Donald Trump is dominating the news cycle again, and there are countless angles to take or critique. I want to discuss one that I don’t think is getting much consideration. There is a lot of speculation about a third-party or independent presidential run by The Donald if he fails in his bid to win the Republican nomination. The Republicans, probably correctly, fear that Trump would pull a lot of their voters into his column and doom their nominee to oblivion. As a result, they’ve been very reluctant until approximately yesterday to get too rough with Trump, fearing that he’ll storm off in a petulant rage and bring his populist support with him.
Okay. I think it’s an almost unassailable argument that a three-way presidential race between a Democrat, a Republican, and Trump would split the right more than the left. But what about the impact on down-ticket races? Would having Donald in the race (but not as the Republican nominee) help or hurt Republicans running for Congress?
I think it would help them by boosting turnout on the right.
The average Trump voter is probably disgusted with Congress and with both parties. They don’t want to vote for just another politician. But if you force them to choose between a Democratic and Republican candidate for the Senate or for the House, most of them will probably go for the Republican.
Could be that a lot of Trump voters would show up and mark the ballot for Trump, leave the rest of the thing blank, and go home. But a lot of them will fill out the whole thing, and from the Democratic Party’s perspective, they’d rather those folks not go the polls at all.
Keep this in mind while reading this next bit:
“Nothing will impact our majority more than who we nominate for president,” said Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma, who chaired the NRCC in 2005 and 2006. “The correlation between presidential votes and House votes is higher today than it’s ever been in American history, so we all have a vested interest in advancing the strongest nominee that we can.”
He said, “I think it’s very hard to put a great deal of distance between yourself and your presidential nominee in either a winning or losing year. … At the end of the day, you have to recognize the presidential nominee of both parties has the biggest megaphone out there other than the president himself.”
Implied here is the idea that Trump would not be a good nominee for the Republican Party. This is fleshed out a little more here:
Pennsylvania Rep. Charlie Dent, who represents a swing district that voted for Barack Obama in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012, said Trump’s comments “have to be condemned.”
“Are these comments helping us as a party? No,” Dent said. “Running political campaigns and winning elections is an exercise in addition, not subtraction. … When comments are made that are so divisive that alienate women, Hispanics, the disabled, Muslims — it just simply limits your ability to win. It’s that simple.”
And here:
Rep. Steve Stivers (R-Ohio), the NRCC’s deputy chairman in charge of helping reelect embattled GOP incumbents, was more blunt.
“It would be devastating to our attempts to grow our majority and would cost us seats,” Stivers said in an interview. Trump “would cost us seats. There are people that couldn’t win if he was our nominee.”
I don’t disagree with these gentlemen or their analysis, but I think it only applies to them if Trump is running as a Republican in a two-way race. If Trump is running as an independent in a three-way race, I believe more right-leaning voters will turn out to vote. And that ought to help down-ticket Republicans.
So, what might doom their presidential candidate could well be what limits their losses in the congressional races. If you’re in charge of the NRCC or NRSC, you’ll probably wind up getting a better report card with Trump in the race as an independent than with him as either the nominee or sitting the whole thing out because he’s been defeated in the primaries and chosen not to run as an independent.
Sounds plausible. As good a prediction as any. Of course politics is the laboratory where we get to see the laws of unintended consequence play out in real time, like a train wreck (or a Eugene O’Neill play — whichever is more painful). So who knows how anything will impact anything.
Off topic but worth noting
Justice Scalia is a racist SOB
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/scalia-race-affirmative-action
And an intemperate idiot. Even if one thinks such things, you don’t say it out loud — particularly if you’re a United States Supreme Court justice. Learn to wear the toga, Tony!
Are they forecast to have notable losses in the first place?
yes.
Thanks, congress is so vile I try to avoid looking at legislature races until spring of the election year.
Good question, but is there any historical evidence for either speculative projection? Unfortunately, if there is, I can’t see it.
Perot, maybe? He was more center-right (relatively speaking), whereas Trump is… for lack of a better term, full dickbag right.
There is no better term, my friend.
Speculation on top of speculation.
This is quite speculative. It would also be the case that Trump would drive massive turnout of Latinos, African Americans, Asians — and while there are relatively few Muslims they would also likely vote for Dems in down-ticket races. I don’t necessarily think Donald T. Rump’s presence as a third party candidate would benefit Republican congressional or legislative candidates.
However, Martins seems to be on more solid footing than the GOP “chicken littles” – Consider:
CW is that Wallace split the presidential DEM vote. That cannot be technically correct because in a two person race in 1960, Nixon received 49.6% of the vote. However, it wouldn’t be inaccurate to conclude that in down-ticket races, Wallace DEM voters generally preferred DEMs. While exceedingly modest, Nixon did have downticket coattails.
CW is that Perot took equally from Clinton and GHWB. If true, the results without Perot would have been Clinton 52.5% and GHWB 47%. Yet, there were no downticket Clinton coattails for which there should be some evidence if the CW is correct.
This is exactly what I think. Trump as a third party candidates guarantees the Democrats the White House but the Republicans the House, and is probably a big boost to the Republicans in the Senate. Maybe this is why of all the Republican leadership, McConnell and now Ryan have seemed the most willing to criticize Trump.
I shall be waiting to see some new polls before concluding that Il Duce, er, Trump, is harming the Repubs in any meaningful way. After Paris when Trump and the Repubs raised the phony Syrian refugee issue, Dems responded with pleas for humanitarian actions and our sordid 1930s history, both perfectly sensible, informed and intelligent responses. There was extensive national coverage. When the polls came out, 68-70% favored banning the baby terrorists. So much for appealing to their higher nature. Point Repub.
Now Trump is escalating the hate by somehow “banning” all Muslims and the cries of Un-American and unconstitutional are flying—with even some Repub worthies bleating “That’s not what our party stands for!” (You could have fooled me, by I digress).
Let’s see what the fine citizens think, can’t be long before a few polls come out. I don’t doubt the Japanese internment camps were highly popular with Americans in their day. Point Trump? We’ll soon see. If a majority of Americans are (finally) disgusted, then we may have reached Maximum Trump…otherwise, the floodgates.
There are polls out today which prove, if anything, Trump isn’t going away. And his numbers will probably only improve with the GOP.
This sounds plausible.
Trump as GOP nominee is probably better downticket for Democrats, as Democratic turnout should be relatively decent and Republican turnout possibly lowered.
As an Independent, Democratic turnout may be lower because Trump is less of a threat, and if more of the pigpeople turnout to vote for the outright fascist, then it would likely help Republicans downticket.
I think I agree.