For a while there, the independent ticket of ex-Democrats Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Nicole Shanahan seemed to be taking crucial votes away from Democrat Joe Biden, at least as indicated by comparing three-way and five-way (with Cornel West and Jill Stein) polls to head-to-head matchups of the incumbent and Donald Trump. Now, even as Biden has all but erased his polling deficit against Trump, he’s getting some more good news in surveys that include other candidates.
Two recent major national polls show Biden running better in a five-way than a two-way race. According to NBC News, Biden moves from two points down to two points up when the non-major-party candidates are included. In the latest Marist poll, Biden leads Trump by three points head-to-head and by five points in a five-way race. Since left-bent candidates West and Stein are pulling 5 percent in the former poll and 4 percent in the latter (presumably taking very few votes from Trump), you have to figure Kennedy is beginning to cut into the MAGA vote to an extent that should get Team Trump’s attention. And it has, NBC News reports:
“Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly said he’s confident that independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will pull more votes away from President Joe Biden than from him — a net win for the Republican’s candidacy.
“’He is Crooked Joe Biden’s Political Opponent, not mine,’Trump wrote on Truth Social late last month. ‘I love that he is running!’
“Behind closed doors, however, Trump is less sure. A Republican who was in the room with Trump this year as he reviewed polling said Trump was unsure how Kennedy would affect the race, asking the other people on hand whether or not Kennedy was actually good for his candidacy.”
Politico notes that Kennedy is drawing higher favorability numbers from Republican voters than from Democratic ones, which could indicate a higher ceiling for RFJ Jr. among Trump defectors. And it’s generally assumed from his past performances that there is a lower ceiling on Trump’s support than on Biden’s; he needs to be able to win with significantly less than a majority of the popular vote, as one Republican told Politico:
“’If the Trump campaign doesn’t see this as a concern, then they’re delusional,’ Republican consultant Alice Stewart said. ‘They should be looking at this from the standpoint that they can’t afford to lose any voters — and certainly not to a third-party candidate that shares some of [Trump’s] policy ideas.’”
One likely reason that Kennedy could be appealing to Republicans is the residual effect from the positive attention he received from conservative media when he was running against Biden in the Democratic primaries; his identification with anti-vaccine conspiracy theories also resonates more positively on the right side of the political spectrum than the left. So it’s in the interest of Team Trump to begin telling the former president’s sympathizers that RFK Jr. is actually a lefty, and that started happening recently, as the New York Times reported: “Mr. Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, pointed in particular to Mr. Kennedy’s views on climate change and the environment, writing on his social media site that Mr. Kennedy was more ‘radical Left’ than Mr. Biden.”
The idea, of course, is not only to discourage potential Trump voters from drifting toward the independent candidate, but to encourage potential Biden voters to consider a Kennedy vote.
If Kennedy continues to draw votes from both Biden and Trump, each of their campaigns will need to make a strategic decision about how to deal with him: Do you ignore him and count on the usual fade in support afflicting non-major-party presidential candidates as Election Day nears, or do you attack him as too far left (if you’re Trump) or too far right (if you’re Biden) and try to make him a handicap to your major-party opponent? The more aggressive approach has become common among Democrats seeking to intervene in Republican primaries (or in the recent case of the California Senate race, a nonpartisan top-two primary) by loudly attacking candidates they’d prefer to face in the general election, encouraging Republicans to flock to the supposed menace to progressivism. This kind of tactic — if deployed with some serious dollars — could have an effect on Kennedy’s base of support.
Certainly Trump seems to be considering it. With his usual practice of saying the quiet part out loud, Trump opined: “If I were a Democrat, I’d vote for RFK Jr. every single time over Biden, because he’s frankly more in line with Democrats.”
Trying to minimize losses to Kennedy and maximize opposite-party votes for Kennedy could become a routine practice down the stretch. Where and by whom this strategy is pursued will depend in part on where RFK Jr. is ultimately on the ballot. Right now he has nailed down ballot access in just two states, Utah and Michigan. CBS News reports the Kennedy-Shanahan ticket is close to securing a spot on the November ballot in a number of other states:
“Kennedy’s campaign says it has completed signature gathering in seven other states in addition to Utah and Michigan — Nevada, Idaho, Hawaii, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Nebraska and Iowa.
