Pollsters will tell you that they can generate whatever result you want. Everything depends on how you ask the question. “Are you troubled by civilian deaths in Gaza and support the cause of Palestine?” will generate a different answer than, “Whose side are you on, Israel or Hamas?” For that reason, the public has every reason to be skeptical not only of polling in general, but of representations about American political views in particular. That’s one reason we like the polling work of our pod guest this week, Mark Penn, the chairman of the Harris Poll.
So, you’d think America is drifting away from support for Israel, right? Joe Biden is very nervous about losing Michigan, and so he’s backing off his support for the war against Hamas, right? Wrong. Biden is drifting for sure, but it’s not because American support for Israel is wavering. That support is at 82 percent.
Take a closer look at that poll above. 72 percent of 18-24 year olds are with Israel. 66 percent of 25-34 year olds. Now, you may ask yourself how in the hell 34 percent of 25-34 year olds ranged themselves with Hamas. There’s everything wrong with the country in one number. But it’s still just a third.
The other real kicker for us in this poll was the number of Americans who believe Donald Trump will be a dictator if re-elected: 56 percent. Also, in response to the question: “Do you think Donald Trump's legal cases make it impossible for him to be a viable candidate for president or is that not a blocker for Trump,” 54 percent think the legal cases make him non-viable. 56 percent think he has committed crimes for which he “should be convicted.” Notwithstanding, Trump beats Biden in a head to head match-up among the same voters. Check out the whole poll here.
Another shocker in the poll is immigration. Again, Republicans have always been concerned about immigration. But Democrats haven’t. Check out these numbers:
And remember how we’re being told inflation is a thing of the past? Yeah, only at the White House:
In short, guess what? You’re not alone. You may want more choices than Biden and Trump — and you’re in good company. You may think immigration is a major problem — and you’re in good company. You may think Hamas is a terrorist group and Israel needs to win — and you’re in good company. The weird thing is that the White House disagrees with you on every front. Sigh.
HIGHLIGHTS
How is Trump beating Biden in polls when 50% of Americans think Trump is a threat to democracy?
MP: Now you're understanding the American public. Okay? Some of the things you've got to understand about the American public. First of all, they are absolutely, positively definite about their choices until they change them. And second, the swing voters who I classify really these days is about 20%. Everybody from 40 to 60 on any question is a swing voter, and they believe a number of completely contradictory things. And the reason they are a swing voter is because on election day, they will have to resolve, "I think Donald Trump is a felon, but I think he did a good job as president." And they have to resolve those two things and decide, felon, good job as president, which is more important? Which resolves it?
What shocks you in recent polling?
MP: The most remarkable finding is just simply how immigration has become the top issue. I've been polling really ashamedly for like 40 years, and except maybe during 9/11, and except for some sporadic time, the economy is always the number one issue and you just sort of drone on about the economy. And to see immigration climb up the ladder... Oh, it was somewhat important. Oh, Republicans cared about it. Hmm, Independents started to care about it. All of a sudden it hit the cities, Democrats care about it. It's remarkable that this issue... Which as you recall also, it seemed like Donald Trump seemed like an outlier on immigration and he is now the main street.
Why is immigration a chief concern now?
MP: I think that it has climbed up the ladder because of two principal concerns. Number one, "Some people are getting free stuff that either I'm not getting or that I'm paying for," and that angers the American voters a great deal.
I have a question, an interesting question, what angers you more basically? I haven't done it. I haven't run it recently because it always comes out the same. "Are you angered more by rich people who have too much or by people who get free stuff from government that they don't deserve?" Americans care far more about the second. If I went over to England or the UK, I'd probably get people caring more about those who are, they call, posh. So I think that underlies it.
And the second thing is crime. I think the murder of the nursing student is just one of those events now that is sheering through the public as, "Oh, I can't believe how he went here and then he committed a crime there and then they let him out in New York and then he killed somebody." And I think those two elements really underlie it, which is, "They're getting stuff I'm paying for. And boy, this is becoming a serious crime issue."
