So You're Saying There's a Chance?
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Welcome to Episode 5 of Beyond the Polls. I have a star-studded lineup today. NBC's Steve Kornacki, Nevada election expert John Ralston, and pollster extraordinaire Scott Rasmussen. So let's dive straight into the fun.

Well, we have a great guest for us on Polling Barometer, and that is Scott Rasmussen, the founder and president of RMG Research and an editor-at-large of Ballotopedia, founder before of Rasmussen Polling, which is now run by another company, and those of us who are sports fans can always thank him for being the founder of ESPN. So, da-da-da, da-da-da, it's up to you, Scott. That was a long time ago. I know. So...

General election polling. And if you were to believe the powers that be and the talking heads, you would think that Donald Trump would have been thrown off the horse and trampled to death by all of these terrible, terrible indictments. But in fact, he's been gaining ground. And now in the real clear politics average, he's ahead of Biden by a little over a point, whereas he was behind by a little under a point just a few weeks ago. What's going on?

Well, let's start with the first part of that comment. You know, there were a lot of people in Washington, D.C., who assumed that there will be a great sigh of relief and celebration on January 20th of 2021, that people were happy Trump was gone and now the nation could return to normal. And it just never happened. The country was evenly divided and it has remained so.

As we've gone on into this last month, the numbers you cite primarily are related to the fact that Joe Biden is slipping a little bit. It's not so much that Donald Trump is gaining. In our polling, we ask, we poll a lot. We're in the field at least twice a week. So we average our monthly numbers together.

Earlier this year, Biden's monthly job approval was around 44%, then it slipped to 43%. Well, in the last couple of months, it's gone down to 41% and now 40%. And I think the reason for that is growing pessimism about the economy.

Early in the year, we saw pessimism declining, but in the last month or so, it's begun to turn around. And we can talk all day long about every issue that's on your heart, but the economy, James Carville had it right all those years ago. It's the economy, stupid, to set the baseline for an election.

And so all of this effort that Biden has had the last two months, we've been hearing Bidenomics works, Bidenomics works, tight labor market, rising wages, inflation dropping. You should be grateful. And so the more he talks about it, the more pessimism rises. Get me behind this. Well, it's not what the president is saying. There was a report that came out last week showing that, you know, it...

Incomes are down about 9% from a year ago. And that's inflation-adjusted income. Inflation-adjusted, yes. When people are trying to buy groceries, they don't get to buy anything except inflation-adjusted numbers. And I think there's a tendency for people who...

who have a certain income level to discount that. But we have to remember that we live in a nation where about 50% of the nation lives paycheck to paycheck. They have a modest amount of disposable income each month because they have to shell out their rent or mortgage or other things all the time.

And if the price of gas goes up $10, well, they have $10 less to spend on groceries. If the price of groceries goes up, they have $10 less to spend on gas. It's a real impact. In fact, years ago, we did research showing that when the price of gas goes up, now the, you know, the economists would say, oh, people are going to buy more fuel efficient cars. No.

When the price of gas goes up, the most common response is cut back on groceries. Next most common response, cut back on eating out. So these are real changes for most Americans. So...

One of the things that the polls continue to show, you've just talked about how Biden's job approval is historically low. I mean, not the worst we've ever seen, but 40, 41 percent is historically low in a third year incumbent. Trump's favorabilities, he may be winning head to heads, but his favorabilities are not good.

They're low 40s as well. So you've got a lot of people who don't like either candidate, but yet they have to choose between them.

Who are the swing voters for the general election? Walk me through who the people who aren't loyally in either camp, who might be throwing up their hands at their choice, but they're eventually going to make one. Who are they and what are they thinking about? Or is it just the economy? Is that all they're thinking about? Well, and again, let's put this in perspective. I remember writing in 2016, it was the first time in American history that both major party candidates were viewed unfavorably.

by the vote by most voters. Now we're at the third election in a row. If it's Trump versus Biden, I think there's a good chance that at least one of those men won't be on the ballot a year from November. But that's a that's a different topic.

Most of the voters right now who might be the swing voters are not thinking about politics at all. And that's really a challenge. You know, when we're talking about this electorate that will finally decide election 2024, we're talking about people who don't talk politics at all. We're talking about people who are gradually becoming disenchanted with politics.

the Biden administration for economic reasons and perhaps some others. We're talking about people who generally are not as engaged in the news. You know, only 8% of voters talk politics every day. A majority talk politics less than once a week. So we're, you know, we're talking about people who the political world doesn't know how to reach.

And I think that when you talk about what that's going to look like a year from now, the biggest mistake a campaign could make a year from October would be to assume that voters know all that's happened in the preceding year of the campaign.

Instead, they're going to have to, you know, you mentioned sports. When you watch the Super Bowl, even if you have never watched a football game all year, the announcers set the stage for you. They tell you, you know, this team's got a strong running attack and this team is weak on this area. Campaigns will need to think like that next October to reach these people.

I think that's a great analogy because I am a casual fan of some sports. I'm an intense fan of others. And when I'm watching one of these big events that...

attract the casual viewer. It's like, I know all this stuff. Come on, talk to me. And when I'm the casual fan, it's like, oh yeah, that's who Stephen Curry is. And politics is a lot like that. In 2016, there was only one poll that I could find

And I found it before the election that had the crosstabs for the people who didn't like both candidates, because even though majorities didn't like Trump and Clinton, in fact, there were only 18 percent who disliked both. It was usually the partisan who didn't like the other. They were undecided as they were polled by the GW battleground poll the weekend that Access Hollywood came out.

