Did Tim Kaine cost Hillary votes

[Da2017]

She could used a more dynamic Vp. Tim Kaine turned off a lot of progressive. I don't believe he was Sarah Palin bad, but he was a boring.

[TML]

I think this is very true in the sense that people who would have voted for her didn't show up to vote. It is not so true in the sense that people flipped to Trump because of Kaine.

[RINO Tom]

I don't know how much it actually affected the final outcome or anything, but the selection of Kane certainly doubled down on the image of Hillary running on a strictly "I am the sensible, enlightened alternative, and that is all you need to take into consideration" shtick.  In Iowa (where I lived during the 2016 election), Hillary's ads were very protectionist, populist and focusing on Trump's hypocrisy on issues of offshoring and whatnot because she knew the Democratic base in Iowa depended on those voters.  I imagine her ads were quite different in Virginia.  The selection of Kaine, rather than a nod to Sanders voters or even a better pick like Brown, really doubled down on the "winning over moderate Republicans" strategy, IMO.

[AN63093]

Nobody cares about the VPs.  People sometimes claim that a VP choice influenced their decision, but anyone who says so is lying to you and just presenting a post hoc justification for a decision that was already made, and made on (most likely) much more trivial factors.  Of course, people do not like to betray the fact that they aren't terribly sophisticated in their decision making, so they'll come up with all sorts of post hoc justifications to pretend like they were analyzing things during the campaign.

Not a single person who flipped R in Luzerne PA was planning on voting for Clinton, and then changed their mind when she picked Kaine.  And I do not mean that as hyperbole, I mean that I'd be willing to gamble that quite literally zero people made that decision.

[UWS]

Likely. Maybe Kaine’s past opposition to abortion as Governor of Virginia, for example, may have led some pro-choice voters to stay home on Election Day.

[Some of My Best Friends Are Gay]

Likely. Maybe Kaine’s past opposition to abortion as Governor of Virginia, for example, may have led some pro-choice voters to stay home on Election Day.

I would doubt this.

It's more likely that his centrism on economic issues led some progressive voters to stay home or cast a protest vote for a third party, but whether this actually had an impact on the election as a whole is very hard to say, and I'd guess it didn't really.

[GM Team Member and Senator WB]

To me, picking Kaine reinforced the belief among progressives like myself that Hillary wasn't going to focus on their wing of the party.

 It certainly cost her votes. Did it cost her the election? That depends on who she selects instead.

[Karpatsky]

To me, picking Kaine reinforced the belief among progressives like myself that Hillary wasn't going to focus on their wing of the party.

 It certainly cost her votes. Did it cost her the election? That depends on who she selects instead.

Sherrod Brown would have won it for her.

[Ilhan Apologist]

I don't know how much it actually affected the final outcome or anything, but the selection of Kane certainly doubled down on the image of Hillary running on a strictly "I am the sensible, enlightened alternative, and that is all you need to take into consideration" shtick.  In Iowa (where I lived during the 2016 election), Hillary's ads were very protectionist, populist and focusing on Trump's hypocrisy on issues of offshoring and whatnot because she knew the Democratic base in Iowa depended on those voters.  I imagine her ads were quite different in Virginia.  The selection of Kaine, rather than a nod to Sanders voters or even a better pick like Brown, really doubled down on the "winning over moderate Republicans" strategy, IMO.

I mean, she had a good reason not to pick Brown, which looks even better in retrospect. I wonder how it would have gone if she had picked Merkley though. Would have been a nod to Sanders voters at the very least.

[cinyc]

No. Hillary Clinton cost Hillary Clinton votes. She was a terrible candidate who made stupid decisions, especially at the end of the campaign. If she paid a little more attention to states like Wisconsin (never visited after the primary), Michigan and Pennsylvania, she might have won.

[Ilhan Apologist]

No. Hillary Clinton cost Hillary Clinton votes. She was a terrible candidate who made stupid decisions, especially at the end of the campaign. If she paid a little more attention to states like Wisconsin (never visited after the primary), Michigan and Pennsylvania, she might have won.

I mean, that was her advisors' intuition, not her own.

[cinyc]

No. Hillary Clinton cost Hillary Clinton votes. She was a terrible candidate who made stupid decisions, especially at the end of the campaign. If she paid a little more attention to states like Wisconsin (never visited after the primary), Michigan and Pennsylvania, she might have won.

I mean, that was her advisors' intuition, not her own.

The buck stops at the top. Otherwise, what you're saying is that Hillary Clinton either lacked her own intuition on to where to campaign or was too weak to overrule her team's bad decisions. Either way, it's not a good look.

Bill Clinton generally stayed in the background for fear of repeating 2008, but had she listened to her husband and campaigned more in and tried to connect to exurban and rural areas, the result may have been different."Basket of deplorables" was an even bigger gaffe than Romney's "binders full of women."

[💥💥 brandon bro (he/him/his)]

Any Progressive voter who stayed home because they were upset that the VP, whose only role in dictating policy is serving as a tie-breaker in the Senate, was insufficiently progressive would have found some other dumb reason to not vote for her even if she did choose a "progressive" VP.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Tim Kaine showed that Hillary wasn't going to even pretend to appeal to progressives.

