I will stick my head in here to say that having had to study this campaign and presidency since before Trump was president, I have to agree that it's likely he's going to win, as much as I really don't want him too. Granted, he is horridly unpopular, which is a huge strike against him, but there's a couple big logistical factors that I personally think based on my studies would at least give him an edge.
And I'm also putting a disclaimer. I'm not here to debate. This is just my observations. Quite candidly, if you disagree with me, I don't care. You're entitled to your opinions as I am mine. I won't be responding to anyone else here, just putting down the thoughts and opinions of someone who has been forced to study the statistics, logistics, and policies of this administration since high school.
The first thing is the "law of incumbency". It's not actually a law in the legal or scientific sense, but it's what we jokingly refer to in my political science department when addressing why it's just harder to topple incumbents. Now, the "law" applies a little differently in regards to presidents and typically is used in reference to Congressional elections, but it does still have some application to the presidential offices. So, to explain as best I can, the "law of incumbency" essentially means that it is always just inherently harder to topple someone who is already in office. It's not impossible, obviously, I've done political work with enough campaigns that were both for and against the incumbent at more local levels to be aware of this. But it is just inherently more difficult. At the congressional and local levels, it has more to do with resources such as franking and name recognition, etc. which is still somewhat true with the president. But since most of the candidates in the running are currently members of Congress, they have access to the same resources and name recognition to some degree. Some, like say Elizabeth Warren, are a bit more well known than your Amy Klobuchars of the world, but as they all are serving in office, they've got some standing for them. Heck, even on the Republican side, Bill Weld has pull not only as the former governor and senator of Massachusetts, but also as the VP candidate for the Libertarians back in 2016 with Gary Johnson. BUT, with that said, unfortunately, the president just has more. Not just Trump, but all the presidents always have more. I won't lie, when I looked at the list of candidates on the democrat side, I maybe new of 1/3rd of them prior to seeing their names on this list. I know I know, shameful for someone who studies politics, but as someone who grew up in a conservative state, unless they were making headlines or were friends with my bosses like Elizabeth Warren or Cory Booker, they just never popped up on my radar. And that is going to be a HUGE strike against the democrats unless they do pick someone with enough name recognition to counter the president's notoriety. Because even if you don't like him, bad press is still press, and it's reaching people who do support him. And because they've seen his name soooo many times since he got elected and even before, that name recognition outweighs most of the democrat candidates.
The second strike against the democrats at the moment also kinda falls into the law of incumbency, but is also separate. And it's partly to blame for the 2016 election's fallout from what I've studied. This factor is split parties. Split parties are essentially when there's too many popular candidates running for one party and can cause major problems when it comes to voting. While it's not a one to one comparison, the very best example I can give of this happening is the 1912 election with Theodore Roosevelt. Again, not a one to one, but for those unfamiliar, Teddy was dissatisfied with Taft and tried to win the Republican nomination. When he failed, he went and founded his own party, and because he was so popular, a lot of Republicans had a hard time to choosing between him and Taft. In the end, because of this, incumbent President Taft was unseated because of the split, and President Woodrow Wilson was able to take over. Overall, since this incident, parties have gotten smarter and have tried to prevent this from happening again. It still obviously happens, as Bernie Sanders' popularity with young people cause them to seek out the independents instead of backing Hillary which is part of the reason she lost (and yes there's sooo many other factors I am breezing over here but for the sake of relevance just stay with me). So when it comes to this election, I am a bit worried. There are a lot of strong candidates on the democrat side, which is good for the party, but if say, John Delaney wins the nomination, well if the people who supported Andrew Yang don't find his policies appealing enough, they either won't vote or they'll vote third party, creating a split. Quite candidly I thought this was going to happen in 2016 with the Republicans too but that's neither here nor there and since I was surprised then because of the split in the Democratic party then, who knows, a candidate might step forward in the Republican party that creates an effective enough split for Trump to be unseated. But that brings me to my third point.