And 57% of those people still said they were either undecided or voting third party when it would have been easy for them to say, oh, I hate Donald Trump. They broke in the last week.

And that's why the polls were upset, because those people broke heavily for him. So we could very well see that again. Right now, there's a Republican presidential debate season we're into. And one of the things I love to do with events like this, I did it with the J6 committee hearings and other things,

The night after the debate, I go into the field and I ask people how closely they followed news about the debate. And then I ask a question. You've got to think about this. This is the day after the debate. All the news is talking about whatever happened. And I asked them, was the debate last week, this week? Is it next week or some point further in the future? And never do a majority of voters know it was this week.

I mean, it's just, again, these events aren't generating the attention outside the political bubble. And that's just hard for people who live in that bubble to appreciate. I found that. I was in northwestern Iowa a couple of months ago, and I'm meeting. I wanted to find out what on-the-ground evangelicals, you know, do my own little Selena Zito research. And I'm talking with these people, and they're talking about how...

you know, I'm not happy with Trump and I'm not sure about anyone else. I want to find out who the alternatives are. And it was right before the first debate. And I said, well, there's going to, are you going to watch the debate next week? Not one of them knew the debate was, it was the last week in August. There were a lot of things to worry about going on. Exactly. You,

Hear a lot about January 6th, January 6th stole the election. And Trump, of course, is one of the major reasons that you can't listen to Trump talk without him talking about the horrible stolen election. And the media talks a lot about that. But we were talking before the program about.

how many Republicans believe the election was stolen. And you gave me some really interesting perspective. Could you share that with my listeners about how we should interpret the idea that many Republicans believe Trump when he says the election was stolen? So let's start with the numbers. 65% of voters, of Republican voters in my latest survey, believe that Donald Trump was the legitimate winner in 2020.

And we hear a lot about that in the media. And bluntly, you're right, because Donald Trump talks about it a lot. What I don't believe any other pollster has asked about is how many people believe that Hillary Clinton was the legitimate winner in 2016. And today, seven years after that election, 60% of Democrats believe that Hillary was the legitimate winner.

What you have is not something that these Republicans are uniquely crazy for thinking they're a guy who won. What you have is what has become the partisan norm, that both parties, when they lose a close election, think the other side cheated. And it goes back in the 90s when Bill Clinton was president.

Well, Democrats tended to think elections were fair. Republicans weren't so sure. As soon as W moved into the White House, those numbers flipped. Now, the intensity has grown, but the partisan movement

The hatred, the partisan, I almost call it a partisan blindness, has just become to dominate the scene. And you know what? As long as the next election is close, I guarantee you that a majority of voters in the losing party will think the other guy's cheated. The only way to do that is to have a 1984-type Ronald Reagan 49-state blowout

And that would be really good for our system. Well, our system isn't a one-man system, although you might be confused. If you were, you know, to drop a Galaxy Quest reference in here, if you were the Thermians and you got these news reports, you might think that America is ruled by one person. In fact, we have a Congress, we have a Senate, we have a House.

It's a little over a year out and these races are taking a little longer to develop, but we now have some a bitter sense, at least in the Senate, of whether parties have got some quality nominees. How do you...

look at the race for the Senate and the race for the House to the extent they differ one year out? Well, they certainly differ because the geographies are different. The starting point for all election forecasts has to be the economy. If

We have a morning in America economy next year and everything is going right and people's incomes are going up and everybody's happy. Well, the Democrats are going to win in a blowout for the White House. They're going to really dominate in the House and they'll do very well in the Senate. If it's a serious recession, the reverse will happen. Republicans will dominate everywhere. I'm not an economist, but everything I read suggests we're likely to be somewhere in between those two extremes.

I would expect in that case, from what I see, the Republicans would have to be favored to gain control of the Senate in a close election. And that's largely a function of which seats are open and the fact that they're doing a little better on recruiting some candidates than they did in the last cycles.

Now, a lot can change between now and then. But, you know, if it's if it's close based on the economy, the Republicans will have the edge there. I think in the House.

I would probably give the edge to the Democrats at this point in time for a variety of reasons, but one of the big ones is the pro-life issue. Too many Republicans are afraid to talk about it, want to put their heads in the sand, and it's not going to go away. In the 2022 cycle, there were 4% of voters who voted no.

who disapproved of Joe Biden, but voted for a Democrat in Congress. Now, 4% sounds like a small number, but a 4% swing in a congressional race is huge. And of those voters, they trusted Democrats more than Republicans on the issue of abortion by a 65 to 4 margin. If Republicans don't have a response, you can be sure they're going to run that through an awful lot of close House races next year.

Well, one of the things, just to conclude, there was discussion about last time was, last time meaning the 2022 midterms, is what matters more? Are we in a straight ticket voting age where if you're

going to be a Republican at the top of the ticket or you disapprove or approve of the president, you'll go all the way down the bottom. Or are we back to where we were maybe 10 years ago where people would split their tickets more, that actually look at the characters of the individual candidate and say, "I'm going to vote for one candidate for this office, another candidate for that office."

Where do you think 2024 is shaping up a year in advance? Is it going to tilt more towards the return that candidates matter? Or is it do you think it's that partisan hatred is going to flip it more back to I'm voting for team red or team blue?

