NATIONAL—Morning Consult–Clinton 50, Sanders 39
NATIONAL—Morning Consult–Trump 49, Cruz 28, Kasich 10
Uh. I thought Bernie had clinched the nomination already. Why does Hillary still lead all the polls?
Isn’t Sanders the candidate of consistency, honesty, and integrity? Here’s his top strategist, Tad Devine, in 2008:
“If a perception develops that somehow this decision has been made not by voters participating in primaries or caucuses, but by politicians in some mythical backroom, I think that the public could react strongly against that,” Devine said.
“The problem is [if] people perceive that voters have not made the decision — instead, insiders have made the decision — then all of these new people who are being attracted to the process, particularly the young people who are voting for the first time, will feel disenfranchised or in some way alienated,” he said.
Square that away with Devine today, in that Washington Post interview:
“I think we have to see where we are,” Devine said, adding that if Sanders were just behind Clinton in the pledged delegate count and had lost the popular vote, “we’re going to make an argument that you should nominate Bernie Sanders.” Devine said the campaign would argue that such an end result was partly because Sanders didn’t contest certain states. “I do think it’s important to take a look at states where candidates have competed with each other,” he said.
See? Now it doesn’t matter to him if he’s behind the popular vote or delegate count, even if voters end up feeling disenfranchised and alienated.
Why? Because the only states that matter now are the ones that Sanders deigned to contest, like Illinois, Missouri, Ohio, Massachusetts, Nevada, and Arizona (which Clinton won, by the way). I mean, both candidates have made strategic decisions on where to contest. Clinton didn’t spend a dime on last weekend’s contests or caucuses beyond Iowa. She knew she would get blown out. Sanders didn’t spend money in the South. He knew he’d get blown out.
Is the Sanders campaign argument going to be that Southern African-American voters don’t count because they didn’t bother to contest for their votes? Dear god! Do they not realize how ugly that argument is? And while it’s bad enough that Devine is making this argument, it’s even more distressing seeing Sanders himself repeat it.
Jeff Stein on why 2016’s BernieorBust will go the way of 2008 Hillarys’ PUMAs.
They mostly agree on big policy questions: Sanders and Clinton may seem at odds right now, but they stand an ocean apart from the major Republican candidates on an overwhelming number of positions.
“The differences between Sanders and Clinton on policy just aren’t very great, and they get blown out of proportion in a primary contest,” Abramowitz said.There are far too many to list here, but a sample include: the need to raise taxes on the wealthy, the reality of climate change, appointing a progressive to the Supreme Court, the desire not to deport millions of undocumented immigrants, and raising the minimum wage.
A (relatively) civil primary: Sanders and Clinton have traded some barbs over their past voting records, and Sanders has knocked her for taking exorbitant speaking fees from Wall Street.
But the primary hasn’t been that acrimonious. “On our worst days … we are 100 times better than any Republican candidate,” Sanders said in February. There have been few attacks driven by the candidates’ personalities or personal histories.“The race hasn’t been very bitter; much less bitter than that between (Barack) Obama and Clinton, for instance,” Grossman said.
Sanders himself: Sanders himself has pledged to back Clinton if he loses the primary, recently reiterating that both candidates’ key goal must be to not allow the Republicans to win back the White House. This effect will be even more powerful if Sanders gives a major speech at the Democratic National Convention urging his supporters to rally behind Clinton, Abramowitz noted.
Historical precedent: In July 2008, 54 percent of Clinton voters said they wouldn’t support Barack Obama in a general election. Ultimately, however, nine in 10 Democrats ended up voting for Obama over John McCain, according to the Nation. Similar threats were made — and later failed to materialize — from the supporters of Howard Dean in 2004[.]
The specter of a Trump or Cruz presidency: This historical precedent is coupled with the strong likelihood that the Republicans will nominate Donald Trump or Ted Cruz, who are both widely reviled on the left.
“Clinton’s been leading Trump by an average margin of 10 points, and that wouldn’t be the case if a significant number of Democrats were defecting,” Abramowitz said.
