I keep wishing someone could poll the triple-Trumpers who are quietly done with him. Nobody has found a way, and the reason is human. Admitting you were wrong to a stranger on the phone is a bigger ask than most people can manage, so they let the call go to voicemail and the pollster logs a shrug. The numbers we do get, like Trump at 53 percent unfavorable in the 5th District, come only from the people willing to pick up. I think the ones who hang up are where the real story is.
That's why Cook moving the governor's race from solid to likely Republican gets my attention. Cook doesn't edit a rating over a yard sign. The Republican Governors Association doesn't spend $2 million in a state it supposedly owns unless somebody in a nice office has seen a number they hate. Add Bice ducking every town hall and every debate, and you have an incumbent who has run the math on name recognition and decided silence is her best friend. Candidates who feel safe don't hide.
Now for the theory I hear most: the Republican who can't stand Mazzei but would sooner eat gravel than vote for a Democrat. I believe that person exists. I also doubt Munson or Nelson wins him outright, and I don't think they need to. Plenty of Drummond voters went home from that runoff with a nominee they didn't pick, and Mazzei took the nomination with just over half the vote. A voter like that has three options in November. He can hold his nose and fall in line, he can cross over, or he can leave the governor's line blank and vote the rest of the ballot. Only the first helps Mazzei. Every blank is a vote he doesn't get, and every blank makes a race Cook already moved look tighter. I'd count the second option too, because the man in the truck with the sticker isn't going to announce it.
Picture a rural farmer with kids at home, a hospital cutting services, and the nearest specialist ninety minutes away. He won't tell a pollster what he's thinking, and he won't tell his neighbor at the co-op either. But he gets to be alone in a booth, and the booth never asks him to explain himself. I'm betting on those quiet votes, and on the embarrassment that comes with them. Embarrassed voters can be moved, and Cyndi Munson and Jena Nelson only have to make the exit easy to find. Show up early, and bring the neighbor who won't say it out loud.
I keep wishing someone could poll the triple-Trumpers who are quietly done with him. Nobody has found a way, and the reason is human. Admitting you were wrong to a stranger on the phone is a bigger ask than most people can manage, so they let the call go to voicemail and the pollster logs a shrug. The numbers we do get, like Trump at 53 percent unfavorable in the 5th District, come only from the people willing to pick up. I think the ones who hang up are where the real story is.
That's why Cook moving the governor's race from solid to likely Republican gets my attention. Cook doesn't edit a rating over a yard sign. The Republican Governors Association doesn't spend $2 million in a state it supposedly owns unless somebody in a nice office has seen a number they hate. Add Bice ducking every town hall and every debate, and you have an incumbent who has run the math on name recognition and decided silence is her best friend. Candidates who feel safe don't hide.
Now for the theory I hear most: the Republican who can't stand Mazzei but would sooner eat gravel than vote for a Democrat. I believe that person exists. I also doubt Munson or Nelson wins him outright, and I don't think they need to. Plenty of Drummond voters went home from that runoff with a nominee they didn't pick, and Mazzei took the nomination with just over half the vote. A voter like that has three options in November. He can hold his nose and fall in line, he can cross over, or he can leave the governor's line blank and vote the rest of the ballot. Only the first helps Mazzei. Every blank is a vote he doesn't get, and every blank makes a race Cook already moved look tighter. I'd count the second option too, because the man in the truck with the sticker isn't going to announce it.
Picture a rural farmer with kids at home, a hospital cutting services, and the nearest specialist ninety minutes away. He won't tell a pollster what he's thinking, and he won't tell his neighbor at the co-op either. But he gets to be alone in a booth, and the booth never asks him to explain himself. I'm betting on those quiet votes, and on the embarrassment that comes with them. Embarrassed voters can be moved, and Cyndi Munson and Jena Nelson only have to make the exit easy to find. Show up early, and bring the neighbor who won't say it out loud.