it is. Of course this is quite a different view from "Trump was the most electable candidate in 2016," but it’s one I’ve held for quite some time now. This also explains why the "low-propensity Trump voters" theory never really materialized this year.

I think this is mostly right.  Trump was a below replacement level Republican candidate and delayed  the realignment.  A generic R should have won the PV in 2016.  The idea that he has some unique base that otherwise stays home or votes Dem has clearly been debunked at this point.

I still think Trump would have won reelection without COVID, but it would not have been an impressive result.  Perhaps he picks up a couple of Clinton 2016 states and basically ties the PV, but his ceiling was below Bush 2004 in the PV and below Obama 2012 in the EC.  Downballot R's would do substantially better, though.  The House pretty clearly flips back in no COVID world and Pence would be on track to win in 2024 unless the economy crashed for some other reason.  

I would go a bit further and say that all he really had to do was be Generic Northern R on COVID (moderately pro-mask/social distancing until vaccination) and he would have gotten this result anyway.

The flip side of this is that a more Southern base type R might have had a significantly worse COVID response than Trump and then lost more dramatically.  Imagine a President Cruz gutting the CDC and throwing a giant Easter party in 2020?

I could see Trump as the reason why both parties are weak, Republicans were unable to fully mobilize the type of voters that ironically put Trump in the White House and Democrats haven't been able to adjust their message to stay competitive.

Then again, 2014 and the time thereafter was a reaction to everything that happened between 2008 and 2014. The same way 2006 and the time there after was a response to everything between 2000 and 2006. Most realigning elections only lead to another realigning election.