But why is voter concern with immigration surprising with today’s border crisis?
MP: Because generally, it was an issue that just base Republicans cared about. And since it was an issue fairly limited to base Republicans, it wasn't really affecting many votes out there. I had another question, which I didn't repeat in this one that I was asking for a while in the beginning of the administration, which was, "How many people do you think are coming across the border illegally?" And most voters would answer something like 10,000 or 20,000. So the fact that it was hundreds of thousands was factually so far removed from what their thinking was that that's also why it was a generally obscure issue in the public's mind
It wasn't until Abbott moved people to the cities and the city suddenly said, "I need 50 million here, a hundred million here," that people realized. I don't even know how Texas has survived over the last number of years as a state, given what the enormous bills have to be for absorbing that large migrant population. So that is what surprised me. That is what we see coming up. It is now an issue that reaches beyond core Republicans. And I don't think the administration ever expected that the issue would ever get that big. And they spent a long time just saying the border was sealed, it's not an issue, these are not the droids you're looking for. And it seemed that everybody bought that until about, what, six months ago.
Shouldn't the economy and inflation be voters’ biggest issues?
MP: Inflation has been the biggest issue until immigration took over here. And I think, again, before the immigration issue, the whole inflation thing, when you look at it, about 60%, 62% of the people think the economy is moving in the wrong direction. A lot of people are unhappy. Fewer people think there's going to be a recession now. I think there's some easing of the issue. And if you go back, the summer before last was really the high point of economic discontent. And since then, there continues to be general economic discontent, but it is not as intense as it was.
What’s the role of the swing voter today?
MP: Back in the day, when I ran these campaigns, we were all about getting the swing voter because what you just read was incredibly true, people wanted bipartisan solutions. Look, even on immigration, people want tougher border and they'll also want to give a path for DACA recipients for work permits and maybe citizenship. And people do like a combination of things that solve problems, some from the Democrats and some from the Republicans.
And of course, that's what we did with President Clinton on a huge scale across all the major issues. And President Clinton's job rating after we did that was, when I went back to look at it recently, was 73. No politician has a rating even remotely like that today because they're not going for the swing voter. They have been captured by the bases and they have been sold this idea that the bases are going to stay home, and that's really the key to victory.
And when you run for your base and you have an election, you get 50 plus one. When you go after swing voters and you have an election, all the people who you tried to get, who you seem flexible for, they give you the benefit of the doubt. You get a real national mandate. And remember, we had a lot of people who ran on this idea. Bush ran on this idea, a uniter, not a divider. Obama ran on this idea, the same thing.
It’s no secret that victory means more than just the base, so why are politicians pandering only to their base?
MP: They have been sold, they're surrounded by aides and people, they have been sold that you need to satisfy the base more than you need to go after the swing, that it's all about turnout in a few swing states, and that turnout is all about how deeply we energize our base. Now, I try to illustrate what I call the math of voting. The math of voting is very simple. You have an election that is five-five, one person switches, it becomes six-four. That's the power of swing voters.
If, instead of having somebody switch, you get someone else to the polls, it's six-five. You need two people at the polls to overcome a single switch or a change. That's the math, but as you said, I'm rather frustrated that people are going instead by, you see this whole thing in Michigan, trying to pressure President Biden to change Israel policy. 100,000 uncommitted votes, the media made it a big deal, riff in the party, he has to go heal that riff. He can't. It's ridiculous. They're never voting for Donald Trump in a million years. All the swing voters are very strongly behind a more pro-Israel policy, although what voters really want is for him to solve the problem.
The vast majority of Americans support Israel. Why is Biden starting to buckle and change course on the issue?
