What Do The January 6th Hearings Mean for Trump’s Presidential Run?
Hello Hackaroos,
Well, another dark day on Capitol Hill with some scary testimony from President Trump’s Far Right friends. We start there then dig into the noise around the latest New York Times poll and what it might mean for the leaders of both parties. One piece of news from this morning definitely not helping President Biden is inflation continuing to surge.
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Let’s begin…
2024 and President Trump’s Far Right Friends
MURPHY: Holy Nutcases on the Loose, Bat-Gibbs! It was as bad as we all thought. (And we knew it, but now we see it in an undeniable, understandable way). The crazy factor of the whole thing is just stunning. The White House became an asylum, which would be sadly laughable if the clear focus of the insanity was a Putsch. Next up will be Pat Cipollone Live and In Person and for Trump, that will be more bad news. There is no doubt the former Orange POTUS’ frame has truly been cracked now, which we’ll discuss below in context of the latest (and CW disrupting) NYT poll of GOP voters.
GIBBS: Another compelling showing by the January 6th Committee yesterday, complete with clips from Pat Cipollone testimony from just a few days ago and even a former Proud Boys spokesperson as well as a Capitol rioter awaiting sentencing, describing how they thought Trump had led them to march to the Capitol and fight on his behalf. Speaking of the former White House counsel, his testimony seems to corroborate virtually all of what Cassidy Hutchinson told the Committee. Boy, the meeting on December 18th sure sounds like Crazy Town, which came just before the December 19th Tweet asking supporters to be in Washington on that fateful day. You really have to hand it to the Committee for how they’ve laid this case out and done so by carefully revealing something seemingly new each time. All of this has happened without some very central testimony from the likes of Roger Stone and, thus far, Steve Bannon, among others. We still have one more primetime hearing next Thursday where the Committee will wrap this all up.
The Politics of a Poll
GIBBS: So, the big story here that we probably didn’t need a poll to tell us is that both the leaders of the respective political parties in the United States are, in fact, not terribly popular with the parties they lead. Interestingly, in both polls it is really dissatisfaction among younger voters that highlights their weakness. I think on Trump's side, this poll begins to show a little of the impact of the January 6 Committee hearings, particularly among more educated Republican voters (Are there still educated Republican voters, Murphy?). But if voters were expecting to see these hearings totally reset the way Republicans thought of Donald Trump and what happened in 2020, the answer to that is: that's just simply not going to happen. The story goes to great pains to suggest that though 75 percent of primary voters said Mr. Trump was “just exercising his right to contest the election,” nearly one in five said he “went so far that he threatened American democracy.” Despite all that’s been heard, there's still a real challenge in reprogramming the massive disinformation fed to the Republican Party based on 2020. But the poll shows half of the Republican Party is on the other side of the ledger from Donald Trump. When he announces he’s running again, he’ll start in a very different place than he probably imagined he would, largely because he spent the last two years, as he did the four before that, on grievance politics. The one advantage that we shouldn't overlook for a guy like Trump in 2024 though are the majority of GOP primaries are winner take all for delegates. You don't have to strain your imagination to figure out that Trump could quite easily end up with 37% or 40% in a very crowded primary and still be stockpiling huge numbers of delegates toward being renominated. Murphy, is there any there there with this poll?
MURPHY: Oh Hell yes, Gibbsie! As our loyal Hacks on Tap podcast listeners know well, I’ve been taking months of endless guff from Axe and Gibbs over my constant predicting that Donald Trump’s grip on the future GOP has been slowly slipping. “They will want to move on, they’re tired of Crazy Trump, ‘New’ is the most powerful word in advertising, polling shows that the growing plurality among GOP voters is ‘Trump was great, but we need someone new now’." And what did I hear back? Laughter, jeers and – you cannot see it on a podcast, but it was there – massive eye-rolling.
Source: The New York Times
So read it and weep boys! I tried to tell ya! Brand new NYT numbers show the GOP – exhausted by Jan 6 and Trump’s lunatic focus on rehashing the “stolen” election – is clearly moving on. (And it’s not the only poll telling us this. Just about every poll of Republican voters over the last year has shown Trump’s strength inside the party slowly declining). The cause is mostly Trump’s mental collapse into maniacal howling about the election, combined with the definite impact of the Jan 6 hearings and its focus on the confessions of Trump staffers. Much more effective to hear actual MAGA servants blowing the Crazy Democracy Hater whistle on Trump that the usual chorus of finger wagging liberals.
I think this poll will be seen a year from now as big marker: the beginning of the potential post Trump GOP era. That said, there is plenty of drama ahead. Trump still has a huge grip on a solid chunk of the GOP and a boundless ability to shove himself into the center of any national intra-Republican debate. Plus, holding a plurality of the vote in a procession of multiway Republican Presidential primaries is usually a winning hand (as it was in the early 2016 primaries for Trump), so Trump has to fall a lot further to flame out completely. And have no doubt that nobody in the party can authentically out-crazy Donald Trump on the wedge issues, especially those that harvest racial tension. So it ain’t over. But it’s a fight now and Trump is being backed into a bad corner. The Elephants are breaking ranks, the big game is afoot and Trump’s future as 2024 GOP nominee is very much in doubt.