I think to a large extent we're going to see team red versus team blue voting. Ballotpedia has done a lot of research showing that over the years that mindset has filtered all the way down to state legislative districts. You know, if a particular presidential candidate wins a state legislative district, their party usually wins it.

I think the potential exceptions to that come to statewide races. Governors have a different function, and every now and then, you know, you can get a Republican governor in Massachusetts or something of that sort. Senate races, the Senate races will likely be driven by the partisan politics

the partisan loyalty. But there are extremes. Herschel Walker was a bridge too far.

that you had in Pennsylvania, a gubernatorial candidate who really dragged down the entire state ticket in 2022. Now, there was no presidential race last time around. I do think candidates at the Senate and gubernatorial level have a marginal impact. But by and large, we're going to see straight party ticket voting. People have learned, hey, the other guys are corrupt. We need to save the world. And the only way to do it is to vote for our team.

Well, on that cheery note, Scott, where can my listeners follow your work?

Well, you can go to rmgresearch.com to see a little more about what we do and also on Twitter at Scott W Rasmussen or @rmgresearch. And we are, most of our work is done privately for our Gold Circle member program, but we do put out data periodically. And coming up very soon, we're going to have a new public vehicle that I'll be happy to tell you about when the time comes.

Well, now you've got, I didn't expect this was going to be like a movie serial next week. Batman, Willie. That's right. Wish I could tell you now, but I can't. So we're going to have some fun in November. Okay. Well, thank you very much, Scott, for joining me on Beyond the Polls. Thank you, Henry.

Well, the Republicans are rumbling this week again. They're rumbling in Los Angeles area at the Reagan Presidential Library, but they're doing so without the frontrunner, former President Donald Trump. Does this mean that this is much ado about nothing, or is it the prelude to something that means something? Here to talk about the state of the Republican race is Steve Kornacki, the national political correspondent for NBC News. Steve, welcome to Beyond the Polls. Henry, great to be here.

Well, you know, when Ron DeSantis got in the race, it looked like there was a race. And since then, he's proceeded to go down. And Trump is now ahead by 42 percent in the latest real clear politics average. Is it over?

Um, it's never over until the votes are cast. But we're in a dramatically different place than I think a lot of people thought we would be at the outset of this campaign and even just a couple months ago. It's a combination, I think, of, you know, some of perhaps DeSantis's shortcomings as a candidate that have

um kind of been established um as he's gotten out there um but i think it's it's it's much bigger than that no one else below him in the polling has has moved up in a meaningful way and meanwhile

Donald Trump through, you know, four indictments, through skipping the first Republican presidential debate, now skipping the second presidential debate, saying things about abortion that supposedly were going to unnerve the Republican base. All he's, you know, he's sort of hit all these tripwires that earlier in the year were supposed to give pause to Republican primary voters and

and it's not only that he hasn't been hurt by them, it's that his support has just continued to grow. Our NBC News poll basically matches that real clear average. We've got him at 59% nationally. I think what's just as striking when you look at Trump's poll numbers is that question. It's asked a little differently depending on the poll, but is your mind made up? Are you definitely voting for him? That sort of thing. And consistently,

two thirds, three quarters, 80% plus, you pick the poll, are saying they are definitely locked in on Trump. So it's not just that he's built this enormous lead. I think there's a depth to his lead that we haven't seen with sort of big runaway leaders in past primaries. So I'm struggling to conjure the scenario where...

where this becomes a barn burner of a race. But yes, it is still, you know, we are still a few months from Iowa, so I won't say it's officially over. Yeah, okay. Yeah, I mean, I watch all these sports shows and

And now you've got the real-time victory predictions. And X is 99% likely to win. And then the miracle happens. So we always have to hold out the possibility of Nikki Haley's Hail Mary pass being tipped by Vivek Ramaswamy into Mike Pence's hands who fumbles it over to Tim Scott.

But your NBC poll, you showed the same sort of trend, not just aggregate, but in the sense that the margin grew over the summertime by 14 points. Trump went up eight. DeSantis went down six. Is there anything in your crosstabs or in the details that you think could illuminate why that happened?

Well, in fact, it's more dramatic, I think, when you take it back one poll earlier. We polled in June and then in April before that. And in April, DeSantis was just getting in the race.

And we had it at 46-31. So we had Trump 15 points ahead of DeSantis. And I think some folks, I have to remind them to go back and go look at the real clear chart. Look at the line graph, the Trump, DeSantis, and the rest of the Republican race. Go back to late last year. Because I've talked to a fair number of people who now are so used to seeing Trump so far ahead in the polling that they forget there was about a three-month window there where

When this thing was 10, 15 points, it was single digits in some polls. There were a few polls I saw DeSantis ahead in. And really, when you look at that trend line, what jumps out is, I don't think it's coincidental, it starts to diverge.

And Trump starts to really grow his support right at that first indictment, the Manhattan district attorney on the Stormy Daniels case. And it does seem like it triggered a rally around Trump effect among Republicans. To me, that's something that has only been reinforced by all of the subsequent legal actions that have taken place. And then, like you said, the the growth that Trump experienced in his lead this summer is

You know, that came in the face of skipping the first presidential debate. And I mean, I just, you know, I can remember all the conversations with Trump hostile Republicans, Republicans who for a long time, but certainly in the wake of the 2022 midterms, did not want Trump to be their their party's candidate in 2024. They talked about all the things I just described being the things that would drag him down.

