Election 2020

[pbrower2a]

Also one of my posts in Leip's Election Atlas. Leip covers US elections as far back as the process (not really an election) that selected George Washington as the first President of the United States). Red favors Democrats and blue favors Republicans as fits a pattern of over 200 years of elections, and I use green for what has yet to happen and purple for ambiguity. I have placed in bold coloration what I consider the likely theme of defeat of President Trump, and I doubt that that will much surprise anyone.

This is the (apparently) objective Lichtman test that has usually been right in determining which party wins the majority of the popular vote in a Presidential election. To be sure our system of electing the President has the States, and not the People, electing the President, so a winner of less than the plurality can get elected President, as in 2000 and 2016. It is still theoretically possible for Donald Trump to win reelection with a Democratic majority of the vote as Democrats run up huge majorities for President in states with 9 to 55 electoral votes (CO, MD, MA, WA, VA,  NJ, IL, NY, and CA) while barely losing some critical states as Hillary Clinton did in 2016.  But -- if the Democrats get an even swing of 1% of the vote from 2016 to 2020, then Trump loses Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, and his re-election bid. To be sure, even swings do not happen.  


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(revision: I consider the statement of former Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld that he is running for the nomination for President through the Republican Party unambiguous evidence that Trump faces a serious primary challenge from someone with bona fide credentials as an elected Republican with a significant history of public service. I am also calling the President's anti-immigration stance an effective change in American politics even if I find it abominable. Lichtman does not ask whether the change that a President effects  (such as a large tariff) is to the good or bad of the country.    

Quote:1.    Party Mandate: After the midterm elections, the incumbent party holds more seats in the U.S. House of Representatives than after the previous midterm elections.
2.    Contest: There is no serious contest for the incumbent party nomination.
3.   Incumbency: The incumbent party candidate is the sitting president.
4.    Third party: There is no significant third party or independent campaign.
5.    Short term economy: The economy is not in recession during the election campaign.
6.    Long term economy: Real per capita economic growth during the term equals or exceeds mean growth during the previous two terms.
7.    Policy change: The incumbent administration effects major changes in national policy.
8.    Social unrest: There is no sustained social unrest during the term.
9.    Scandal: The incumbent administration is untainted by major scandal.
10.    Foreign/military failure: The incumbent administration suffers no major failure in foreign or military affairs.
11.    Foreign/military success: The incumbent administration achieves a major success in foreign or military affairs.
12.   Incumbent charisma: The incumbent party candidate is charismatic or a national hero.
13.   Challenger charisma: The challenging party candidate is not charismatic or a national hero.

1. GIGANTIC NEGATIVE. We now have a definitive answer on November 6, 2018. The GOP not only lost seats in the House of Representatives, but also its majority. This is usually a negative for practically any administration,
2. NOW NEGATIVE There could be, but that is yet well enough into the future that we can't say anything.

I'm not saying that Bill Weld will succeed in knocking out Trump, but his campaign will weaken Trump. This has become an unambiguous negative, and it could get worse for the President. The last two incumbent Presidents who faced a serious primary challenge (Ford and Carter) lost their re-election bids. In view of his experience, Bill Weld is a serious candidate. Effective Presidents do not face primary challenges. To be sure, I cannot yet say that Weld is as effective as Reagan in 1976 or Ted Kennedy in 1980 -- but he demonstrates a weakness of this President. Some GOP constituencies dislike Trump. The primary challenges to LBJ in 1968 created chaos.

Rivals for the nomination  are rarely effective in bringing all their early breakaway supporters back to the fold.
 
3. A Republican will be President in 2020 and the incumbent will be running even if something happens to President Trump. Pence would run for re-election.
4. I think that there will be, but that is too far into the future for any discussion yet.
5. Way too early to tell. Ask again in August or September 2020.
6. The Obama economy had a growth rate unusually high, as it was a recovery from a nasty recession. This will be impossible to meet.
7. NOW POSITIVE -- if for all the wrong reasons He hasn't yet. The tax bill is it. I expect more efforts at deregulation of industry, union-cracking, and privatization even if those prove unpopular. In view of the anti-immigrant policy that our President has, he now gets a positive. Lichtman does not judge whether the effects are good or bad, as in the past with a huge tariff bill. Consequences could lead to the strengthening of negatives, as in domestic unrest.
8. GIGANTIC NEGATIVE.  Sure, the President did not directly inspire one of his supporters to send bombs to Democratic politicians and celebrities, but he consider himself lucky that none of them blew up a target. Donald Trump may be no antisemite (Nazi-style antisemitism is racist), but the creep who mowed down eleven Jews in a Pittsburgh synagogue did so out of a concern that the  specific Jews had been  supporting immigration of non-white people. The frequent polite demonstrations from the Women's March on have not been unrest, but they can certainly call attention to his awfulness and aid in organizing an electoral opposition.  
9. GIGANTIC NEGATIVE.  This is the most systematically and severely corrupt Administration in American history. The legal problems keep piling up.
10. Likely but it has yet to happen. NOW NEGATIVE. I do not trust the deal with North Korea, and this President is insulting so many of America's traditional allies that something will go bad. The tariff is a disaster waiting to happen. I'm calling it now for reasons shown above on America's loss of credibility among its traditional allies. This is a matter of timing, and I could have done it earlier.  I do so now, not that anything has changed abruptly. Remember how badly he bungled the response to the deaths of four Special Forces soldiers in Niger? Maybe not, but I saw that as a portent of trouble.  
11. The nuke deal with North Korea? There is no enforcement in place. The President would need China and ideally also Russia as an enforcer.
12. Trump already seems much less charismatic now than in 2016. He still has charisma with his cult. That will not be enough.
13. We have no idea who the Democratic nominee will be.

Two clear blue, six red, four green (has not happened yet but still can), one purple (ambiguous). He now has no room for any one of them going red, and may have to reverse one of those4 keys in red.

Any bad result from the Mueller report or exposure of misdeeds involving Assange merely intensifies the ninth key already in flaming Atlas red.


The Lichtman test is not of my making, and it offers ambiguities for interpretation -- but  I have been slow to recognize any one of these turning against the President, choosing to recognize them only when they have become irrevocable  -- if only in my opinion. I am tempted to believe that pervasive corruption will be enough (as with an economic meltdown for Hoover or with catastrophes of foreign policy or continuing stagflation for Carter) to make this President unsuited to re-election in itself. Trump is on the margin of failure as it is, in accordance with the Lichtman test.