GIBBS: Eye rolling? I would never! Then obviously, on the Democratic side, the poll showed how unpopular Biden is at the moment. His overall approval rating is at 33, which is, let’s just say, pretty catastrophically low. Inside the Democratic base, the numbers aren't particularly impressive either in this poll (please read my note at the end though for some important questions and context). Among Democratic primary voters, about an equal number are concerned about his age (33%), as they are job performance at (32%). But, if you're a Democrat, the bright part in the otherwise bleak poll and what some have been gravitating to is this idea that despite how unpopular Joe Biden is, he still beats Donald Trump 44% to 41%. Two fairly unpopular standard bearers at the moment slogging it out. It’s more than a talking point for both parties as Trump will have to convince Republicans he can actually beat the wounded incumbent Joe Biden or it’s going to get a lot tougher for the former President. Murphy?
Source: The New York Times
MURPHY: It is certainly more bad news for Donald Trump that he appears the be the one Republican prospect that even Joe Biden can beat! That said, let me now involve the Milt Gwirtzman rule: ignore all national Presidential polls until after the first major nominating contest.
GIBBS: Before we leave this Mike, one potentially big asterisk to all of this and maybe why we shouldn’t read too much into just one poll. If you read the fine print, I’m a little surprised that the Republican primary polling is of only 350 Republican primary voters and on the Democratic side, it's just 191! I’ve been to town hall meetings in small towns with a whole lot more than 191 people. And when you start analyzing the samples of certain voter demographics inside that number, the margin of error starts to get sort of big. I would suggest that the old Gray Lady of the New York Times probably has the resources to give us samples that are statistically stronger, particularly more than 191 voters. No telling what it would do to the numbers. We're opening public polling season with the highest of top tier news outlets and seemingly enough resources to do this right, yet giving us almost trivial sample sizes. Pollster friends think its nuts. My plea is for them to do better.
Remember Abe
GIBBS: The world is still mourning the death of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his senseless murder has stunned Japan, a country that had just a handful of firearm-related deaths last year, and the entire world. Abe is rightly being remembered as a leader who brought stability to a country that had been going through almost a revolving door of Prime Ministers. He was a strong ally of the United States. And in that strengthening relationship, also called out the real dangers of what was happening with a growing, dangerous China. A noteworthy figure in Japanese politics, and one that was still, while not in the role of a politician or prime minister, active as he was out campaigning when this all happened. A terrible end to a remarkable career and legacy.
MURPHY: He was a big deal and is a loss to his country. In many ways, Abe was the Ronald Reagan of Japan; a towering figure who dominated his long era in Japanese politics.
TIDBITS
GIBBS: The fundraising numbers for the 2nd quarter of fundraising are coming in and some are just wow. In Georgia, Stacey Abrams raised $22 million from May 1 through June 30, an astounding amount. She raised more than 3 times the amount of Brian Kemp, a sitting Georgia Governor in just two months. In Pennsylvania, John Fetterman raised $11 million for the quarter. In Arizona, incumbent Sen. Mark Kelly followed his first quarter fundraising haul by raking in $13.6 million. Just how much money is pouring into campaigns ahead of 2022? In Ohio, Rep. Tim Ryan, in so many ways a really good candidate who is fighting to put the Senate race on Democrats radar screen, raised over $9 million. Right now, Dems are focused on incumbents in trouble and other open seats in order to stay at or above 50. And Ryan is doing what he should be doing, which is raising a lot of money and working hard to get Dems to pay attention (read: invest significantly in the race). We've seen now a couple of public polls that say this a could become a real race. The question for Democrats is are they going to jump in? Is the party ready to spend $50-60 million in a state which has trended away from them in recent elections? Definitely worth keeping an eye on in the coming weeks. We’ll have more on fundraising numbers as we get a fuller look when campaigns have to file their detailed FEC reports, which will also tell us how much money they have in the bank.
MURPHY: No doubt it is a great year to be a Democratic fundraiser hunting for piles of small dollar online contributions; the grassroots Donkeys are stompin’ mad and ready to spend. The problem is the pesky larger voter universe. Those folks, not base D’s who are madly rage typing their credit card numbers into Act Blue, will pick the actual winners and losers of 2022. And it’s a hard rule of political gravity during inflationary times that when Fred Z. Voter gets slammed twice a week – at the gas pump and the grocery checkout line – old Fred feels real pain and becomes primed to push back at the ballot box (see the new inflation number out this morning). And while gas prices are slowly declining, food prices are not. (I heard a restaurant chain CEO say today that turkey prices for Thanksgiving will be up over 100%.) And, as a famous Democrat once said, the buck stops at the President’s desk. What this D money surge really means is the Dems will have the resources to make a case to voters that the election is about something other (please God, please) than punishing Joe Biden and his Democratic party. Not easy. I think the best Dem bet is a few Senate races where the GOP is running, well, let’s be polite and say “sub-excellent” candidates. Plus there are a few states (Nevada in particular, and to a lesser, but still meaningful extent Florida) where the Roe decision gives a handy new power tool to previously lagging Dem candidates. So the D’s have a prayer in the Senate and money will sure help, but the odds at this point remain stacked against them.
We’ll be back on Friday. See you then!
Murphy and Gibbs