Trump Pollster John McLaughlin Explains His Client’s Lead
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Hi, I'm Tara Palmieri. I'm Punk's senior political correspondent, and this is Somebody's Gotta Win. On this episode, I have Donald Trump's pollster on the line, John McLaughlin. He's been working with Trump since 2016, even before that, back in 2011, when Trump was dreaming up his political future. He's been working with Trump since 2016,

While he's been criticized in the past for painting a rosier picture for Donald Trump than some of the public polling, he did accurately predict what percentage of the national vote he would win in 2016 and 2020. His latest polling is better for Trump than the latest public polling that shows Biden getting a small bump, edging closer to Trump nationally.

We talk about what's driving this shift, which Biden 2020 voters are now voting for Trump and which Biden voters Trump has lost. Plus, we talk about the impact of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on the race and how the hush money trial is impacting voter sentiment. So let's get down to it. We've got a lot to cover.

John, thanks so much for joining the show. I am always fascinated by public polling versus the polling that the candidates are getting. And everyone in town in Washington is talking about Biden's bump. It's a little bump, but it's a little bump.

But it's about two points. NBC had a poll that shows him at 44% to Trump's 46% nationally, with 10% undecided. It was taken at the same time as your poll, and you work for Donald Trump, like we mentioned, you're one of his pollsters. And you have Trump at 49% and Biden at 45%. So that's a 4% difference. Tell me how...

they're polling wrong and what you're doing right or vice versa. Why are you getting different numbers than NBC? Well, it's not apples to apples. NBC did a poll of registered voters and the universe of registered voters or eligible voters in the country would be well more than 160 million that voted in 2020. So we model our

polling after a turnout like 2020, which Biden won. So there's four points more Biden 2020 voters than there are in the Trump voters in our poll. However, since we screen for likely voters and we use a 2020 model,

You know, you can go back on our website where we posted the results on McLaughlinOnline.com. And you can see that back in 2016, when we were for President Trump, but we also still did our published monthly polling. And back in 2020, we still polled for President Trump and we published these polls. We weren't leading in the national popular vote. So we went ahead in the national popular vote.

about the same time that Biden decided to surrender Afghanistan to the Taliban. And since then, Trump's been leading in the national popular vote or running even. And in our last national poll, he's up 49-45. It was in March after we won the primaries and we got a post-primary bump for Trump. We were up 49-33. Now it's 49-45.

But, you know, that's significantly better than we were doing in 2016 or 2020 at this point in time. Yeah. And I want to point out for our listeners that you were right in 2016 by saying Trump would get 46 percent of the national vote. And in 2020, when you said 47 percent. Right. Right. And we were always we were always battling for an electoral vote win.

where we could lose the national popular vote, but we still could win. So while everybody was saying, you know, there was a Hillary lock in 2016, we were saying, no, we could win a close race. And President Trump proved us right when he, you know, we were barnstorming to like five different states a day. And he was, you know, focused on those battleground states where we could get our votes out. And by 78,000 votes out of the 139 million,

in 2016, you were able to win an electoral college victory. And in 2020,

You know, we're still battling for pretty much the same battleground states. And, you know, by 44000 votes, Biden was able to pull it out out of 160 million. Only in the battleground states, though. He won the popular vote. Right. He won the national popular vote. But Georgia, 11000 votes, Arizona, 11000 votes in Wisconsin, 22000 votes in.

you know, we were behind. So Biden won the electoral college. Right. So how should we be looking at public polling? Is it all about the battleground states? Do these national matchups even really matter? I think you should be looking at the battleground states, but even the battleground counties, his counties, what happened was we had a strategy in, in 2016,

uh, that I think, you know, the Democrats caught on to. I mean, when, when you read, uh, David Plouffe's book in 2020, it was in March of that year. He had a, he had a book out where he understood that when Donald Trump asked me in the summer of, uh,

2016, how are we going to win? All these national polls have us losing. And I said, we are going to bring out new voters to the electorate. We're going to bring out working class voters who, you know, were making less than $60,000 a year, who were one paycheck away from destruction. And we're going to bring them out in the key battleground states, which Donald Trump did. He appealed to working class voters.

