Pollsters joining us today. House,lachlan and neil neil was the pollster for the previous republican nominee, mitt romney, 2012. You can follow along the and ask usn olitico. S, p we are excited to have this conversation. Thanks. Good to be here. I want to start with the question i get most when people in a speakingr gig or in general conversation, to what extent polling has underestimated President Trump. Both of you believe there is underestimation going on. John, what drives that . I think it is significant. Two things. Reporting, you are ahead of the curve in terms of the changes technology has made. It is harder to get voters period. You focused on the education levels, workingclass levels. Polls structured to keep up with technology and where people are and being able to get a hold of them, that is one challenge. Then there is the challenge of donald trump. He is a unique figure in history. Beat thehe odds he odds. It was a close race. The strategy was built on new voters. 9 million new voters made the difference. People forget this. We won a close race, 78,000 votes in three states, 139 million and there were still 80 Million People t eligible to vote. A lot of the polling did not capture that. [indiscernible] assumed turnout for Hillary Clinton would be the same as barack obama and she was not obama. The media has gotten more hostile. [indiscernible] medianeral establishment does not like donald trump. And if you think you are polling on behalf of the media [indiscernible] trump orders [indiscernible] basic questions like, who you think is going to win . It is harder than usual. On best polls will be based past turnout, the last midterm election, which was historic or the president ial election, historic, and now, there is a challenge of a pandemic, unemployment levels, unrest in the cities and now you have two hurricanes hitting during the rnc. [indiscernible] are the polls underestimating republicans . Let me go back. John raises good points. We found in focus groups in 2016, we would ask people who they are voting for, and what was interesting is, not until one voter was brave enough to say they are voting for donald trump, did other voters around the focus group table also admit, confess they were trump supporters. Part of it is because of the polarization today. Republicans really dont like democrats. Democrats dont like republicans. There is a real shyness, and unwillingness to tell people who you are voting for because they dont want to get into arguments. We did postelection work in california and michigan after 2016 and found more than 30 of trump voters said, during the campaign, they were unwilling to tell others they were supporting donald trump. They turned out to be, look at the crosstabs, more likely to be women, higher educated, living in the bluest counties. Really interesting. Primaries,t, during 2016, the Interactive Voice Response data where people just have to press a button who you are voting for, trump scored three points higher on those types of polls then he did with a live interviewer. That speaks volumes. Finally, recent polling in iowa and north carolina, 35 of voters in each state say they know someone who is a trump supporter who wont tell anyone but their closest supporters. 9 . T no. Is it a couple points . Yes, probably. Lets stick to a national metric. Job approval rating. August is not necessarily an indicator for november. I would like to wrap this question in Historical Context and look at the last six president ial campaigns where the incumbent president was seeking reelection and compare that to where donald trump is today. Pointss running 210 ahead of where bush and carter were doing at this point in august and they both lost. Points behindng where other successful incumbents were at this point. Watermark onest 26 list is obama, 2012, job approval. Why is 42 , where trump stands to winenough for trump in november . You tend, you tend, if im correct, that is all online . No phone interviews, right . With that, you have a certain type of voter. A lot of the polls for job approvals are really differently done and undervalued to republicans. Abc, nbc, 26 ike, republicans and the last exit when for the 2018 bad year republicans lost the house, was 33 republican and the one in 2016 was 33 republicans. What is relevant is, the modeled after the 2016 turnout, yesterday they had him at 51 job approval. What is important about that is the last two president s to be reelected is really polarized. 9 11, the parties are really polarized. Reelected,ay he was he had 51 job approval and he got 51 of the vote. Obama, hurricane sandy, he had a renaissance and got reelected with 51 . I do not think the president is that low. Is the highrange 40s, and some of the polling 51 . Im touching that is about getting reelected. There models eight years ago, they had barack obama, when he got reelected, at 48 at this time. I think the president is doing better than the Morning Consult poll states and i think that has to do with methodology. Four years ago, there was no job approval. But there were similar polling between clinton and the president. The president knew we were in a close race and he worked hard enough that we won that in a very close election. Right now, i am thinking the president is covering close to 51 of job approval. Certainly, the convention helps get our message out. [indiscernible] a lot of the polling under reports republicans. In june, you authored a Campaign Memo via the president s twitter feed, i want to quote from it. The latest polls must be intentional. Cnn, who have democratic operatives have consistently under pulled republicans and recording bias polls. You described this as an intentional strategy. Neils firm is the republican half. [indiscernible] your argument is that this is intentional in order to suppress republican votes. Politico, that is not our intention. Viewers how you think that works. If neil was taking care of that pole, we would do much better. A lot of these are adults. 