For those understandably worried about the United States sliding towards a fascist dictatorship under Donald Trump, the current debate about the polls is an all-consuming obsession. There's Team Freak Out, who point to polls showing Trump is pulling ahead of President Joe Biden in the 2024 presidential election and start panicking and demanding that Democrats reverse course somehow. Then there's Team Chill Out, with members such as Jennifer Rubin at the Washington Post, who argue to ignore "meaningless, premature polling" when "we are a year away from the race," long before most people are paying much attention.
These two teams are in constant argument with each other on social media, but in truth, both sides have a point.
Team Freak Out is right to worry that voter complacency could result in the nation sleepwalking into a Trump dictatorship. Team Chill Out, however, is right that most voters aren't paying much attention. They rarely hear Trump talk, so when they're re-exposed during the 2024 campaign, many will be reminded of the importance of keeping the fascist imbecile as far away from the White House as possible.
Crucially, a huge number of voters, especially swing voters, simply don't believe that Trump is going to be the Republican nominee in 2024. This is a point that never-Trump pollster Sarah Longwell has hit upon repeatedly in her focus group testing of undecided voters of all ages. She and Amy Walter of the Cook Report discussed this aspect of the race on a recent podcast.
"A lot of them have not grokked yet that Joe Biden and Donald Trump are likely to be the nominees," Sarah Longwell explained of her in-depth interviews with swing voters.
"They really believe something can change," Walter agreed. "A number of them are like, 'Well, if Biden is the nominee, if Trump wins."
When pollsters call potential voters, in other words, they are often reaching people who don't take the "Trump or Biden?" question seriously. Some view it as akin to asking them whether they'd rather have dinner with John Lennon or Joseph Stalin. Once the matter shifts out of the realm of hypothetical to real, we may very well see the polls change to reflect this dawning realization that this is really happening.
For hardcore political observers, this feels preposterous. In the Democratic primary, Biden is functionally running unopposed, faced only with a couple of fake candidates who seem more interested in attention-seeking and profit than in mounting a real bid for the presidency. In the Republican primary, there are technically candidates mounting well-funded challenges that appear to be serious efforts to win. But, unless Trump dies, their odds are infinitesimally tiny. The FiveThirtyEight poll aggregator shows Trump with nearly 60% of likely primary voters, which puts him 47 points ahead of his nearest contender, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida.
So why on Earth are so many voters not getting this? The reason is what political scientist Brian Klaas deems the "Ignorance Bias," which is where "political elites assume most other people think about politics often and have a basic working knowledge of it that is rooted in facts and reality." This, as he points out, is a false assumption, as most people barely pay attention to politics. For example, more than half of Americans cannot name a single Supreme Court justice.
Most people's understanding of the news is cursory and impressionistic, cobbled together by half-read headlines, glanced-at images on the news, and vaguely sourced assertions on social media. For those folks who are mostly checked out and satisfy themselves with occasionally looking up at the TV news while getting dressed in the morning, the landscape of information is very different than that of those who are paying attention. For one thing, the blissfully ignorant probably think former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley is winning the Republican primary.
Just flip on cable news today and watch it on mute. Odds are you'll see lots of images of last night's Republican debate, with lots of chyrons hyping Haley for her allegedly sober-minded performance. Or, if you glance across political headlines, you'll see photos of the four debaters, which include former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy along with Haley and DeSantis. If you bother to listen or read a little, which is more than most people do, you'll see the surge in stories highlighting how big money interests are backing Haley. Most people believe money controls politics, even more than it actually does, so this may sound like she's got it in the bag.
The face that's not really as visible? Trump's. People may know he's been charged with crimes, even if they don't understand them, but let's face it: That's only likely to increase their skepticism that he'll actually be the nominee. If anything, most Americans tend to assume some mysterious "they" — such as billionaires or a shadowy "elite" — are the real people in charge, and would never let that happen. So it will come as a bit of a shock when "they" prove once again to be powerless to stop Trump from seizing the nomination.
It's tempting to lay the blame entirely at the feet of ordinary voters for not paying attention. And yes, there's some blame here, because people really could siphon a half-hour out of their day away from watching reality TV garbage to be a little better informed about politics. But the truth is that politics is boring and hard for most people, and most people are under enough stress as it is, so of course they tune out more than they should.
The media has done everyone a disservice by propping up the illusion that the presidential run of either Trump or Biden is in doubt. Along with the misleading hype of the GOP faux-primary, there's been relentless coverage — the kind that pierces the bubble of ignorance — about Biden's age and the possibility that he'll step aside for some yet-unnamed Johnny Unbeatable Democrat. Just this week, there's been a flurry of headlines and cable news hits about Biden's throwaway comment at a fundraiser that, "If Trump wasn’t running, I’m not sure I’d be running." This has created opportunities for reporters to do things like ask Biden, "Would you be running for President if Trump wasn’t running?"
Stuff like this, when run through a filter of inattention, ends up sending a message that the fate of the primaries is an open question. So no wonder ordinary people see this stuff in passing and think that the Biden v. Trump rematch isn't happening. The most frustrating aspect is this: The reporter who asked that dumb question is no doubt aware that primary voting starts for Democrats in less than two months. The notion that Biden is just going to drop out and clear the way for some random person who has no campaign staff, no funding, and no name recognition is a joke. But by asking it, she legitimizes the assumption that Biden is on the verge of calling it quits and, I dunno, Michelle Obama will run or something.
The media plays this game because the fake drama and alleged uncertainty are good for ratings. It justifies focusing horse race coverage over that which garners even less audience attention, substantive discussion of policy. It's a little less clear why the Republican National Committee is so interested in propping up this charade, even as they must know it is a giant money pit that will not move the needle away from Trump at all.
Well, there's no way to read their minds, but it is worth noting that the main person who is benefitting from all this hype about the GOP debates and primaries is Trump. The more the press is chattering about Haley and DeSantis and whatever fool thing Ramaswamy said on stage, they less they are talking about Trump. They aren't headlining how he has called more than half the country "vermin" who he plans to "root out." They aren't giving wall-to-wall coverage of how he has threatened to repeal Obamacare or that he is using his rallies to treat the January 6 insurrectionists like heroes and martyrs. Because that stuff is "old news" to the political media, it is shifted to the back pages and light cable news coverage, making it not news to the vast majority of people who are only paying a little attention.
That's the bad news. The good news is this: Ignorance is a much less fixed position than, say, being a MAGA diehard.
People may not recognize now that Trump is going to be the nominee again, but that will change as soon as he actually becomes the nominee. Most people already dislike Trump. So they are going to be open to arguments about voting against him, especially once that possibility moves from the mental space of "hypothetical" to reality. Getting people to pay attention may be out of the reach of the mainstream media sources already being mostly ignored. But that creates an opportunity for social media, door-to-door canvassing, advertising, and other outreach efforts to meet people where they're at. This isn't a lost cause. And there are 12 months to help people fill that knowledge gap with real information.