And they came out so that the turnout was 9 million more voters in 2016 than it was in 2012. And so when they talked about pivot counties where Obama had won and then Trump had won, we were bringing out new voters to change the election. Well,

Well, David Plouffe in his book, you know, A Citizen's Guide to Defeating Donald Trump, he was focused on those counties within those battleground states where they were registering new voters and they were going to make it easier for them to vote, meaning they were going to have drop boxes. They were going to ballot harvest and you were going to see increases of voters like in Wisconsin. They had these permanently disabled voters that were bringing ballots in for it.

And so you had 160 million voters come out. But in these key battleground states, they were making it easier for the voters like Georgia with the drop boxes. They got rid of voter ID practically. And Georgia, they changed the election laws.

so that you could vote, whether it's absentee or secure drop boxes or in person, but you had to have voter ID, whether you were voting absentee or whether you were voting... Well, we were in the middle of a pandemic too. It was an unprecedented time. Right. So we're not in a pandemic anymore. So it's time that the voter law is that you have voter ID and you secure the... Like Florida has a great law in terms of

When you vote, you get an email that would acknowledge your vote. And whether you vote early in person, whether you vote absentee or whether you vote on Election Day, you need voter ID so they know it's you. You mentioned 2016, right? And this idea of bringing out a new coalition of voters, bringing out new voters who didn't vote before. Who is Trump losing from his 2016 campaign?

coalition, because he obviously lost some people in 2020 to Biden. Oh, yeah. But the people who are dead, that's who we're losing right now because we're doing better. What do you mean by people who are dead? Like seniors, rural voters?

Women. We're performing better than we did in 2016, without a doubt. How is that? With who? Well, the key thing is there's four or 5% in these polls who voted for Biden in 2020 that are now voting for Trump in 2024. Who are those voters really quick? Who are the voters that were voting for Biden that are now going to vote for Trump? A quarter of them are black, a quarter of them are Hispanic. Their average age is 35. They're younger, they're more diverse. And

And by the way, Biden knows it. So he's he's focused on trying to win those voters back. I mean, they're they're spending a great deal of time trying to win African-American votes back in Georgia and North Carolina. They're we're we're doing everything we can to keep those votes. What are you doing, by the way? How are you keeping those voters?

campaigning to them. The Trump campaign is actively reaching out to these voters. I mean, when Donald Trump himself went to Georgia to be indicted and arraigned back in June of 23, when you drove through those communities in recent rallies, it was a diverse crowd. It's not

It's not the usual Trump mega Republicans like they portray. So that Donald Trump is getting support because they reach out to them. You're doing social media. You're doing voter outreach. So the Trump campaign is speaking directly to those voters. Our Super PAC has been advertising on African-American radio. Okay. And the Biden campaign is trying to come back and get those voters back. Okay.

So you're seeing, you know, Biden went out early as we were securing the nomination and it was a historic nomination so that I mean, he, you know, President Trump, he kids about he'll he'll get up at a rally and say, oh, John McLaughlin, great pollster.

I got better numbers than Lincoln and Washington. And then I'll get a bunch of phone calls from your colleagues in the media. And I say, no, I don't remember that. I did work for Arthur Finkelstein when he was one of Reagan's three pollsters. So I can tell you that Trump's numbers in the primaries, which were record, historic record wins in the primaries,

They're better than Reagan's and Aiden's. Absolutely. You were ahead of that as well. You saw that he was really going to blow it out of the park in Iowa and New Hampshire, Nevada. So, yeah, I saw that in your polling. But I do want to go back to this, you know, the fact that it is tightening a little bit between Trump and Biden. I know it's still early days, but like he's clearly lost a few points among Biden voters. Who are they right now? Who are the people that he's losing? Actually, we're holding in our polls, we're holding our vote.

Biden is getting back some of the votes that he was losing that were probably undecided. And there were probably Democrats who cared about abortion as an issue or worried about the Trump conviction trials, because right now,

I mean, credit Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles, the Trump campaign ran a great primary campaign. And we have momentum in March coming out of that. And we were reaching out well beyond our Republican base. And then what happens now is you're looking at, you know, my March poll to the to the April poll. We're still ahead. But Biden's getting back.

There was about four or five percent that was undecided that he had in 2020. You know, so basically he's getting back, say, pro-abortion voters who he should have had in the first place that he was losing because he's losing them on inflation. Plus, he's also losing what I call safety moms.

