Category: In the media/Roll Call

The Winston Group’s David Winston writes in today’s Roll Call about the “existential split” within the Democratic party that has twice led to the election of Donald Trump and to the Democrats becoming a third party.

What has driven the Democratic Party into third-party status isn’t complicated. There is now, and has been for some time, a potentially existential split in the Democratic Party between working-class voters, historically the key voter group in their coalition, and what I call “Democratic liberal elites,” whose influence isn’t in numbers but in money and the media. 

There is no better example of that disconnect than the events surrounding Kamala Harris’ candidacy, as Democratic power brokers pushed Joe Biden aside hoping for a better candidate.

Lunch bucket Joe was out. Elite progressive Harris was in.

It was this split, rooted in class and ideology, that opened the door to a second Trump presidency and remains a significant challenge to the Democratic Party as it tries to rebuild.

Read the full piece here.

The Winston Group’s David Winston writes in today’s Roll Call about the media narratives that “simply did not pan out, as the results and exit polls show.”

Pundits also argued that because the country was so polarized, there were no neutral voters; everyone leaned toward one party or the other. There was no true political center, independents weren’t really independent, and anyone following the election should use that lens if they wanted to understand it. Their conclusion: The key to this election wasn’t appealing to the middle; it was going to be turnout operations. 

But if that were true, what happened to the vaunted Democratic Party get-out-the-vote effort? In this election, Democrats’ share of the electorate fell to a historic low, and they are now a smaller portion of the electorate than both Republicans and independents, according to the Edison exit polls. 

Read the full piece here.  

In today’s Roll Call, The Winston Group’s David Winston writes that 2024 may “go down in history as the election the Democratic Party ID hit an all-time low.”

Exit polls ask voters which of the two major parties they identify with, or neither, as the case may be. Comparing the composition of the electorate in the 2024 presidential race with the one in 2020, Democrats dropped a significant 6 points in party ID, going from 37 percent to 31 percent and becoming, de facto, the country’s third party, behind both Republicans and independents.  This year’s major turnabout by voters gave Republicans a historic plus-4 party ID presidential-level advantage that delivered a political hat trick for the party — the White House, Senate and House. 

… Democrats and the media should have seen this coming. The Winston Group’s 2022 post-election analysis noted that Democrats had the lowest percentage of the electorate, 33 percent, that the party had experienced in the past 20 congressional elections. The previous low was 35 percent, which came in the Democratic defeats in the congressional elections of 2010 and 2014. Definite red-flag material. 

Read the full piece here.

In today’s Roll Call, the Winston Group’s David Winston writes that “this election will be won or lost on the basis of who voters believe will deliver a stronger, more stable economy.”

While Republicans had produced a better economy than Obama’s, their decision to emphasize other issues for the party’s closing argument [in 2018] cost them seats. 

That was the GOP’s mistake. Ironically, for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, their mistake was looking to Barack Obama for economic policy advice. Their post-pandemic stimulus package, the American Rescue Plan, was nothing less than a page out of Obama’s playbook — on steroids — and just about as effective.

Read the full piece here.  

The Winston Group’s David Winston writes in today’s Roll Call about the Vice Presidential debate between Senator JD Vance and Governor Tim Walz.

Walz, whether you agreed with him or not, Vance did a good job presenting his policy positions. His recent experience doing interviews with the press was clearly a help. His statements were precise, making the points he wanted to make with clarity and, surprising to many, with warmth and compassion. Vance’s friendly interaction with Walz made the debate more about content rather than personality, which Walz equally contributed to. 

Read the full piece here.

The Winston Group’s David Winston writes in today’s Roll Call about the possibility of a second Trump-Harris debate and the current state of the presidential race.

The possibility of a second Harris-Trump debate makes for a great subplot to one of the most interesting campaigns we’ve ever seen. How the campaigns and the candidates address the debate question rests on whether they think another debate will put them over the top or whether they can afford to take the chance, given the last debate.  

Today, most polls show the race is hovering around a 2 to 3 percent national Harris lead. That means the Electoral College is in play. 

Read the full piece here.

In today’s Roll Call, the Winston Group’s David Winston writes about a key indicator of electoral success: the winner of the popular vote outside of California.

For both parties, historical trends show that the “rest of the country” margins align more closely with an Electoral College victory and can be a valuable measure of what will happen in November. Given the closeness of the race, there is a serious possibility that the Electoral College could determine the outcome rather than the popular vote.

Read the full piece here.