240 million eligible adults to vote . It is registered voters. There are a lot more registered [indiscernible] because of the historic challenges of this election. 150 million. It is still a likely voter model. In june was only 26 republican. You have really smart people working on these polls for the networks. I cant believe they dont think the likely voter model is not you know, they are not shooting for it. They are doing this much broader audience that is, you know, clearly, clearly discounts our voters and undervalues them. I am sure neil agrees with me, the republicans will be over 30 of the turnout. If it is not, the campaign [indiscernible] we are wasting our time talking about national polls. In all seriousness. [indiscernible] i didnt do one Single National survey during the entire campaign. Not one in 1. 5 years of work. Our universe, our country was made up of the 12 states that were the target states. If you look at polling this year and what is going on, they was the lack ofin 16, good quality state polling. That is still a problem. In these target states, hardly any have been conducted in the past month. That is ridiculous. It is easier for large media to do national polling. Very few do statewide polling. Look at those national numbers. The president ial approval rating. Enough tobably not get the president reelected nationally. It is not a national election. It is Electoral College. Individual target states. If the president is at 46 nationally, he has a hell of a good chance getting reelected. In the target states, the numbers will be significantly better. We all wish we could have more state based polling. We share that sentiment. Lets go to a question that addresses [indiscernible] actual votes. Won suburban areas overall by four points but things have changed among white, educated voters who have moved strongly against trump, and part of that evidence comes from 2018, where democrats were able to flip the house through the strength of suburban areas from charleston to Oklahoma City to orange county, california. I have spoken to republican strategist who have identified suburban women, collegeeducated suburban women as a weak spot for trump and republicans generally. Can you talk about what, in the next 70 days, the Trump Campaign can do to turn this around, to bring in those voters again they were able to win in 2016 . You saw last night, the first night of the convention, it was really a great contrast with the Democrat Convention. Fact, theree , in were not a lot of battleground state polling after the Democrat Convention but last night was a great night for the republicans. The president really showed there is a diverse republican voters,d that suburban particularly independent voters have a reason to vote republican and for President Trump and not for the democrat ticket. There is a second term agenda the campaign put out that is really popular. Creating jobs, covering preexisting conditions, school but it gives a really thorough policy goal analysis that the vast majority of those issues are popular, which is in sharp contrast with the democrats. They played more character contrast with the president and were light on issues. If you want to know what the Trump Campaigns strategy is, look at the second term agenda and the appeal of those issues to suburban voters, particularly independent women and men. I think it is something the voters will say, defunding the police . That is a bad idea. That is going to result in higher crime. Guess what . I have to vote for the republicans. They may not be thrilled with the president s style to get things done because he is a businessman, but they do like the results. The results are very important for them. Elaina, let me interject for one minute. Please. There has been some erosion for trump in suburban areas. Iis really interesting got back a poll yesterday from a republican who did not think he was in trouble in a rural area in a key state. The numbers came back trump was doing better now than he was doing against hillary. Polling these areas because they are safer republican. Are gettingike we higher turnout that could offset some suburban areas where we are seeing erosion. Thank you for that. Let us close with a lightning round. We appreciate your time. Try to keep these brief, maybe a couple of words. We are going to be using these ratings as our guide. Race not senate popping in public polling . Our democrats confident they could flip come november . I heard you ask that last week and that is an easy one. The one i am watching most closely is maine. Hell collins is running a of a campaign. John . I would agree with neil on senator collins. She is doing quite well and i think President Trump is going to surprise people in maine as well. I have a feeling that what i am seeing is, as President Trump rises, so will the Republican Senate candidates. January 2021ion, who controls the senate and by what margin . Republicans are going to control that by the skin of their teeth. John . I think we might be a seat or two better than that. [laughter] justresidential race is taking shape now at the Republican Convention ends and people we have several political lifetimes to go through now i november. Thank you for talking with us about trumps path back to the white house. It was great having you both. Thank you for the opportunity. Thank you. Before we sign off i want to thank elaina and the politico team for the conversations we had. Getting the republican perspective this week, we will watch the polls over the next 70 