[Ilhan Apologist]

No. Hillary Clinton cost Hillary Clinton votes. She was a terrible candidate who made stupid decisions, especially at the end of the campaign. If she paid a little more attention to states like Wisconsin (never visited after the primary), Michigan and Pennsylvania, she might have won.

I mean, that was her advisors' intuition, not her own.

The buck stops at the top. Otherwise, what you're saying is that Hillary Clinton either lacked her own intuition on to where to campaign or was too weak to overrule her team's bad decisions. Either way, it's not a good look.

Bill Clinton generally stayed in the background for fear of repeating 2008, but had she listened to her husband and campaigned more in and tried to connect to exurban and rural areas, the result may have been different."Basket of deplorables" was an even bigger gaffe than Romney's "binders full of women."

You think she should have been clairvoyant and done what her pollsters told her was a bad idea?

[cinyc]

No. Hillary Clinton cost Hillary Clinton votes. She was a terrible candidate who made stupid decisions, especially at the end of the campaign. If she paid a little more attention to states like Wisconsin (never visited after the primary), Michigan and Pennsylvania, she might have won.

I mean, that was her advisors' intuition, not her own.

The buck stops at the top. Otherwise, what you're saying is that Hillary Clinton either lacked her own intuition on to where to campaign or was too weak to overrule her team's bad decisions. Either way, it's not a good look.

Bill Clinton generally stayed in the background for fear of repeating 2008, but had she listened to her husband and campaigned more in and tried to connect to exurban and rural areas, the result may have been different."Basket of deplorables" was an even bigger gaffe than Romney's "binders full of women."

You think she should have been clairvoyant and done what her pollsters told her was a bad idea?

A candidate can't always be guided by the polls. I'm not a Bill Clinton fan, but even I can admit that Bill Clinton has 100x better political instincts than any pollster and almost every other living politician.

[Inmate Trump]

I don't think anyone was deterred from voting for Hillary because of Tim Kaine, but I do think she could've chosen someone else who would have brought in more votes.

He was boring.  He lost the VP debate to Mike Pence.  I think he was a weak choice for VP who added basically nothing to a candidate who could have benefitted greatly from a running mate who was A) something other than the standard straight white male, B) exciting and enthusiastic and non-bland, and C) from a swing state, which Virginia is not.

[Ilhan Apologist]

No. Hillary Clinton cost Hillary Clinton votes. She was a terrible candidate who made stupid decisions, especially at the end of the campaign. If she paid a little more attention to states like Wisconsin (never visited after the primary), Michigan and Pennsylvania, she might have won.

I mean, that was her advisors' intuition, not her own.

The buck stops at the top. Otherwise, what you're saying is that Hillary Clinton either lacked her own intuition on to where to campaign or was too weak to overrule her team's bad decisions. Either way, it's not a good look.

Bill Clinton generally stayed in the background for fear of repeating 2008, but had she listened to her husband and campaigned more in and tried to connect to exurban and rural areas, the result may have been different."Basket of deplorables" was an even bigger gaffe than Romney's "binders full of women."

You think she should have been clairvoyant and done what her pollsters told her was a bad idea?

A candidate can't always be guided by the polls. I'm not a Bill Clinton fan, but even I can admit that Bill Clinton has 100x better political instincts than any pollster and almost every other living politician.

Just because he happened to be right in this one instance?

[Sestak]

He may have cost them votes not because of what he was but because of everything he wasn't.

[538Electoral]

I don't know. But I do know he likely was a help in Clinton winning Virginia.

[Inmate Trump]

I don't know. But I do know he likely was a help in Clinton winning Virginia.

She would've won Virginia anyway.  Sure, he may have helped, but it'd have gone to her in the end.

She should've chosen someone who was from an actual swing state.

[💥💥 brandon bro (he/him/his)]

But I do know he likely was a help in Clinton winning Virginia.

How, pray tell, do you know this? There's close to no actual evidence that this is true.

But if you guys want to delude yourselves into thinking a state that elected a D governor by 9 points is more competitive than it actually is be my guest.

[TrumpBritt24]

Given how toxic both Presidential candidates were, the VP seat played a substantially weaker role in 2016; but it's quite obvious that someone like an Elizabeth Warren or Julian Castro wouldn't have gotten killed in a debate by Pence as Kaine did.

[Ilhan Apologist]

Given how toxic both Presidential candidates were, the VP seat played a substantially weaker role in 2016; but it's quite obvious that someone like an Elizabeth Warren or Julian Castro wouldn't have gotten killed in a debate by Pence as Kaine did.

I mean, at least for Hillary a less forgettable VP would have helped distract from her toxicity.

[Gracile]

I don't know. But I do know he likely was a help in Clinton winning Virginia.

No. It didn't make a difference considering certain parts of VA that voted for Kaine/Obama in 2012 shifted away from Clinton. She would have won VA by a similar margin regardless of her VP choice.

To answer the question, I think choosing Kaine may have put off some of the more left-leaning voters who may have voted for Clinton if she chose a more progressive VP. However, I think a lot of those voters were never really on her side, to begin with.