You know, the one indictment after another would just reinforce to Republican voters that, you know what, maybe Trump's getting a raw deal or, you know what, maybe this is a pile on, but it's not smart to nominate him. And maybe there's a better alternative. And, you know, we want to win. And DeSantis has shown he can win Trump. And all I think the biggest thing that's happened here is that is that that type of Republican I'm describing, the Trump hostile Republican, you know,

Their case rests on an electability argument, and they're having trouble making an electability argument when there are polls out there showing Trump doing better than he ever did in 2019 and 2020 in general election trial heats, and than he ever did in 2015 and 2016 in general election trial heats. So if you're trying to tell Republican voters who like Donald Trump, hey, I know you like the guy, but he can't win,

First of all, they've heard it before and he did win. That was a story of 2016. And second of all, they can look at the polls. He's actually matching up quite well against Biden right now.

Yeah, I mean, that's the thing. I'm glad that you mentioned that is that Trump is now ahead of Biden in the real clear politics average. You know, some polls have my Washington Post poll has him up by 10. Today's Economist YouGov poll has Biden ahead by five. But, you know, the average has been moving in Trump's favor.

And of course, that will have something to do with Biden as well, because it's not like Trump's favorabilities are jumping through the roof. It's more that when we have a case of the two types of cake you don't want and you don't have a third dessert option, you have to have to make a bad choice. But Iowa is obviously the first state. It's also one where Trump

is polling behind his national average, although that, too, has moved. He's now 33 points ahead in the RealClearPolitics average. He was 26 points ahead. And the DeSantis campaign is saying Iowa moves late, churchgoing evangelicals, etc., etc. How much credence would you put in those claims? Or is this just a case that it's probably over in Iowa, too? It's just the margin will be a little smaller.

Yeah, I mean, I think there's sort of two types of evangelical vote in Iowa. It is overall about two thirds of the Republican caucus electorate are evangelical Christians. Um, Trump did lose the state in 2016, almost came in third place behind Marco Rubio. Um,

We have a poll now we do in conjunction with the Des Moines Register and Ann Seltzer, who I think is sort of the gold standard pollster out in Iowa. And what's most striking to me is if you look back at the exit poll from the caucuses in 2016, Trump lost the evangelical vote by 13 points, actually finished third among evangelicals in the 16 caucuses en route to losing the state by three points to Ted Cruz.

In our poll, our Iowa poll, which is now about six weeks old, we had them ahead by 27 points among evangelicals. So just a massive sea change. I do think there is a type of evangelical voter, and I think geographically you find that voter in the northwest part of Iowa. There's a type of evangelical voter who I think is true. It sort of fits more the profile that political analysts put on. You know, we talk about groups of voters, right?

You know, we talk about evangelicals as a group. We tend to think, you know, there are all these very exact litmus tests that every candidate has to pass, abortion being a major issue, but there being other issues as well. And I think what Trump has shown over the last eight years is there's a lot more give in that.

with evangelicals and with other voters. But I do think there's a group of evangelical voters, and again, I think in Northwest Iowa, they're particularly prominent, who really are fixated on a specific set of issues. And I think he could pay a price with them, could underperform with them, but they're a minority of the evangelical voters in the state. I think Trump, when you look at the early primary states, I think he's much more vulnerable in New Hampshire,

than he is in Iowa. Ironically, New Hampshire was the state that righted the ship for him in 2016 after he lost Iowa. But I think I see more slack in his numbers, more kind of skepticism of him, and more of a potential just given that independents can vote in the primary in New Hampshire. I just sense he might have more trouble there than in Iowa this time around.

Yeah, I travel to northwest Iowa. I always wondered, it's the home of the highest concentration of Dutch immigrant populations, the Dutch Reformed. There's a smaller community around Pella in Mahaska County, and they act exactly like you with the stereotypical evangelical. They care a lot about life, they care a lot about religious liberty, and they are not like other evangelicals in the state, and it may very well be that the Dutch move one way and

Baptists and non-denominationals move another. And we can find that. I'm sure I'll be hearing from you on election night exactly those sort of distinctions. I mean, the Dutch reform thing is so fascinating. And that is I mean, we were already thinking ahead.

That's where Trump underperformed in 2016. You know, Western Michigan is another place. I mean, you can look at these spots on the map and there's all sorts of theories why I I'm going to credit this to Tim Carney from the Washington Examiner. And I may be wrong, but I think this was a.

big emphasis in a book he wrote a few years ago, looking at sort of communities like these Dutch reform communities that are there's sort of vibrant, healthy civic society is built up. And these were the places that Trump did the worst in the 2016. It's also you'll find that in Utah, you know, a Mormon dominant state.

you'll find these types of communities. And Trump did terribly in Utah in 2016. That's where the lag has always been for Trump, I think, with Republicans.

Yeah, and those are not a majority of the Republican electorate, although they are an important part of that. But you mentioned New Hampshire, and you mentioned the independent question. That gets to what is likely my final question, which is turnout. You know, is that we know, like in 2016, everyone, or not 2016, in 2008, everyone looked at New Hampshire after Barack Obama beat Hillary Clinton, and the polls were saying it was going to be the end of Hillary's career, and she wins.