We are seeing the stages of grief among Sander’s supporters now. Some are in different stages at different. Jason is in denial. Tad Devine and Jeff Weaver, Bernie’s campaign heads and top strategists, are in the bargaining stage.
Ok, you say. We get that Clinton has built a strong delegate lead. But she should be able to close this out with more strength, winning the vast majority of the remaining states. And if she doesn’t, it shows weakness for the general election. Well, […] [a]t this time eight years ago, ]President Obama] too had an all but insurmountable delegate lead.
But in the last 9 contests, we lost 6 of them. Now, we had some issues like Rev Wright we were fighting thru. And Hillary Clinton campaigned admirably. But we predicted those losses long before based on the results we were seeing in the earlier primaries and caucuses.
Even as we were moving towards the nomination, and ultimately the Presidency, we knew we would lose a bunch of states in the latter part of the primary calendar. Some suggested it showed weakness or would hurt us in the general.
History suggests otherwise.
First Read: “The Badger State is almost taking on a role like New Hampshire: Because it’s the only state voting in an otherwise empty stretch, it’s less about delegate math than it is about momentum on both sides. It feels like we’re coming out of halftime and the next scoring opportunity offers the team that seizes it a chance to reset. For Republicans, the #NeverTrump movement has to prove it’s got the juice to slow the frontrunner’s momentum, because they’re going to have a much harder time stopping him if they don’t change this narrative fast. Meanwhile, Trump hopes to make plays in areas like Green Bay and Paul Ryan’s hometown of Janesville to flex his muscles with traditional and non-traditional GOP base voters alike.”
“By the way, watch for the complex rules of GOP delegate allocation to influence how the campaigns operate. While 18 of the state’s 42 delegates will be awarded to the statewide winner, the majority – 24 delegates – will be allocated to the winners in specific congressional districts. That means that candidates are likely to hammer away at the areas of the state where they feel they have best chance of racking up a CD win. And, of course, keep an eye out today too for Gov. Scott Walker’s ‘formal decision’ in the GOP primary.”
Rick Klein: “Before there’s any teamwork, maybe there can be agreement about the rules of the game. John Kasich’s campaign’s efforts to work with Ted Cruz forces to block Donald Trump – first reported by CNN – look to be stalled over a lack of trust, not to mention the fact that Cruz needs Kasich less than he needs him to just get out of the race.”
“But there’s a powerful point that it’s not too late for Kasich and Cruz to make in unison: that they won’t support Trump as the nominee. Yes, this would be violating the pledge, a pledge that was re-confirmed by all the candidates at the latest Fox GOP debate. Yet both Cruz and Kasich are edging toward that reversal anyway. What’s the downside in making that formal, if that’s what they both believe? It wouldn’t be a partnership, but it would create a major and unprecedented moment for two candidates who need to shake the race up, and fast.”
Brian Beutler writes about the Republican party after Trump:
One way or another, the Republican Party is about to rupture—the only question is from which side. If Donald Trump wins the GOP presidential primary, as he’s heavily favored to do, he will drive some unknown, but large, number of regulars from the party. If Republican officials manage to wrest the nomination from him for nearing but failing to reach the threshold required to win outright, he will bolt, and take some unknown, but large, number of supporters with him—either into a third party, or into a protest movement that haunts the actual GOP nominee and creates an air of illegitimacy around him.
NBC News on the GOP’s down ballot dilemma: “Republicans are growing increasingly concerned about the impact a Donald Trump presidential nomination could have on other GOPers whose names are on the ballot this November. Nearly every recent poll measuring a potential Trump v. Hillary Clinton general election matchup shows the real estate mogul with a double-digit deficit. And a potential blowout loss could have a major impact on down-ballot races. Case in point: Just eight of the 21 GOP senators up for re-election in 2016 have said they would unquestionably support Trump, according to an NBC News count.”
“Another data point to keep in mind shows just how much the confluence of statewide and national political factors have Republican biting their nails with a little more anxiety since last year. Back in November, the Cook Political Report ranked a total of five Senate races in the ‘Toss Up’ category, including four seats currently held by Republicans and just one held by Democrats. Now that’s up to six Republican-held seats, with no movement on the D side.”