days. We turn it over to senior politics editor, charlie and reporter laura for the swing states map. Good morning. I am the senior politics editor at politico. The electoral map has changed quite a bit and we are here to talk about one of the key states. I am joined by my colleague, National Political reporter, laura, to explore the new swing states map. Throughout the political conventions we will take a look at six states at the heart of the electoral map. Today, we are focusing on arizona. Part of my coverage of politico is the president ial race as well as demographics. I have covered the changing demographics in arizona and what that means for president ial races and ballot races. Before we dive into arizona, mary newman is providing us background into the dynamics at play. If arizona were a color, it would be read. It is home to the red rock state park, famous for the red clay, cardinals fans are draped in red, but the biggest reason is the voting patterns. The state has voted for the republican candidate in 70 of general elections. We came within one percentage point of carrying arizona. I hope you will help us to better on thursday. This bill clinton rally was the last election when the deeply republican state voted for the democrats. In 2016, trump won the state, but things seem to be shifting making it a democratic target. First, let us talk demographics. Part of the reason arizona could turn blue is the growing power of the latino vote. The hispanic vote turned out strongly in favor of president clinton. That is something the republicans are going to have to look at in the future. Bringing it back to 2016, and exit poll analysis estimated 80 ary clinton won more of the latino vote and eligible latinos went up to 42 . Latinos have been historically written off, but democrats increasingly believe they could provide crucial voting margins for joe biden, especially in arizona. In mid july the Biden Campaign try to win over more latino voters. They spent 1 million in spanishlanguage outreach. Arizona is dominated by maricopa last several the elections it has accounted for 60 of the votes captain arizona. The candidate who wins maricopa usually wins the whole state. Top of the emerging purple and blue in Maricopa County there is the o the devastating impact of covid. Trump started advocating for them to open in may. Reopening. Open things up. Our country wants to open. And the republican governor followed suit, quickly reopening the state while taking a lax approach. Governor ducey even signed an executive order banning local governments from issuing mask mandates, a policy he later retracted. In june the daily numbers of confirmed cases grew from 187 aday to almost 5000. The pandemic has hit one of the Fastest Growing voting blocks the hardest latinos. Latino residents are more than twice as likely to become infected. 73 of latinos living in arizona hold trump directly responsible for allowing the pandemic to spiral out of control and almost 50 answered yes when asked if the pandemic led to anyone in their household losing a job, receiving a pay cut, or having trouble paying bills. It is hard to overstate the gravity of the situation. The 11oses arizona votes, his reelection could be doomed. Arizona has produced two president ial nominees over the last halfcentury including barry goldwater. The governorship is controlled by republicans. For the first time, organizations include arizona and the battleground state poll ing. What is going on . The latino population has grown and they have increasingly become more politically active. Activists and organizers on the ground see the battle between latinos and gop governors, as well as the former sheriff who was known for legally defining a judges order to stop racially profiling latinos those woke up younger generations and made them more politically active. Democrats and republicans alike have told me, in the state, trump has accelerated these dynamics and due to his presidency a moderate democrat, which biden has fashioned himself as, could be more viable. The debate surrounding arizonas response to the coronavirus has been among the most politicized with President Trump praising governor duceys handling of the pandemic and joe biden ripping the governor. How is the pandemic shipping the election environment . Arizona has been one of the hardest hit states and latinos and native americans in that state have been disproportionately hospitalized and killed by the virus. Recent polling shows latinos are disapproving of trumps handling of the pandemic and fearful of exposure. It follows that that could push more latinos toward biden, particularly younger ones who have not always been in joe bidens corner. During the primary joe biden did not do as well with younger generations, particularly Younger Voters of color, but trumps handling of the virus could push more his way. Coronavirus impact on older generations has weakened trumps numbers with white voters. That could also play a role. Joe biden was leading donald trump among arizona latinos according to a july poll. Tell herything i can still has a ways to go to consolidate the latino vote. That is right. Biden needs to recreate the path democratic senator Kyrsten Sinema created when she won her senate seat. She received 70 of the latino vote and 45 of the white vote. She did not run what you would call a progressive campaign. She promoted border security. What we are seeing in more recent polls, but similar to the one you cited, is that biden is 63 among latinos from a latino decision firm. Definitely has a ways to go to win more of the latino vote, particularly Younger Voters. In a state like that he could potentially lead with his immigrant background. Bidenso think improvement among latino outreach is