And in 2022, we had the big Trump challenge to Brian Kemp and many other Republicans, including Brad Raffensperger in the polls, had Kemp winning by about 15 to 20 points on the eve of the election. And he won by 50. And those sort of errors tend to be.

turnout questions that the pollsters use a likely voter screen, but it's hard to estimate who's going to vote in a primary. And when you have independents who are

don't vote in a party primary. Maybe they do this time. Could you talk with my listeners about how polls, not necessarily the NBC poll, but generally how polls will try and construct likely voter screens and how accurate can they be in examples like

a Democratic primary that's not going to be a primary in New Hampshire and a third of the state having nothing to do unless they play in the Republican primary. And these people are not Trump friendly. Exactly. And that's that gets to why I think, you know, if Trump has a clear vulnerability in an early state, I think it's much more New Hampshire than than anywhere else. You know, look, in terms of trying to construct in a poll what the electorate is going to look like, you're looking at things like what's the voting history of

of the respondent, you know, is this somebody who's participated in these before? Asking them, you know, we have the enthusiasm question in our poll, rate your interest on a scale of one to 10. You know, we look at the nines and the tens as sort of the most motivated, the most engaged, the most likely.

You know, but yes, New Hampshire, because of the large number of independents in the state and there is sort of just an independent spirit in New Hampshire, too. I mean, it is it's it's it sounds like a cliche, but it's true. And like you're saying, there's this we're not even sure yet.

How this is going to shake out because New Hampshire Democrats are in this dispute with the Democratic National Committee. Joe Biden, who did terribly in New Hampshire, wants to kind of bury it a little bit here. And the New Hampshire Democrats are trying to fight back. But, yeah, I think a good example, if folks want to go back in time a little bit.

a trip down memory lane, go back to 2000, the New Hampshire primary, because there were two primaries, actually. It was John McCain against George W. Bush on the Republican side. They were the two main players. And then it was Bill Bradley and Al Gore on the Democratic side. And they got to New Hampshire, and the

The big variable there, and I know the pollsters struggle with how to measure this, was how are they going? These independents who were interested were both interested in Bill Bradley and John McCain. So it was this was the big X factor in each party's primary. How were they going to split and what ended up happening? And you really didn't know till the returns came in.

was they wildly, disproportionately chose the Republican primary. And so McCain ended up blowing out Bush on a scale that people weren't expecting. And Bradley ended up losing 53-47. If it had been, I'd say, like a 50-50 split of independents going Democratic and Republican, McCain still would have won. But I think Bradley probably

who had beaten Gore in New Hampshire. Not that that would have changed the outcome, but it would have prolonged that Democratic race more. But that's how big I think a difference the independents can make in New Hampshire. Well, that raises one final question. And as I as I go back on what I said, South Carolina has no party registration and is a party run primary that the parties choose different dates. They run them separately.

it's becoming increasingly clear to me that Nikki Haley is trying to replicate the Rubio three, two, one strategy third in Iowa, second in New Hampshire, although I'm sure she'll take first in New Hampshire on the basis of a McCain style independent run. Uh, but then she comes to her home state with no partisan registration. If, if,

3-2-1 works and it works in New Hampshire or if 3-2 works and it works in New Hampshire in part because independents come out for Nikki Haley. Could we see that be a major effort in the South Carolina primary of saying this is your chance to get rid of Donald Trump, vote for the favorite daughter?

I think that would be the message. But the first part of that message, I think you run into a problem with right now, at least this is your chance to get rid of Donald Trump. There's just no there's no evidence even in South Carolina polling right now where Trump, the last one I saw was it was ahead of Haley 46 to 18, that there's this burning desire to get rid of Donald Trump. And now that we've

invoked the 2000 primary campaign, I will again, because the postscript to John McCain's big win, independent fueled win in New Hampshire, was that the race then went to South Carolina. And the message that the Bush folks took to South Carolina voters was, hey, John McCain is only in this race because of mischievous Democrats and independents who

who, you know, who listened to the media and got behind the media's favorite candidate in New Hampshire and won a medal in our primary. Um, and, and, and so it basically made it a test of, Hey, look, Bush is the, is the, if you're a real true Republican, you're for Bush. If you're one of these democratic interlopers, you're for McCain. And it sort of challenged the basic loyalty, the basic partisan loyalty of the electorate. And they responded, uh,

and Bush ended up winning South Carolina pretty easily. McCain then won Michigan, which is another open primary, but then Bush just responded by saying, see, the Democrats did it again, and then he wiped them out on Super Tuesday. So I think that's the, I think you're right. I mean, if you're Haley, if you're any of these candidates, you're grasping to come up with any strategy that might work here, and I think that's

That's as sensible as one you can find for Haley. But the danger is when you start relying on independents, or especially start relying on some of these states that allow Democrats to vote, you make yourself vulnerable to that kind of charge that you're teaming up with the other party to cause mischief in the Republican primary. Yeah, I remember that Michigan primary. There actually was an organized effort by some Democrats because

Michigan Governor John Engler was very unpopular with Democrats because he had a very Republican successful administration. He was chair of Bush's efforts. So let's embarrass Engler by beating his guy. And they did.

I think 10% of the Michigan Republican electorate self-described as Democrats in the exit poll. That's right. That's right. But so the entire, so what you're telling me is that the entire anti-Trump Republican cabal is like the Jim Carrey character in Dumb and Dumber who just looks and says, but you're telling me there's a chance.

You know, there's flashbacks to 2015 and 2016 when I remember they kept changing. You kept hearing what Trump's ceiling was from his critics. It's 15%. It's 20%. It's 25%.

