‘We’re thinking landslide’: Beyond D.C., GOP officials see Trump on glide path to reelection

[woodley park]

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/06/15/trump-glide-reelection-republican-officials-316457

Interviews with more than 50 state, district and county Republican Party chairs depict a version of the electoral landscape that is no worse for Trump than six months ago — and possibly even slightly better. According to this view, the coronavirus is on its way out and the economy is coming back. Polls are unreliable, Joe Biden is too frail to last, and the media still doesn’t get it.

“The more bad things happen in the country, it just solidifies support for Trump,” said Phillip Stephens, GOP chairman in Robeson County, N.C., one of several rural counties in that swing state that shifted from supporting Barack Obama in 2012 to Trump in 2016. “We’re calling him ‘Teflon Trump.’ Nothing’s going to stick, because if anything, it’s getting more exciting than it was in 2016.”

Delusion sure is a hell of a drug.

Thoughts? Are these guys a bunch of clowns, or are they on to something that literally everyone else is missing?

[Lord Admirale]

[DINGO Joe]

Klan gonna Klan

[GeorgiaModerate]

Part of it is probably the need to project confidence and optimism.  Part of it is believing their own talking points.   Part of it is probably truth based on local conditions; I don't doubt that Robeson and other rural counties may swing even further toward Trump.

Who knows, maybe their optimism will lead to overconfidence and complacence.

[Zache]

Can't wait to see the NYT/WaPo/Politico "Republicans in Disarray" articles on November 4th about how the Republicans were in meltdown mode the entire year

[Beet]

Nobody knows, but if he really got 300,000 people to sign up for his Tulsa rally it's gargantuan. This weekend, thousands of people lined the piers of San Diego to celebrate his 74th birthday. The support out there for him is massive. But we've created so many echo chambers on the left that we don't understand why he is so popular.

[Blair]

I'm more concerned that politico publishes these sort of articles.

The thing that made the 2018 race unbearable was how the press would panic & try and find every event which showed the Dems had blown it.

[Hindsight was 2020]

Nobody knows, but if he really got 300,000 people to sign up for his Tulsa rally it's gargantuan. This weekend, thousands of people lined the piers of San Diego to celebrate his 74th birthday. The support out there for him is massive. But we've created so many echo chambers on the left that we don't understand why he is so popular.

So now that limoliberal is cool you’re just gonna become the new concern troll?

[Alben Barkley]

Nobody knows, but if he really got 300,000 people to sign up for his Tulsa rally it's gargantuan. This weekend, thousands of people lined the piers of San Diego to celebrate his 74th birthday. The support out there for him is massive. But we've created so many echo chambers on the left that we don't understand why he is so popular.

Some liberals across the nation sign up for his rallies with no intention of going just to keep the seats empty.

And in any case rally size doesn't mean anything in terms of electoral results. Just ask Democratic nominee Bernie Sanders.

He has a cult base, sure, we know that. But there are no signs he's expanded it or that it will be enough for him.

[Ferguson97]

Lmao

Though these assholes did just make me paranoid about R's lying to pollsters

[Kung Fu Kenny]

I mean, Democrats shouldn't overplay their hand based on polling. We saw what happened in 2016--polls are not reliable and there may be a large group of voters who are underrepresented that will show up for Trump. We have to act like we're behind until we know for sure we've won. These maps where people are trying to argue for Texas, Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, etc. flipping are overdoing it. Keep it simple and focus on PA, WI, MI, and AZ and build from there. We don't need to demolish Trump to get the point across.

[Sir Mohamed]

Nobody knows, but if he really got 300,000 people to sign up for his Tulsa rally it's gargantuan. This weekend, thousands of people lined the piers of San Diego to celebrate his 74th birthday. The support out there for him is massive. But we've created so many echo chambers on the left that we don't understand why he is so popular.

With all due respect, the narrative "Trump is doing well" in this post hardly makes sense. As the 2020 primary showed, crowd sizes don't really matter. Otherwise, Sanders would have been the nominee and Biden done before April even begun. And what is even the point about San Diego? There will be more than 4 million Trump voters in CA this fall. That's more in a dozen of rural Rocky Mountain states combined. Does that prove CA is more red than WY, ID and MT combined?

Only group Mr. Trump's support is "massive" is his hardcore base, which is less than a third of the electorate. The dude never reached positive approvals over his term and, as we speak, is in Carter/HW territory months before the election. How is he popular then?

[Bojack Horseman]

We need to save this for posterity. Who knew LimoLiberal wrote for Politico?

[Alben Barkley]

I mean, Democrats shouldn't overplay their hand based on polling. We saw what happened in 2016--polls are not reliable and there may be a large group of voters who are underrepresented that will show up for Trump. We have to act like we're behind until we know for sure we've won. These maps where people are trying to argue for Texas, Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, etc. flipping are overdoing it. Keep it simple and focus on PA, WI, MI, and AZ and build from there. We don't need to demolish Trump to get the point across.