MP: The interesting thing is, again, does anybody else ask the questions the way I do? No. So my question says, are you with Israel or Hamas? Okay. The fact that even 17% are with Hamas is remarkable to me, given that they're a terrorist group, but that's what this war is about. And then there are questions about the ceasefire and dealing with Palestinian civilians and so forth in terms of what the right approach is. Most questions go something like, are you for Israel, the Palestinian people, or both? And then they show more people are for Israel, but then of course, a lot of people are for both, but that's not the war. The war isn't Israel against the Palestinian people. Those questions are not really expressing the conflict that we have here.
Can you imagine that someone else had a question that was closer to mine, but then they put in a both or a neither, […] can you imagine if I asked you, during World War II, are you with the US, Germany, or both, or neither? It's a ridiculous question. When two people were in a war, it was one side or the other.
Nobody else asked 20 questions on Israel. They ask one, one question or two, really, at most. And when I probed it, there was a big problem with young people. Young people were divided, not so much in the last month’s poll. Actually, what I found is more people, over time, actually, I thought they would leave Israel. They did not leave Israel. I think more information came out about the sexual crimes that were committed, that actually, there was more, I think, information that got out there about some of the Hamas atrocities because public opinion has not shifted against Israel, it has remained steadfast. And also I understood what was going on in the college campuses because particularly when we started, it was about 50/50 among 18 to 24. And then by the time you got to 65, it was 95. So there is a huge difference, a huge difference in the information that people have. There's a huge information generationally over Israel, but the bottom line, where are swing voters on Israel? They're very strongly behind Israel. And obviously there's a play here by the left, by the same people who recently visited Cuba to poll the administration's policy and trying to claim that he's politically hurt by his position. First of all you shouldn't be seen as operating out of politics in terms of that. That's one of the first important rules of strong foreign policy decision making. You are the leader of the country, you have to lead the country.
Do you think Biden’s changing course on Israel because of internal pressure?
MP: When I saw President Biden's initial statements on Israel, I thought they were strong, they were unequivocal, they were surprising almost to me, and they were in line with his historical positions, right? And what I've seen recently really seemed to be the White House staff and others trying to drag policy away from the president's original positioning. And the president with his ice cream comments certainly was not helpful. So I don't know how much of his comments are just for domestic political consumption. I don't really know what's going on behind the scenes, but I know what I report, which is in fact, on Israel, it's quite strong.
Biden is the least popular president since Harry Truman, but his Vice President is even more unpopular. Will Vice President Harris’s popularity be a problem for Biden’s campaign?
MP: We don't know what this presidential election is going to turn upon. In the past, we've had the surprising result that when people don't like both candidates, that actually the issues become more important because the candidates’ weaknesses cancel themselves out. And even though they spend like 80% of the campaign attacking each other, which is what I expect here, it turns out that doesn't really matter. What matters is what people think about the issues. And we don't know to what extent it will turn about Vice President Harris.
Clearly 75% believe that she would become president at some point if Joe Biden is reelected. Whether or not that's a salient issue, that's up to the Trump and the Trump campaign to somehow make it a salient issue. I don't think it is at the moment.
Democrats are hoping that the abortion issue will drive voters to the polls, will that work?
MP: I think it's an important issue. I think the fact that it's not the most important issue doesn't matter. I think when you go back and you look at the suburban women's vote, that suburban women's vote, few people realize was generally in the past as much as 20 points Republican. And that vote is very susceptible to just as a matter of fundamental human rights. They believe it's a woman's body and she should have the choice. Even though in fact, abortions are only about a third of what they were. Half of all abortions are in three states, California and New York and Illinois. And most upscale suburban voters who are I think most affected by the issue are not really the consumers of abortion, but they feel very strongly about this as a fundamental right.
What are the chances for a third-party candidate to win the presidency this year?
MP: I always call being president the low probability profession, even for the person who has the highest probability. So it doesn't happen until it happens. You're right, my wife runs No Labels. She's going to come out with whatever, whatever she comes out with. I can tell you I polled for John Anderson. I certainly am familiar with the openings for a new party. And for a long time, moderates in the country and 38% of the country is moderate, have been dissatisfied that the parties are not serving their needs.