Oh, he just needs a one on one race, you know, and he just Trump just blew through all these different sort of barriers that they said that were supposedly in place. And I've heard it this time around. And I, you know, I at the beginning, it was what you would hear from the Trump campaign.

the anti-Trump crowd on the Republican side was just, look, the problem right now is it's a crowded field. Wait till it thins out. And it's like, Trump's at 60%. That's not just a crowded field. That's an outright majority. It's an easy outright majority. And like I said, it's not a name recognition thing either because...

It's grown as the year's gone on, and the percent who say they are hardcore committed to him, definitely voting for him. I'm using 2000 here. The last time a candidate consistently led in the national, not incumbent, consistently led in the national polls by the margin Trump does now was George W. Bush, 99-2000. And you know what? When you go back and look at those polls,

The percent who said they were definitely committed to Bush was about half of what you get for Trump right now. Bush's support was softer. He was as far ahead. He did get a scare. He did end up winning the nomination with relative ease. And his support was half as it was was twice as soft as.

as Donald Trump says right now, among Republicans. So, yeah, I just... I've seen John Kerry come from 3% in September 2003 to win the Democratic nomination. I've seen McCain get written off and left for dead in the summer of 07 and win the Republican nomination. So I reserve the right to be missing something huge and dramatic that's right in front of my eyes and will become apparent with time. I reserve the right for that to happen. But right now, I just...

I once again feel like I'm seeing these arguments from the anti-Trump side of the Republican Party just not being aligned with where the Republican Party's voters are.

Well, Steve, where can my listeners follow your work? Anytime we've got a new NBC poll, we should be debuting it on Meet the Press. So that'll be every few months. You can follow me on Twitter at Steve Kornacki, K-O-R-N-A-C-K-I. And I'll pop up on MS at very random times. But if you're watching it, maybe you'll see me. Well...

Thank you very much, Steve. Illuminating as always, and I hope you'll return to Beyond the Pulse. It's fun to have these conversations. Always happy to.

Well, this week's state of play, we're going to go to Nevada, that ultimate swing state and also early voting state in the Republican primaries, caucuses. Well, our guest is going to tell us why they're different and why that matters. We have the expert extraordinaire of Nevada politics, John Ralston, CEO of Nevada Independent, joining us on Beyond the Polls. Welcome, John. Thanks for having me.

Let's talk about that, because there's a difference between a primary and a caucus, and there's a lot of fight in Nevada, or I guess, is it Nevada or Nevada? I'm told it matters. Nevada. Okay, I got it right. Nevada, among what the legislature prescribed and what Republicans are going to do. Can you tell my listeners about the primary caucus division and how the GOP will actually select its delegates?

If you'll permit me just a minute or so of brief history so people understand how this all started. Way back in the 2008 cycle, Harry Reid, may he rest in peace, and his allies got Nevada into the early state slot, but on the condition that we were a caucus. And we were a caucus for a long time. The Republicans then quickly followed suit.

and went with a caucus. But as you know, there have been problems with caucuses, turnout, counting votes, etc. And Iowa really had some problems in a couple cycles. And so Reed, before he died and his allies afterwards, lobbied the legislature controlled by Democrats to pass a presidential primary bill instead of a caucus.

That is what the law is now. This is the first time that it's being implemented since that law passed.

But the Republicans have decided not to go along. And without getting too much into the weeds, and I will if you'd like, the state Republican Party is like many Republican parties around the country dominated by Trump supporters. And this is seen widely by both Democrats and Republicans and anybody with a triple digit IQ as a way to fix the whole thing for Trump.

And why they think they need to do that is another question, because Trump is going to do fine in the primary, too. But they are fixing it so much that they are disqualifying anybody who takes place in the February 6th primary from participating in the caucus where the delegates will be apportioned. But Nevada only has 26 delegates. It's not that many delegates. So there is some thought that some of the other candidates will file for the primaries.

So with respect to the caucus, the reason it might favor Trump is because it attracts a smaller turnout, and that means that the more hardcore Republican is likely to show up, and that's his voter base? Or is it some other theory? Nope, you got it. You hit the nail on the head. Listen, all of these Republican parties, their bases are generally Trump supporters. You've seen all the polling. Most state polling reflects how well Trump is doing nationally, but...

Because of the way Nevada does elections now, and by sending mail ballots to every voter, they clearly are worried that you might have a strange result if there's a huge turnout and someone spending some money here, like a DeSantis.

or maybe even Nikki Haley if she has any momentum. I don't think that's likely, by the way, but it's possible. Well, the problem with this, of course, is that most people are confused about this, not just in state, but nationally. Why are they having two elections, one on February 6th and another on February 8th? And which counts more? And what if different people win? What is Nevada going to do? And so it's created a real nightmare. Just this last weekend, they had a state

Republican Party meeting where there was a move to try to go back to the primary, but it was soundly defeated by the very pro-Trump Central Committee of the party. So is this a winner-take-all primary or is this a proportional, I mean not primary, is this a winner-take-all caucus or is it a proportional caucus? It's a portion, I forget the exact formulas, the same way it was done in 2016. They have the formula, there are thresholds,

But there is no reason to believe that this Republican Party specifically is going to be able to run this in an orderly and in a way that, you know, generates trust among people, whether they're candidates or media or anybody else.