Polls were only off by like a point or two in 2016 nationwide. Some of the state polls had a bit larger errors, but there's no guarantee those errors will be replicated (likely some work has been done in the past four years to correct for them) or that any polling errors will once again be in Trump's favor.

And no, it's not "overdoing it" to argue that states that very well could flip according to the polls could flip. Nobody is saying Biden should prioritize those states over the most likely flips, but that doesn't mean he shouldn't invest in them at all (you want to keep Trump on his toes and force him to defend more territory rather than just be able to focus on the rust belt himself, and you do want to seize any opportunity you have and increase your room for error). And honestly, I would argue we DO need to demolish Trump to get the point across. It will make any claims of "voter fraud, RIGGED!" harder if the election is a blowout and it will send a clear signal to the GOP and the world that the country is absolutely done with Trump.

[Person Man]

I mean, Democrats shouldn't overplay their hand based on polling. We saw what happened in 2016--polls are not reliable and there may be a large group of voters who are underrepresented that will show up for Trump. We have to act like we're behind until we know for sure we've won. These maps where people are trying to argue for Texas, Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, etc. flipping are overdoing it. Keep it simple and focus on PA, WI, MI, and AZ and build from there. We don't need to demolish Trump to get the point across.

People lying to pollsters.

I think creating fake rsvps to his events is a reasonable thing to do.

[Kung Fu Kenny]

I mean, Democrats shouldn't overplay their hand based on polling. We saw what happened in 2016--polls are not reliable and there may be a large group of voters who are underrepresented that will show up for Trump. We have to act like we're behind until we know for sure we've won. These maps where people are trying to argue for Texas, Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, etc. flipping are overdoing it. Keep it simple and focus on PA, WI, MI, and AZ and build from there. We don't need to demolish Trump to get the point across.

People lying to pollsters.

I think creating fake rsvps to his events is a reasonable thing to do.

Which is why I'm pumping the breaks on NPV polls, because some state polls are far too close for comfort.

[pbrower2a]

They believe what they want. They live in an alternate universe of their choosing.

[Crumpets]

Spoken like the Democrats around oh [checks watch] 4 years ago, about this time.

[Beet]

Nobody knows, but if he really got 300,000 people to sign up for his Tulsa rally it's gargantuan. This weekend, thousands of people lined the piers of San Diego to celebrate his 74th birthday. The support out there for him is massive. But we've created so many echo chambers on the left that we don't understand why he is so popular.

Some liberals across the nation sign up for his rallies with no intention of going just to keep the seats empty.

And in any case rally size doesn't mean anything in terms of electoral results. Just ask Democratic nominee Bernie Sanders.

He has a cult base, sure, we know that. But there are no signs he's expanded it or that it will be enough for him.

Bernie's largest rally was around 25,000 IIRC. 300,000 is out of this world level.

[Senator Spark]

Trump is going to be in good shape with the economic recovery. Count on it.

[MR DARK BRANDON]

Trump is going to be in good shape with the economic recovery. Count on it.

Please tell me more about how the jobs bounce turned out.

[Stranger in a strange land]

Part of it is probably the need to project confidence and optimism.  Part of it is believing their own talking points.   Part of it is probably truth based on local conditions; I don't doubt that Robeson and other rural counties may swing even further toward Trump.

Who knows, maybe their optimism will lead to overconfidence and complacence.

Thinking that you can't possibly lose an election is a great way to lose an election.

[Tartarus Sauce]

This sounds like a party that doesn’t want to face the reality of the situation it finds itself in.

[Brittain33]

Nobody knows, but if he really got 300,000 people to sign up for his Tulsa rally it's gargantuan. This weekend, thousands of people lined the piers of San Diego to celebrate his 74th birthday. The support out there for him is massive. But we've created so many echo chambers on the left that we don't understand why he is so popular.

Some liberals across the nation sign up for his rallies with no intention of going just to keep the seats empty.

And in any case rally size doesn't mean anything in terms of electoral results. Just ask Democratic nominee Bernie Sanders.

He has a cult base, sure, we know that. But there are no signs he's expanded it or that it will be enough for him.

Bernie's largest rally was around 25,000 IIRC. 300,000 is out of this world level.

There’s an enormous difference between entering your name on a website and actually attending a rally, Beet. I know at least some of those 300,000 are liberals screwing with the Trump campaign and many of the rest may have no intent of attending.

[BlueGrassKentuckian]

A lot of that is posturing but there is truth to it. Trump has huge support among Republicans/his base. I just went through the 2016 election archive, lots of similar state poll and NPV margins, lots of people saying Trump would be defeated in a landslide.. and look what happened. Hillary lost all 6 states that Obama carried TWICE and showed significant polling error. Not to mention, she almost lost New Hampshire, Nevada and Minnesota. Don’t be complacent and the Dems should of picked a better candidate.