So you've got these suburban independent and Democrat moms who are saying, you know, there's illegal immigration that really is bringing criminals into the country. Fentanyl's out of control. They're worried about their children's safety. So crime. People who put crime at the top of their list. Yeah. Women. Right. And they're more independent-leaning. Is that the thinking or they're Democrats? Some are Democrats and they're more independent-leaning. And I call them safety moms.

Their moms were very worried about immigration as an issue or crime and safety as an issue. And they were also upset about inflation because even though the Biden people are telling them inflation has gone down since last year, compared to when Trump

was president, they're spending on a trip to the supermarket, they're spending $200, $100 more at least to feed their families. And now when they're going to buy gas, it's not like $2 a gallon when Trump was president.

It's going back up towards $4 a gallon nationally. And some places near big cities, like whether it's New York or California, which aren't in play yet. Although the Siena poll had Biden only up by 10 points. Wow. You think California and New York are in play? Not California, but New York. Interesting. New York is with, not my poll, but the Siena poll as of last week had 10 points. That's the dream for Donald Trump to win his home state. Yeah.

Yeah, and they're giving us a lot of press and a lot of time to campaign in New York, unfortunately. And New Yorkers have known Trump the longest. Do you think he'll actually play in New York? Are you guys actually going to spend money there? Unfortunately, we're playing in New York right now every day. So it's like... Oh, you're right on the campaign trail, right in a Manhattan lower criminal court. And when you saw when Donald Trump, there was recently a police officer that was gunned down by cashless bail criminals that should not have been

you know, on the streets at all. They should have been in with based on their prior arrests and record. They should have been in jail. But because of the breakdown of law and order in New York, they were out there and it was tragic. They gunned down a police officer in who was from Long Island in New York City. And Donald Trump

went to the wake and paid his respects to the family. And you recently had upstate New York, you had two police officers killed by some madman with a gun. And Biden's going to Syracuse

but he's not paying any respects for the police officers. So, you know, so it's, it's, there is a, there is a problem in New York. Okay. Can I ask you, what's a bad day for Biden? Like what's he losing from 2020? A bad day for Biden is when something happens where people say inflation is not really going down. We can't cut the interest rates and your mortgage payment that,

you know, is double when Trump was president is still going to be double. Your food bill is still going to be double than when Trump's president. And your gas bill is going to be double when Trump's president. And your utility bill is going up. So good luck paying for air conditioning in the summer and heat in the winter. So that's a good day for Trump, a bad day for Biden.

And another bad day is when Iran lobs missiles at Israel. It's really not about Trump, though, then. You're making it more about referendum on Biden, then. That's sort of the strategy, then. No, his record's terrible. He's making Donald Trump look good every day. So what's Biden losing from 2020? Like, who do you think he loses? Well, I told you, the safety moms. Safety moms. Younger voters and also working class minorities. You really think you're going to be able to hold on to the Black and Hispanic vote?

Yes. I mean, Republicans have won 20% of the black vote before in statewide races. I mean, I've done it in Georgia with Governor Deal. That's how he got elected by eight points. It's a different population down there. Well, it's also you have middle class voters who support charter schools that the Biden Department of Education doesn't.

You have African-American voters who work in law enforcement, who want to send their kids to charter schools. In New York State, I mean, we were talking about New York, they got a cap on charter schools in New York City. So if you want opportunities, North Carolina, if you want opportunities for your children, you happen to be African-American,

You got to seriously take a look at voting for Donald Trump. And it's happening. Okay, I want to ask you, Trump is obviously like going off on TikTok, right? He's against the ban. Does he think this appeals to Gen Z voters? Is that why he's doing that? No, I think he truly believes he has more of a libertarian position on this. I think he'd like to be able to say that, you know,

that they should have American ownership. That's when he was president, he was calling for men. He would like to see them with American ownership. But I think what's changed in between is... A good talk from Jeff Yass. No, no, no. What I'm thinking more of is when those drop boxes appeared in Georgia, they were paid for by Zuckerberg.

by grants. And so there was, there was basically, he was using, he was using his money where it was $400 million estimated, right? That he was basically registering voters in Democrat areas, not in the rural areas, but in Democrat areas.

