Q&A – Can Trump Win Haley’s Supporters & The Political Middle?
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Today’s Entry: Today’s question was submitted by a colleague in a mini-debate pertaining to the scope of Donald Trump’s Republican nomination win. The question in question became this. How much of Nikki Haley’s base voters in the Republican primary weren’t Republican voters? Secondarily, can Trump effectively win over Haley’s supporters and that of the political middle in November.
Bottom Line: Former President Donald Trump has now done what no previous Republican president has been able to do. Make a successful political comeback. Teddy Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover before him tried (in Hoover’s case a few times) but failed. But in wrapping up the Republican nomination with a dominating Super Tuesday performance he also did something no presidential candidate in either party has ever been able to do – win over 90% of the pledged delegates in a contested primary. Donald Trump’s pledged delegate win rate after Super Tuesday and at the time Nikki Haley dropped out of the race was 91%. There has never been a non-incumbent president in either party to win delegates at anywhere close to that rate. By the pledged delegate standard, Trump’s current presidential run is the most impressive in partisan political history. Yet, there are many who assert the narrative that Trump can’t win in November.
The thesis for Trump’s lack of electability is this. Yes, he has a solid base of passionate support, however those who aren’t already with him, won’t be with him in November. Given Haley’s ability to consistently win about a third of the Republican primary support that could be a problem. And that’s true. If Trump were to lose out on a third of Republican primary voters in November that would all but certainly spell doom. However, that won’t happen and from a point of practicality it isn’t true. First, in this analysis, I want to illustrate the difference in support Trump and Haley received in states with “open” primaries or caucuses, where anyone regardless of party affiliation could vote, compared to the level in support with states with closed primaries or caucuses where one had to be a registered Republican in order to vote.
In the 2024 election cycle, there are 24 states, including Florida, with closed primaries or caucuses compared to 26 with open processes. Through Super Tuesday 23 states had voted for president. Of those states (Trump vote percentage in parenthesis)...
- Closed (8): Nevada (99%), Idaho (85%), North Dakota (84%), Alaska (88%), California (79%), Maine (71%), Oklahoma (82%), Utah (57%)
- Open (15): Iowa (51%), New Hampshire (54%), South Carolina (60%), Michigan (68%), Missouri (100%), Alabama (83%), Arkansas (77%), Colorado (63%), Massachusetts (60%), Minnesota (69%), North Carolina (74%), Tennessee (77%), Texas (78%), Vermont (46%), Virginia (63%)
So, what’s the scorecard?
- Donald Trump’s average vote percentage in states with closed votes: 81%
- Donald Trump’s average vote percentage in states with open votes: 68%
What this appears to illustrate is that about 13% of the voters in the open states have been non-Republican voters attempting to influence an outcome in the Republican primary process. Meanwhile, Trump has been the top choice for more than eight out of every ten Republican voters. This isn’t exactly surprising. On the day Donald Trump left office, and keep in mind this was fresh on the heels of January 6th, his approval rating among Republicans stood at 85%, it was 39% among independents and only 2% among Democrats. One might imagine that if a voter approved of Trump at the very end of his presidency, they’d stay with him as he attempts to reclaim the presidency. And that’s effectively what we’ve seen with only about a 3% variance which is within the margin of error. And that takes us to the next phase of the question. Can he win over the rest of the Republican vote that wasn’t and isn’t with him and the political middle? The answer to both is yes, it’s possible but also that he may not need to. I’ll explain.
It’s been said many times that a 2020 Biden-Trump rematch is one that the country doesn’t want. That’s obviously not true given that both candidates have sailed to victory in their respective primaries. Democrats want Joe Biden. Republicans want Donald Trump. But, with both presidents having high negatives from outside their base there of course is some truth to it. The best way to illustrate the view of the possible and the probable in this race is to highlight where Joe Biden’s approval stands across the political spectrum. Joe Biden’s current approval among Democrats is 75%, among independents it’s just 23% and with Republicans it’s 2%. So, let’s revisit Trump’s final presidential approval rating across political constituencies compared to Joe Biden.
- Trump’s approval rating was 10% higher among Republicans than Joe Biden’s currently is among Democrats
- Trump’s approval rating was 16% higher among independents than Joe Biden’s currently is
- Biden and Trump have and had equal levels of support among partisans from the opposing party
This highlights two instructive points. First, Biden has a far bigger problem within his own party than Trump has within his. Second, while neither scores well with independents, Trump has outperformed Biden by 16% with them. There’s your win in the political middle. So, in other words, just because Joe Biden won the first match doesn’t mean that Trump has to do something differently or has to try to be someone different this time. President Biden, through his own failures, has taken care of that for him, at least as of now.