So what we could probably expect then is not a lot of serious campaigning. Maybe some people might cross the threshold because of their national name ID. But after New Hampshire, unlike what could have been, it sounds like Republican candidates are going to just hightail it down to South Carolina and camp out there.

Possible. The one thing arguing against that, and I will always try to make Nevada seem important. I don't know why some people think I try to make it seem more important than it is. But if you are just looking for momentum after Iowa and New Hampshire, and you want to get headlines as opposed to delegates, since the delegates are not that important from Nevada, they might come here.

and campaign and participate in the primary. I mean, the whole thing is so exclusionary. They're not only disqualifying anybody from the caucus who participates in the primary, they are charging each campaign $55,000 to participate in the caucus. So in other words, they're treating it as a fundraising exercise. Exactly right.

Well, once the A's move to Las Vegas, you will have three major sports franchises, which are more than Pittsburgh or St. Louis or Baltimore or Cincinnati. You don't have to worry about Nevada being important. Every Sunday, every sports event shows how it's important.

Well, I would be remiss if I didn't say there's actually four at once the A's move here, because I'll get in trouble because the reigning world champions in women's basketball are the Las Vegas Aces, and they are about to get into the finals again, and they do not like not being mentioned in that conversation. And so I don't get any angry notices, and you don't either. Let's not forget the Aces. Let's not forget the Aces. In fact,

But bringing that up when any sports trivia contest is your ace in the hole. There you go. Nevada is not just important in the primary or in the nomination process. Nevada is, although it's gone Democratic more often than not in the last decade, it is a high candidate.

swing purple state. Can you break down Nevada's geographical regions and where Republicans do well, where Democrats do well, where the swing vote is? I love your early mail or I'd say your early ballot tracker during the general election, but for the people who aren't geeky enough to have already discovered it, tell my listeners a little bit about the regions of Nevada and where

and how they fall. You say geeky. I say for people who have actual real lives and don't pay attention to this as closely as you and I might. Nevada is really three different states. There is Clark County, which is Las Vegas, which has essentially more than two-thirds of the population. You then have the other urban area, which is Reno and the environs.

Which has about 15%. And then the rest are 15 counties, rural counties in between Las Vegas and Reno. And that's, you know, it depends on the day, but about 12% or so of the population, maybe a little bit more.

The rural counties are all very, very deeply red and Republican candidates always do well there. People are like 80, 20 red or 75, 25 red. I mean, it can vary, but some of them are those numbers are fewer, just 60, 40. But that's still deeply red.

And Clark County, where most of the population is, used to be very, very Democratic. It still is. The Democrats have about a 9% advantage, 120,000 voters out of about a million three or so. I think the latest numbers are. So it's still where the Democrats build what I call their firewall because and then go to the rest of the state. Reno, Washoe County.

in the other urban area in the north is the Swing County. It's very evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats. Real quickly, the one big demographic change over the last five years or so, because the legislature passed a motion

voter voter bill where if you go to the DMV to renew your license you can register to vote but if you don't you are defaulted to register as an independent has been an explosion of independent registration which is now the plurality in the state how did independents vote in 2022 do we have a sense of that I mean how did these defaulted DTS voters end up going

So, independence in general depended on the race. For instance, we had the two top of the ticket races in 22 here were both very close for governor and US Senate. In the US Senate race won by the Democratic incumbent Catherine Cortez Masto, they voted for her by small numbers.

In the governor's race, Joe Lombardo, the new governor, won enough independents to defeat the incumbent governor, Steve Sisolak. He was the only Republican challenger to defeat a Democratic incumbent. The Democrats still have about a two and a half point lead over the Republicans statewide, but it's no

longer as important as how those independents vote. And some of those independents are actually, you know, Mark Melman, the pollster, likes to say there's no such thing as an independent. They're just Democrats or Republicans masquerading as independents. But a lot of those new DMV defaulted independents just didn't vote. Because you can imagine that a lot of them don't even know that they were registered to vote at the DMV and didn't pay much attention.

So can you handicap the presidential and the Senate race? Because CCM's Catherine Cortez Masso's colleague, Jackie Rosen, is up on my Twitter feed. She's always telling me it's always the closest decisive race. Please give her money. That may be an exaggeration, but it clearly is going to be a contested race. Can you handicap a Biden-Trump rematch and then handicap the Rosen reelect for me?

As you mentioned, we're a purple state and we almost certainly will remain that way for some time based on the demographic trends. Biden beat Trump by two and a half points here in the last election. That matches essentially what the registration numbers are. So I think if that's the matchup.

I think Biden's numbers are bad here, too, by the way. Trump's are just as bad or slightly worse. I think it slightly leans toward the Democrats. Turnout will be higher. The Democratic machine here built by Harry Reid is still formidable. So I give a slight, slight edge if it's Biden, Trump to Biden.

Jackie Rosen's race, you know, if Catherine Cortez Masto won by only 8,000 votes, Jackie Rosen, who's a freshman, probably going to have a close race too. However, the Republicans have a contested primary and the National Republican Senatorial Committee essentially without endorsing has endorsed Sam Brown, a veteran who ran against Adam Laxalt in the primary for Senate last time, raised a lot of money through the grassroots, but lost.

Sam Brown has never won a race, but the NRSC is petrified that Jim Marchant, who is also in that primary and is a far-right MAGA conspiracy theorist who almost won a statewide race last time, will get the nomination.