And then he was giving out grants to make it, you know, in Wisconsin, it was a big deal. He was giving out these grants where the government wasn't running the election. They basically had partisans where he got a tax deduction and there was no FEC filing.

Maybe a new alliance with TikTok, but that's China, so it's a bit awkward. No, no, I think it was more like, look at Elon Musk and X. Right before the election, we were censored. The New York Post, the oldest newspaper in America,

was censored. And the story about the Hunter Biden laptop wasn't published. And we posted our post-election survey, which wasn't done for Trump, but was done that we usually do every year. And the Media Research Center asked a question. They paid for the questions where 36% of the Biden voters were not aware of the Hunter Biden laptop story. And among those voters, 13% of them said they would have changed their vote, not necessarily come to Trump. Some of them would have

But others would have not voted for Biden or voted for another candidate. Okay. I want to bring it back to the polling. So how is the trial impacting voters, this hush money trial? I think it's taken away from our narrative, where we'd like to be talking about our record versus Biden's.

President Trump's record as president versus Biden's record. And instead, we have to talk about he has to be in Manhattan every day. And this is unprecedented in America. And when you look at the poll that we published last week,

66% of all voters say politics has played a role in these indictments. Because last year was the Biden indictment phase. He was ordering all the supporters and minions to indict Donald Trump. This year he's ordering them to convict Donald Trump. There's no actual explicit ordering. Merrick Garland works for Biden. He's got Jack Smith working for him. He was complaining to the New York Times that Merrick Garland wasn't moving the indictments fast enough. So you got Jack Smith there.

Colangelo was what, the number three person in the Department of Justice? He's now prosecuting the case for Bragg in Manhattan. And Fannie Willis...

Forget about the stuff about her boyfriend, but Wade, the prosecutor, was invited to the White House for two meetings for eight hours. And Fannie Willis was going up to see Kamala Harris in the White House. So to the American voters, we're not being fooled by this. Sixty six percent say politics played a role in this. Fifty six percent say Biden played a role in this.

54 to 36 old voters to tell us is a double standard justice where Trump gets prosecuted, but Biden finally gets let go. 56 to 35 voters want to decide the election themselves and not the courts. And last month when we asked it, they said, does Biden want to put his opponent in jail?

56 to 30, they said, yes, this month it went down a little bit, 53, 34, because Biden himself is pulling back from being seen and associated with these cases. I think he's always not want to be associated with this. I don't think he's ever, I don't even think he's made any comments so far. You can't say they don't want this to happen. Regardless, he doesn't want to be seen as having influence. How is the trial impacting women?

independence. Have you pulled to that specificity? I mean, in a way, they're making Trump a sympathetic figure. Even to women and independent voters? Yes, because right now they're saying if they can do this to him, they can do it to anybody. That's what your polling shows too? Yes. Majority of voters last year told us that. Plus, you've got 66% of all voters say the country's on the wrong track and Biden has a 56 job disapproval. So they're not really receptive to the idea of

Biden going after his political opponent with, I think law firms say too light a term on this. He's trying to put Donald Trump in jail. I mean, this morning they were having a hearing about the gag order. They want to take his right to free speech during the trial.

And so this is it's really unprecedented in American history. I mean, you've never seen this happen. Have you polled what a conviction would mean for Trump? I mean, right now we're holding steady. So right now we're holding our lead. Your polling shows you holding steady at 49 percent. I mean, if he got 49 percent of the vote, it's over, right? Right. Plus, yeah.

But we don't think that's going to happen in the end, right? I mean, he kind of has a ceiling. I think 47 is his ceiling. Well, his ceiling is Biden's job disapproval. So as Biden's job disapproval goes up, we can go up.

Right now, you've got third-party candidates who might take some of it, but we can go up farther. Okay, so what about an acquittal? What does that do for him? Obviously, that's a boon, right? That would be good. Then we get to talk about campaign issues like inflation and the border and security, etc. Okay, so give me your—obviously, an acquittal is the best-case scenario, right? But give me your worst-case scenario. I mean, the worst-case scenario for us—

I, as they put us in jail, I mean, it's, it's, I mean, they're, they're not kidding around. This is a serious stuff. They're trying to take away his wealth. You got, you got Letitia James, attorney general in New York. I mean, the bank made money, right? Okay. Nobody lost money. Nobody was defrauded. And, and,

They undervalued, you know, and they're saying he's got to put up a bond for $175 million after she wanted a half a billion. Does a conviction, though, make independents less likely to vote for him? That's what a lot of the polling shows. Right now, it's made them sympathetic. They're trying to make him the Nelson Mandela of America. Nelson Mandela. Oh, yeah, he's comparing himself to that. The hypocrisy of this is that when you look at, you know, here they're talking about when Putin put his Navalny in jail, his opponent. I mean, that's exactly what Biden wants to do.