And I always liken it to if there's an ice cream store and your choices are only vanilla and chocolate, then it's not surprising that you choose vanilla or chocolate because you're not giving people Rocky Road or Strawberry or any of the other things they might really want to have. And I think that in politics here, the moderates have gotten more and more frustrated when you cite those people, those statistics that you did, that means most swing voters think the Republicans have gone too far to the right. The Democrats have gone too far to the left. They're unhappy with their current choices. Most people are unhappy with the economy. And I've got two candidates here who seem to spend their time working on their bases.
So given that there is pretty much a significant opportunity for the right candidate with the right financing, with the right profile, I don't know whether there will be one or not, but if you ask me, it's always a low probability that anybody's going to win. Is there an opening here for somebody to come in and say, "This system is broken? I have the answer." Abraham Lincoln was the third party candidate. The Republican Party was the No Labels Party of 1860, and he won with 39%. So you actually win the American presidency with something like 34. So you don't need 50%. You don't even get 50% most times.
Nikki Haley won a lot of Republican votes before ending her campaign. Will that be a problem for Trump in November?
MP: It's really interesting. When Trump originally showed up on the political scene, he was the outsider candidate against the Republican establishment and against conservatives like Ted Cruz. Now he is the conservative establishment candidate, and Nikki Haley has kind of the independence outsiders, and he needs those votes in a general election. So I don't know exactly how he, he's going to fill that hole, but he cannot get to the presidency with the Republican base alone. And so I think that how that kind of plays itself out and whether or not he can unify the party and get those voters, a lot of whom have real hard and fast dislike of him. Now, they also don't like Joe Biden either, which is why in England we used to call them the clothes pin voters, that they have to hold their nose and vote for somebody, and we're going to see how that plays out. But I think it's a real problem for his campaign.
Nikki Haley told Marc that she won’t be a No Labels candidate. Is there no chance she makes a third-party run?
MP: I want to make clear I have no information whatsoever. I just said I've learned in my and through the political years that Bill Clinton said he was never, ever running for President. Barack Obama said he was never, ever running for president. And Hillary Clinton said she wasn't running when I was doing secret polls to see whether she should run one year. The one question you cannot trust a politician on is whether or not they're going to run for the highest office in the land.
Will sore loser laws stop Haley from running in the general election?
MP: I don't see how the sore loser laws would hold up based... Again, I'm almost a lawyer in many ways, but not a lawyer. But nevertheless, the Supreme Court has always said, "You can't add state by state conditions to being a candidate for president." And that's whether or not Donald Trump is a felon. And it would seem to me whether Nikki Haley ran in a primary, that if the filing dates are such that you can't do it, then it can hold. But if the filing dates aren't that way and you can exit and run, I think those laws will get brushed aside.
Full transcript here.
SHOWNOTES
Harvard-Harris CAPS Poll, February 2024
Takeaways from Harvard-Harris CAPS Poll from Shaiel Ben-Ephraim
InteractivePolls: Monmouth Poll on Southern Border Wall
InteractivePolls: Swing States: Who do you trust more to handle…
InteractivePolls: Bloomberg/Morning Consult Poll on Trump vs. Biden in Swing States
Somebody else said it much better … and even Mark Twain repeated and attributed these words to the former British Prime Minister:
“There are three types of lies -- lies, damn lies, and statistics.”
― Benjamin Disraeli
Reference: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/4173-there-are-three-types-of-lies----lies-damn-lies
But not to leave out the venerable Mark Twain … here are his words that also seem especially appropriate in these times:
“Patriotism is supporting your country all the time and your government when it deserves it.”
― Mark Twain
Reference: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/85741-patriotism-is-supporting-your-country-all-the-time-and-your
The way I see it … the government has justifiably earned nothing deserving whatsoever, except for a swift kick-in-the-ass.