If Jim Marchant gets the nomination, then the race here is essentially over and the Republicans will pull out of Nevada. If Sam Brown gets the nomination, he has a chance, I think, against Jackie Rosen. You also have the former ambassador to Iceland under Trump, Jeff Gunter, in that race as well.

Now, is Gunter a self-funder? Is that something that the NRSC has to look over their shoulder at? They don't want Gunter in the race. It's unclear how much money he has. He does have a significant amount of money. And even as we are talking, he has just put his first ad out there. It's a very small buy, but it is all an attack on

on Sam Brown for not being Trumpy enough, and he's the real Trump guy. If Trump decides to endorse in this race, and I think the NRSC would prefer he didn't, that could change things, of course, referencing everything else we've been talking about today because of how Trumpy the base is here.

Now, we talked before about the presidential primary on February 6th. When is the Republican primary for Senate? The actual primary for Senate is June is in June. I believe it's June 11th. So there's lots of time for Trump to get in, lots of time for the ambassador to Iceland to spend millions to get his name ID up and all of the above.

There is, although my experience with rich guys saying they're going to self-fund is when it comes to writing the check, they're not quite as generous as their consultants would hope they are going to be. Yeah, I'm not sure there's any way to lower the expectation versus reality gap for consultants.

It's true. I'm afraid I'm afraid. Harry and a Huffington's ex-husband, Michael, kind of warped those expectations when he just like for then wrote a ridiculous sum of money, like 30 million dollars and didn't seem to care. Since then, dollars dance before people's eyes when they see self funders. We're really dating ourselves by talking about Michael Huffington. You know, now now now they know we're not spring chickens.

Yeah, well, I'm afraid any listener of me knows that I'm not a spring chicken. In fact, I'm a fan of Super Chicken. And if you get that reference, you have been dated. So, John, I'd love to have you back. Where can my listeners follow your work?

Well, if you want to go on the Nevada Independent site, please read the Independent. I'm so proud of the staff. If you want to follow me on Twitter or threads, you can follow me at Ralston Reports. And the Nevada Independent covers Nevada news, not just the political horse race. That's right. We cover public policy, government campaigns, issues. We do a lot. And you'll be telling everyone who's

booking their tickets, whether or not that strike is actually going to take place. I would say it's very unlikely that the culinary workers voted to authorize a strike. I've seen this movie before. They always vote to authorize the strike. They rarely actually strike. Well, for all of you gamblers getting ready to go down to the strip, you can get your tickets on the advice of John Ralston. And John, thank you for joining us on Beyond the Polls. My pleasure. Thanks for having me.

This week's ad of the week comes from Kentucky's gubernatorial race. Now, you might know Kentucky as a deep red state, and the fact is it is a deep red state, but it nonetheless has a Democratic governor, Andy Beshear, from a longstanding, powerful Democratic family, the Beshears.

He barely won in 2019 against an unpopular and overly ideological Republican incumbent, and he is facing a man named Daniel Cameron. Cameron is African-American, the state's attorney general, and a protege of Mitch McConnell. So you might think,

establishment Republican, young novel articulate guy, should be a shoe-in in a deep red state. Well, in fact, Bashir remains slightly ahead in the polls and he's fighting back as this week's ad of the week demonstrates. I was raped by my stepfather after years of sexual abuse. I was 12. Anyone who believes there should be no exceptions for rape and incest could never understand what it's like to stand in my shoes.

This is to you, Daniel Cameron. To tell a 12-year-old girl she must have the baby of her stepfather who raped her is unthinkable. I'm speaking out because women and girls need to have options. Daniel Cameron would give us none.

This is a powerful ad. There's no two ways about it. The young person who is no longer 12 is now a young adult, looks straight at the camera, talks persuasively to the camera, no flinching, no sign of overt emotion, a very professional and calm job. That's exactly what's needed to make the case. And the case is simple.

If you think that there should be exceptions for victims of rape or incest with respect to abortion, you should not vote for Daniel Cameron. Now, that is an issue that cuts across virtually all ideological lines when it comes to abortion. Even most Republicans overwhelmingly support what Donald Trump now calls the three exceptions, rape, incest, and life of the mother. Daniel Cameron, it is stated on the ad that,

opposes exceptions for rape and incest, and the ad gives two citations, one a radio and one in the date, and one a newspaper article in the date, and it says Cameron against exceptions for rape and incest. Again, this is not a subtle ad, but it's a quiet ad. It's not the ad that tries to jam three or five pieces of information with dark negative music and pictures like many negative ads. This is a straight...

intellectual and emotional appeal, and it's quiet is part of its effectiveness. Its target is obvious. Its target is the independent and the moderate Republican who made Beshear's narrow victory possible to say, Daniel Cameron is not the sort of Republican that you can support.

Note that there's no mention of Beshear in this ad. Now, campaign finance regulations required that the sponsor of the ad be identified. So at the bottom of the ad, at one point, a picture of Beshear comes up and it says paid for by Andy Beshear for governor. But since it's a state campaign, they don't have to have the regulation that requires the candidate to say, I approve this message. So Andy Beshear never appears. His name never appears. This is simply an effective campaign.

negative ad designed to drive Cameron's favorability among the sheer voting, otherwise loyal Republicans. And because of that, it's this week's ad of the week. Thanks for joining me on this edition of Beyond the Polls. I'll be back again in two weeks with a debrief of the Republican debate and discussion of all things political. Until then, let's reach together for the stars as we venture Beyond the Polls.

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