So it's serious stuff. This episode is brought to you by Jersey Mike's Subs. Jersey Mike's uses only the highest quality meat sliced right in front of you, piled high with the freshest toppings. It is a Jersey Mike thing. My favorite is number 13, the Italian. Love the Italian. I'm half Italian. I like Italian subs. I especially like Italian subs made in good places. Like Jersey Mike's, planning your summer picnic, backyard adventure, or beach day? Well,

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Back to the polling. Most of the networks they're polling, it says Biden will win because they believe likely voters will come out as opposed to just registered voters because there's just like low enthusiasm for the election. Do you agree with that? No, the NBC poll, I disagree with it. Trump has the more enthusiastic base, which is why when they put these third party candidates, he's still ahead. A lot of Biden's voters are based on anti-Trump sentiment. And if you can't draw up the anti-trump sentiment, he doesn't have much of a record to run on at all.

So, I mean, the border is a mess. Inflation is high. The economy, most voters think the economy is getting worse, not better. And in spite of the fact that economists say we're not in a recession, about half the voters say we are in a recession. And then you've got literally insecurity when it comes to what's going on in the world, where a big piece of why Trump got elected in 2016 was he was going to end the endless wars.

what she was doing with Afghanistan, etc. Biden, these endless wars have started again. We're just not as directly involved, but people are afraid that if you can't end the war in Ukraine, if you can't end the war between Israel and Iran,

Then, you know, war spreads. So it's America looks weak, Biden looks weak. And Trump is the strong leader that people will say, I don't like his tweets. I don't want to watch his rallies. But you know what?

I'll vote for him again because we need peace and prosperity. Can I ask you a bit more about the third parties? You keep saying that third parties have big influence. RFK, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., new polls show him taking more from Trump than Biden. But before that, polls showed him taking more from Biden than Trump. So why is there a shift happening right now? Well, I think it's because Biden was bringing back some of those pro-choice voters that he had in the Democrat Party.

And but and he was taking them from Kennedy, not from Trump. So Trump's vote total didn't go down.

in my polls anyway. And why are those pro-choice voters coming back now? Is it because of the ban in Arizona and Trump making clear his position on abortion? Trump's position has always been clear on abortion. Well, not really. He came out finally and said what he stood for, which was states' rights. And then there was a ban the next day in a state. Well, he put up a video. But on the other hand, he was saying that, you know, like in Alabama, there should be exceptions. And Trump is for those exceptions. He's always said that. But on

But on the other hand, when you look at when you when you look at Biden pulling back some of his base, that's it. So what happens when he pulls back some of his base? Kennedy is left with more Trump voters. However.

Those Trump voters don't really know where Kennedy stands, that he would end fossil fuels, right? He's also been weak on immigration. He's also been weak on crime issues. So Kennedy, those of us from New York that know of him and know his activity for years, he's a liberal. He's a traditional liberal.

So when you realize he's a traditional liberal, he'll end up taking more from Biden than from Trump. He was really pumped up, though, over the summer by conservatives like Steve Bannon and Tucker Carlson. And he was on Hannity. And even Trump said he could be a running mate. It's not surprising that there is this feeling that he has. And he's he is sort of a chaos agent. He's not your traditional candidate. Yeah, but he is a traditional liberal. So when they realize he's going to ban fossil fuels, he's going to he's for all the the

the climate change legislation, et cetera. And he's been, he has a lot of liberal others, a liberal social position, social issue position. He needs four higher taxes. When you hear those things, people, people that are Trump supporters, they easily come back. Okay. If you're Trump, do you want RFK on the debate stage? I want Biden on the debate stage. But Biden and RFK. Kenny will come. The question is whether Kenny's scoring or not in the polls.