“The Secret Service says people attending the Republican National Convention in Cleveland this July will not be allowed to carry guns,” The Hill reports. “The statement comes in response to a petition that calls for allowing open carry of guns inside Quicken Loans Arena, the host venue. The petition has amassed more than 43,000 signatures as of Monday morning.”
Damnit. We would have finally rounded up all the Republicans in one place, and armed them, and knowing their stupidity and homicidal tendencies, they would have all killed each other. Alas…
Politico on why McConnell will not relent in the Supreme Court fight: “The activist right has been galvanized by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s quick and forceful insistence that the Senate will not take up a high court nominee for the rest of Barack Obama’s presidency, spending millions already to defend the GOP position with likely lots more to come. Tea party groups that have dissed McConnell for years as an establishment sellout are singing his praises.”
“It’s safe to say all of that would end the instant Republicans agreed to take up Merrick Garland’s nomination. And the fire would turn inward at the worst possible moment for Republicans, as the party is scrambling to save its narrow Senate majority in November.”
Steve Benen on the Sanders campaign’s disastrous conference call yesterday on the state of the race:
I think Devine slipped up again in a way he’ll soon regret. Mother Jones reported:
“[Hillary Clinton’s] grasp now on the nomination is almost entirely on the basis of victories where Bernie Sanders did not compete,” said senior strategist Tad Devine. “Where we compete with Clinton, where this competition is real, we have a very good chance of beating her in every place that we compete with her.”
Devine named eight states where he said the Sanders campaign did not compete with a big presence on the ground or much on-air advertising: Texas, Alabama, Virginia, Louisiana, Tennessee, Mississippi, Georgia, and Arkansas.
According to a report from Business Insider, Devine added, “Essentially, 97% of her delegate lead today comes from those eight states where we did not compete.”No matter which candidate you like or dislike, I think it’s fair to say Team Sanders has generally run a strong campaign, exceeding everyone’s expectations, and positioning the senator as one of the nation’s most prominent progressive voices for many years to come. Sanders isn’t the first presidential candidate to run on a bold, unapologetic liberal platform, but he is arguably the first in recent memory to do in such a way as to position himself as a leader of a genuine movement.
But whether or not you’re impressed with what Sanders has put forward, his campaign’s latest pitch is an unfortunate mess.
[A]s a rule, presidential campaigns don’t get to lose a whole bunch of key primaries by wide margins and then declare, “Yeah, but we weren’t really trying.” If these eight nominating contests have left the Sanders campaign at a disadvantage they’re unlikely to overcome, it’s actually incumbent on his top aides and strategists to explain why they didn’t make more of an effort in these states. […]
At its root, Devine’s argument is that Team Sanders identified a series of early, delegate-rich states, but they chose not to bother with them. That’s not just a bad argument; it’s the kind of message that’s probably going to irritate quite a few Sanders supporters who expect more from their team.
Making matters slightly worse, Tad Devine’s pitch isn’t altogether accurate. In Virginia, for example – one of the eight primaries in which he says Team Sanders chose not to compete – plenty of campaign watchers know the senator actually made an effort in the commonwealth and lost anyway. The senator also campaigned in Texas, which is another one of the states Devine said the campaign wrote off.
As for the argument that Sanders wins “in every place that we compete with her,” even taken at face value, it’s not an especially compelling argument: Team Sanders made a real effort to win in states like Arizona, Nevada, Ohio, and Massachusetts, but he lost in each of them. […]
Devine also said the Sanders campaign chose to compete for state victories, rather than compete for delegate victories. I have no idea why the campaign would deliberately choose to compete by the wrong metric that would lead to defeat, but if I were a die-hard Sanders backer, this kind of rhetoric would be incredibly frustrating.
Bernie Sanders is running Hillary Clinton’s campaign from 2008, and he is becoming just as annoying as 2008 Hillary. And Tad Devine is doing a great job imitating Mark Penn.