having an impact in a state like arizona. His campaign has improved that outreach which they did not have much of during the primary. In the last month he released spanishlanguage apps in states like arizona and they had the speaker have region specific accents. Speaker had ae Mexican Accent because the majority is of mexican descent. White suburbanites are also critical in arizona. They seem to be up for grabs this year. What issues are driving their votes . Like most voters a lot of it is going to be health care, the economy, coronavirus. Say that arategists big reason republicans lost the 18, which led to democrats winning the house, is trumps divisiveness. Theyre talking about his racist tweets, Administration Family separation policy, all of that contributed to losses. Republicans also lost women by 19 points to the democrats. If trump continues that kind of strategy, one that is very nixon , it could potentially hurt him in a state like arizona. But his bet is that it would rally his base around him. In terms of electoral votes arizona is not as big of a prize. Wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania are, so why are parties focused on arizona . Arizona is a more exciting state because it really is a tossup. There have been consistent polls showing biden is leading trump. Arizona also has more elec Electoral College votes then wisconsin. The red belt states would represent more, but i have heard among bidens campaign that tryona might be a better then wisconsin. Particularly because of changing demographics. It sounds a lot like the Hillary Clinton argument in 2016. Timeve a limited amount of so let us to a lightning round. If there is one thing the Trump Campaign must do to win arizona, what would that be . I would say trump needs to not shrink his base which is what we see occurring with the Republican Party over the last 4 years. That would require him to reverse course. He needs to over perform with white voters and if he can, shrink bidens gains with latinos. Winning the majority of white voters is not going to cut it because the republican candidate did win and still lost statewide. Let me ask you the same question. What about the Biden Campaign . What does it have to do to capture arizona . I would say biden has to carry phoenixs Maricopa County which is the most populated county in donald trump carried in 2016 by three percentage points. I think he needs more among independent voters. I agree with you. I know it sounds a lot like Hillary Clintons strategy, but again, that was before democrats won statewide. That is a good point. Thank you all for joining us for the swing states map. We have two more states to go. Join us tomorrow as we take a look at florida. Thank you for watching and take care. We welcome the Campaign Manager for trump to the show. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for having me. Let a set the stage for our conversation. We are going to talk about polls, although that is not the favorite topic of any campaign, but the averages joe biden leading by 7. 6 point. The president has suggested he is not a fan. Tell us where you have this race today, 70 days before election. First, thank you for having me. You do great work. Thank you. I am not going to bore you 2016, i amg about not going to tell you of the polls between july and election day only 13 had trump ahead, of the 20 taken in pennsylvania and wisconsin only 1 had trump first. The same people who were polling polling 2020. Till pullin 2016 who hadle in it right are polling for us again. Is thet of the matter president changed the map in 2016. Ality . Nt option the president holds true. How are you going to run the table in the midwest . He only has to win one of three. Cushion, but i also talk about optionality th because he lost by 1700 in new hampshire, two points in nevada, three points in maine. Mitt romney lost by 15. Pathways andle that is what you want. Do you and the president do you see yourselves as the underdogs . Not is forwe are or you guys to decide. Every day at camping hood quarters we treat this Campaign Headquarters we treat this , we scratch and claw, to have the bluecollar mentality. You guys of the experts. There are 70 days between now and election day. Talk about one concrete thing you think the Campaign Needs to do between now and november 3 to ensure victory for President Trump. We need to keep talking about joe bidens radical policies. You did not hear a lot last week at the Democratic National convention about democrats policies. You heard about fear tactics and the bad things about america. You did not hear about their policies and that is not because they do not have policies, it is because they are bad. Their policies test poorly. Deal,orders, the green redirecting police funding, those are poor and that is why you heard little about the policies. The more we talk about democrat policies being pushed by joe biden and the radical fringe the better we are. The better our standing improves. When you talk about one thing we aim to do, will do, continue to do is exactly that. How was the campaign changed since you have taken over . How have we changed . Role, not new to the team. I am familiar with the operation, the president , the campaign. Campaignhe part of the that is really focused on the stretch run. The ground game, early voting starts in a few weeks, absentee ballots dropped in north carolina. Calendar, thehe focus on the early states, really the discipline to the calendar is what we take seriously. You actually live in a state, new jersey, that sent out ballots by mail. There has been controversy around that and with the president has said. Do you want people to use mailin voting to vote this november . I think in the states in which mailin voting has already