For Kennedy to score that high in the polls, he's got to take more votes from Biden. He's not going to take it from us. So leave out the Kennedy part. I don't think Biden wants to debate Trump at all. I don't think he's going to debate Trump. And with or without Kennedy, we want to debate Biden. Okay. So let me talk a little bit more about Kennedy because he's on the ballot in Michigan, which is a battleground state. What kind of impact do you think that's going to have? I think...

Trump's ahead in Michigan because Biden wants to ban gas-powered cars and trucks. He would wreck the auto industry. According to your polling, how far ahead is he in Michigan? I've seen him as much as five points in some polling. What do you guys have? I'm not going to tell you. Why not? I got you on the show. This is the time to say it. By the way, the real clear politics average in Michigan looks good. And it

It's really because he's destroying the auto industry there. And when you think about that,

Kennedy, who's a climate change lawyer, environmentalist, he's for getting rid of gas powered cars and trucks. So we get rid of gas powered cars and trucks. You know, they won't. I mean, Kennedy has the same positions. Plus three is what they have for Trump in Michigan. Is that what you guys have as well? I would say that's really I would say that's a very accurate forecast. So let's go back to RFK, though. What kind of impact he has there? It's going to take from Biden. So they really have this when it comes to the auto industry. I mean, that's

Kennedy's leading thing is that he's a climate change environmentalist lawyer.

So he wants to ban fossil fuels. He wants to ban fracking. Biden right now is restricting oil drilling, gas drilling. And plus, he's mandating that we get rid of gas-powered cars and trucks. You get rid of gas-powered cars and trucks, there's going to be a lot of families devastated in Michigan. Not just the auto workers, but anybody who works with them that's associated with it and their state economy, whatever's left of the auto industry will be gone.

Because they can't sell the electric vehicles they have right now. Plus, they're vulnerable to Chinese competition. So when you look at foreign competition, Kennedy and Biden are both losers on that issue. So...

He's going to take from Biden, not from us. Okay, so I want to go back to abortion policy. How important is it in your polling? How does it rank? Well, it comes up single digits. When you look at the national poll we just published, inflation is the most important issue where you get over a quarter of the voters saying that's the most important issue. Almost half the voters say the economy is the most important issue. You get immigration in double digits. And abortion, because it's a state-by-state decision, most states in the country have not changed their abortion law.

And other states, they have referendums, et cetera. So it's not...

you know, it's not quite the issue that I think the Biden Democrats want to have it as an issue. How does Trump fare with abortion? On the issue? I think most voters are happy with their states' design. Is that based on your polling or is that just your gut? No, that's based on you. You look at the national polls, that's based on the polling. So, and you can see it in the national polls too. So early voting is a huge issue. How do Republicans feel about it when you look at the polling? Republicans...

Look at the last election and they have a lot of anxiety about the last election and how the early voting, particularly the drop boxes and, you know, some of these paper ballots where, you know, they were taking them way after Election Day. No other country does that. So I think I think when you if you have the laws corrected, like in Georgia.

Governor Kemp got reelected. The Republicans got reelected on the statewide ballots. OK, Herschel lost the Senate race, but all the other statewide Republicans won. And it was an honest election in spite of the fact that Joe Biden decided to attack them. Wait, you're talking about 2022? Yes. But no, not all the statewide Republicans won. Oz lost. Kerry lost. No, I'm talking about Georgia, where they fixed the law. Oh, in Georgia, OK. They have a little right to vote.

So I think the Republicans embraced dearly voting as much as or not as much, but close to the Democrats. And there was plenty that voted on Election Day. So I think if you look at what happened in Georgia in 2022, after they had fixed their election law, I think Republicans were fine with it because they felt there was an honest election.

Even though Herschel lost, but Governor Kemp and the other ones lost, and you didn't have Stacey Abrams saying it was stolen, etc., because it was an honest election.

I think the question is, it's like states like Pennsylvania when they're going to take, they're going to have absentee ballots come in after they have Act 77 still the law there. I think that's a question. Yeah. So that's an issue in Pennsylvania, right? You guys are having a hard time with messaging there. Well, not a problem with our message, a problem with the law. So the law needs to be, you know, made sure that

You just don't want to have election fraud. You don't want to have any possibility or any feeling of abuse, etc. in the law. Well, you want them to vote anyway, regardless. Right. I mean, you really do. So the messaging right now from Trump is that it's fraudulent. So will they go out and do it?