“The super PAC supporting Kennedy, American Values 2024, says it has collected enough signatures in Arizona, Georgia and South Carolina.”
Coping with Kennedy could become a game of three-dimensional chess between the Biden and Trump campaigns. But if it begins to look like RFK Jr. has become an existential threat to Democrats or to Republicans, you can bet they’ll go medieval on him without even a moment’s hesitation.
Gareth,
As Ruy (and many others) have pointed out, professionals have drastically shifted from being strongly Republican to Democratic. This shift has already had profound effects – for example, making urban districts very difficult for Republicans to win (the minorities and younger professionals tend to live in urban areas in higher percentages, while managers tend to reside in the suburbs). Managers (as distinct from professionals) remain strongly Republican. This distinction is also important in deciphering the North/South divide, as the larger Nothern urban areas tend to be more skewed towards professional services (law firms, financial institutions, advertising, media, healthcare) while most Southern cities’ economies are focused on managerially dominated firms (retail chains, travel, food industries and so on). Of course, there are many large exceptions to that.
According to the 2000 national exit poll, Gore carried African-Americans 90-9 with 1 percent for Nader. Gore also carried Asian Americans 55-41, with 3% for Nader and 1% for Buchanan. I don’t have a breakdown for students, but Gore carried voters aged 18-29 by a margin of 48-46, with 5% for Nader, and 1% for Buchanan.
I agree with Publius that most voters establish a partisan preference in their first few elections, and are very apt to remain with that party. It would be very encouraging, and strong evidence for the emergence of a clear Democratic national majority, if Kerry and Edwards can keep anything like the 58-37 margin among students they enjoy in the Harvard poll, and extend it over the next two presidential elections to the non-students in the 18-29 age group.
I don’t have data, but it seems to me that Reagan ran well among younger voters, and that they were Perot’s best group as well as Nader’s.
What was Bush’s approval rating among blacks in 2000?
I read that Kerry was writing his own speech for the convention, which would then be gone over by speechwriters.
Can you imagine if Bush wrote his own speech? {giggle}
Ruy: Single most important poll result I’ve seen so far this campaign (and apologies if you already noted it in your very long post which I haven’t quite made it through):
LA Times question: Among those voters (about 60%) who know enough about Kerry to evaluate him, he leads by 10 points. Among those voters who do not know enough, he trails by 12.
Bingo. That’s what’s weird about all the recent polling. To me, this is fabulous news, unless Kerry totally blows the convention (not very likely, based on the speech he gave at the send-off rally in Denver today, which I attended). He leads strongly among those who are clued in, and many of those currently choosing Bush don’t know enough about Kerry AND ADMIT IT.
The race is still on — to define John Kerry. And the man himself has the first best shot at it this week.
HEY! I’ve been paying taxes since I was 17! Bush being gone would be my wildest dream. All I can say is that in my upper-midwest college on the Minnesota/North Dakota border it runs about 55% Kerry, 40% Bush.
Ruy, why ignore Asians?
I believe they’re going to be the largest demo in 50 years or so (overtopping hispanics) and they are mostly republican aren’t they?
It’s a myth that people get more conservative with age. Just look at people over 65- that’s the best Democratic demographic! What in fact happens is that predispositions just get stronger with time. Basicially if you vote for the same party your 3 first presidential elections, you’re pretty much hooked for life. So the political environment during someone’s late teens through mid-twenties are decisive for future political loyalties.
BUt will African-Americans and GenX’ers decideit is important enough to go and vote?
Howdy Ruy!
do you (or any helpful commenters) have the numbers for Bush’s 2000 support among young voters?
Aren’t the young usually a good demographic for Democrats? And isn’t it usually a life-cycle, not cohort phenomenon? (In other words, don’t young college students become conservative professionals when they start paying income tax?)
Now the key is getting all those disaffected college students to actually vote!