occurred it is fine by me. I think they have shown that it works. It has been proven over years. When 80our concern is days, 90 days out from election day you have governors changing the rules. That is a scary proposition. My concern is democratic governors are making promises to the voters that you cannot guarantee. This is not a Postal Service issue. This is a local county clerk issue. They simply do not have the bandwidth to be accepting millions upon millions of ballots. That was 80 or 90 days to prepare. Eight or nine years . Sure. 80 or 90 days as a responsible. We talked about this with the democrats, a big challenge is getting people engaged on both sides regardless of your party. Heardirtual convention we a lot last night about promises made, promises kept. The president urged people to think about their lives before the pandemic. Critics highlighted a playbook this morning and said you are trying to rewrite history, the campaign is try to rewrite history, gloss over covid, gloss over the state of the country which is in a significant amount of distress. How do you respond and how does the campaign tackle criticism like that . The president built the worlds greatest economy once and he is going to do it again. He has a track record of being a builder in his private life and doing it as president. The fact of the matter is he responded to covid aggressively and early, shutting down travel from china. We see the results to this day. Im talking about the wall street journal and that covid cases are at a two month low. We are making progress. So the president at the press briefing sunday talked about the vaccine, rolled out the second term agenda and at the top of the list was finding a vaccine by the end of the year. A commitment that what he built before will be built again. The president suggested his response to covid19 is an asset. How much did you think he should be campaigning on that . He is not campaigning a covid. He is campaigning on being a leader, on being strong, providing steady leadership. Is not something you campaign on. It is something that shows your character, shows your strength, and shows your resolve is a leader. I think the president has shown that. When he has talked about on the campaign trail it was to display those traits. A lot of people heard last night tim scotts speech. The convention leaned in pretty hard on racial issues. Let us listen for a second at what tim scott had to say. [video clip] cottonfamily went from to congress in one lifetime. The nexthy i believe American Century can be better than the last. I think we got cut off a little bit. I think it was interesting he said the next century would be better than the last. Talk about the president s relationship with black people and people of color. He has been criticized for stoking tensions. Widely and so hard on this issue why lean so hard on this issue . I was the base of President Trumps election in 2016. I am a white guy who owns a pickup truck, i like college football, i drink beer. This time around, last night, tonight, and the remaining days you will see the expanded base of support for the president. You saw last night with tim scott the president has grown this party, the president has grown his coalition over the years, and he is proud to highlight these Great American stories. You heard a lot of anger and despair and darkness last week. You are hearing a different tone this week. We have Great Stories to tell that we are telling through these Great American stories whether it is tim scott or brenda jones last night. Youre going to hear more stories that are inspiring and beautiful and really reflective of how the president has grown his infamous base. We want to shift to being more forwardlooking. We are quickly running out of time. Can you talk about debate prep, who is involved . Give us behindthescenes of the playbook version of where your head is at on debate. Sure. Believe it is great training for what is to come. Still plenty of time left between now and september 29th. We hold out hope the commission would make the right choice. 16 states are going to be voting before the first debate. That is problematic. Said the president trains every day by being president. We have had sessions to make sure he is paying attention to september 29, but we will get through the convention and move onto the big prep. I want to follow up really quickly. There are three debates scheduled by the commissioner. Wheres the campaigns head at today when it comes to the president participating in all three debates . I am really not sure why this is such a conversation. Onmade clearly very early that we would be at all three debates. We wanted more debates actually. You can count on him being at all three. Five,e for more, four or name the place and we are going to be there. We are happy to do more. [laughter] we have a couple of more questions and then we will let you go. How much can we expect the president on the campaign trail in person . A lot. You can do one of two things. You can hide out and count the days underground or you can be aggressive like the president. The president ended last week during the Democrats Convention week in stronger standing which is amazing. He did that because he was aggressively taking his case on the road. He traveled more in one week than joe biden has traveled since march. You will see him doing more events. He was able to hopscotch around the country at a bunch of events in minnesota and wisconsin. Events is what you can expect. We are being more nimble as a campaign every day. Were seeing him veer off in minnesota and drop into minneapolis. He saw him pick up pizza pies and old forge last week. You also see our circuit operation
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