The Republicans aren't stupid. Trust me, whether you agree with their policies or not, they are actually very smart people. Well... most of them anyway. I've worked enough campaigns to know there's a few idiots in every batch. But the point is, while you may only see the faces of the people running, there is a team of very brilliant people working behind them to make things happen. If you're ever interested in seeing how a staff can make or break a politician's career, just look at Ronald Reagan or Strom Thurmond. Whether you agree with their policies or not, their staffs are excellent examples of a well oiled machine able to keep a facade going for years. And I believe, since Trump does have experience as a businessman, he is aware of this. It's why he's fired so many people. Reports have come out detailing how his staff would defy him in his earlier days, but now most of them are gone, which whether you agree with Trump or not, it makes sense. If you disobedied your boss repeatedly you'd probably be fired too. And so now his staff is largely subservient to him, and while it may not seem like it, they know what their doing. Sure, there's several things I'd be doing differently, but they're making good use of Trump unpopularity to motivate his followers. And trust me, as someone who lives in a conservative state, I can confirm that they are responding like dogs to a treat. Their use of outrage marketing is very impressive. But it only really works if there's no one to compare him to. Which is why I think other than Bill Weld and a few others, there aren't going to be a lot of nominees on the Republican side. And there's many reasons for this. For one, a lot of members of Congress that I've worked with don't want to deal with the stress that being the president comes with, and their staff doesn't either. I remember one senator I worked for said that even if he did manage to get elected, he gets so many crap already that coupled with the bad publicity Trump has given the Republican party, he could probably never be able to pull his weight as the proper check and balance against Congress. In his words, he'd "be trampled like a welcome mat". And, unfortunately, I think that is the mentality a lot of Republicans have right now. They do not want the negative stigma Trump has given the nomination to impact them and their ability to do their jobs. And while they're certainly feeling it in their offices, the phone calls I can repeat from memory are overwhelming evidence of that, they're feeling it less than if they were to take the seat right after Trump. And sure, Bill Weld has stepped up, but I'm sorry, I don't think he's a strong enough candidate. Other than the 2016 election, he hasn't been in politics recently enough to draw on his support base as much as I think would be needed. But, he might surprise me.
There's several other things I think will impact this election and make it a bit of a wild ride for sure. For one, polling will still probably be off. The way polling typically works is that they poll people who have voted in the past three of the last four or five elections, and while there's been several since Trump was elected, in my area at least, most people only voted in the 2016 election, and a few did vote in the midterms. So they don't meet that minimum. The majority of Trump's supporters are also older, which means polling by phone will be difficult for a number of reasons, and internet polling is definitely shot. So at least on the Republican side, I don't think the polls will give an accurate representation of popularity unless the formula gets changed up.
In addition, while Trump's lack of popularity is a huge strike against him, there's no denying that his staff has done a beautiful job of framing a lot of his efforts as successes. His foreign relations, for example, have really focused on his efforts to mend things with Russia and North Korea lately and have tried to ignore some of his more controversial actions. Even Pence's threats to Venezuela for action have been framed to look like valiant efforts to save a dying people much in the same manner Vietnam was framed. And if it worked then, who's to say it won't work now. And whether you believe the economy is the result of his efforts or the result of the groundwork laid by Obama, it doesn't really matter. President Trump has the platform, not Obama. So guess who gets to claim credit? President Trump. It doesn't matter if he did or didn't cause it, former president Obama doesn't have the same soap box and while some people in higher positions are calling BS, they just don't have the same weight to their names as the current president.
I think unless the Democrat party can all unite behind a single candidate and there's an effective enough split in the Republican party, President Trump will win. Unfortunately for them, the odds are stacked against the Democrats, just as they are always stacked against the party not holding the incumbency. We haven't had a single term presidency since HW Bush lost in 1992. Just shy of three decades later, it's possible history will repeat itself. Taking a quick glance over the list of single term presidents (not counting partial presidencies just for comparison's sake), most of the presidents who only held one term where Republican. So who knows. Literally anything can happen. Personally, I'm not a fan of Trump. I'll spare you why but I'm optimistic that he'll get taken down. But, the reality is my studies and research just have the odds stacked in his favor for a re-election. So we'll see.