No, he doesn't criticize how they vote in North Carolina or Florida. OK, but in Pennsylvania, which is a true battleground state. Right, because they're worried about the word about voter I.D. I mean, if every if every state in the union had strong voter I.D. laws and you were assured that the votes would be counted and accurate, fine.

But nobody likes to be ahead on Election Day and have ballots show up a week later and you've lost. How worried are you, though, that Republicans, like based on your polling, are not going to go out and use early voting? Like they're not going to use mail-in ballots. They're not going to vote early. They're not going to show up. I mean, are you are you concerned about that? No.

No, not as much as because if they feel it's a secure election, they're going to show up. Plus, if they've decided they're going to vote for Trump, they'll vote early. By the way, in a way, it's going to be something new for Republicans and plus the RNC. They're talking about 100,000 volunteers in these battleground states. So and by the way, it's not just the battleground states. It's really battleground counties.

You have to get into a handful of counties that will decide the battleground states. Okay. I want to ask you one last question because I know that you were Netanyahu's longtime pollster. And in his last election, you were the main pollster for him. And he was able to bring in a new type of coalition, bring out new voters that don't normally vote.

But the conventional wisdom post-October 6th, 7th is that if the election were held today, he would lose. What do you think? Right now, I think he's more worried about winning a war than winning an election.

I haven't been over there. I haven't polled for him since October 22nd because, you know, I mean, it's really a terrible, terrible and unique situation. But I think there were some polls out this week saying his coalition is gaining votes. And he's been down and up in the polls before. And I think a lot depends upon the future and security of Israel. I think right now it's one, the vast majority of Israeli voters are

It's always been a challenge between security and cost of living over there in terms of their top issue. Right now it's security. And as they realize that Prime Minister Netanyahu is doing everything he can to keep them safe,

And they certainly love Donald Trump over there. I mean, it's like he kept them safer and stronger. And I think right now, I think right now Netanyahu is totally focused on the security of his country more so than ever. So we'll see. What are the prospects that there is an election held even earlier? In spite of what Joe Biden and Chuck Schumer are saying, I don't think there's going to be an election very soon because there's

There's a unity government and the unity is because they're worried about their very existence as a nation.

I mean, they're surrounded by people that want to destroy them. Well, they were backed up the other day when Iran was shooting missiles. That was interesting. Yeah. So Israel, do you think it will have an outsized role in this election? And if so, how? Well, we'll see. There's division within the Democrat Party. There's not in the Republican Party. In the Democrat Party, there's absolutely people and forces at work that are...

They're not just anti-Israel or anti-American. When you start having Democrat activists holding rallies and chanting and teaching the people how to say death to Israel and death to America, you've got a big problem.

And I think that as the campaign goes on, I think that's going to be a bigger problem for Joe Biden. Okay. I'm going to leave it at that. Thank you so much, John. I appreciate your time. We'll see how this all shakes out. But until then, I'll be checking in with you, of course, to see what numbers you're getting, what the Trump camp is doing.

thinking and strategizing. We'll see how that trial shakes out, what that means for the polls. We'd like to be campaigning and not stuck in Manhattan every day. You don't think it adds to the idea that he's like the ultimate victim? You don't think that that perpetrates that narrative? We've been trying to make the best of a bad situation. I mean, we've never seen the leading political opponent to the incumbent president of the United States prosecuted.

by people that are either his employees or his supporters. So it's a really unique time in American history. Donald Trump is an amazing person.

person, let alone president, that he's able to endure all this. But he truly believes in America and he loves the country and he's fighting for the principles he believes in. So we need to win this election. We've got 196 days to go and we're going to do everything we can to win it. Thanks so much, John. Appreciate it. Thank you for the opportunity. Of course.

That was another episode of Somebody's Gotta Win. I'm your host, Tara Palmieri. I want to thank my producers, Christopher Sutton and Connor Nevins. If you like this podcast, please subscribe, rate it, and share it with your friends. If you like my reporting, please go to puck.news slash Tara Palmieri and sign up for my newsletter, The Best and the Brightest. You can use the discount code Tara20. See you on Tuesday.

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