Certainly a roller coaster counting process. And still unclear, a full clarifying picture of what is happening down ballot for several weeks. We have assembled a stellar team to help us navigate a couple of key questions. What happened, and why . Was there an expected gap between expectations and eventual results . If so, what was the cause of that . How are the two parties, democrats and republicans, now going to move forward in terms both their program, their policies, but also how they position themselves electorally. With that, let me turn the mic over to my coconspirator in this endeavor, ellyn toscano. Ellyn . Hello. I am the cofounder of the inside american politics series. Hosted for 10 years, and last year and this year by the center at nyu. We started the annual conference in 2008 following the historic election of barack obama as president of the united states. Now, we come together to discuss the election of joe biden. With an equally historic Vice PresidentKamala Harris, the first woman, the first woman of color. We do find ourselves in a transitional and dynamic moment in the transfer of power from the current president , donald trump, who has not conceded but will instead contest the results. To president elect biden, widely accepted and acknowledged as the president elect based upon the counts of state and local voting officials across the country. However contested, there was an historic turnout with votes still being counted. The turnout hit a 50 year high at 148 million votes, which accounts for 62 of the eligible voting age population in the united states. We are grateful to participants of these panels over the next two days. Each of our panelists is expert and experienced in american politics, and very busy with the ongoing drama of this historic and historically messy transfer of power. Before we begin, let me thank my coorganizer steve mcmahon, with whom i have had the true pleasure of working all of these years in the presentations of these conferences. And the center, the executive director who you just heard from and the Deputy Director of programming and outreach, tom mcintyre. I would also like to thank our cosponsors for this programming. The Brennan Center for justice and nyu both. Some logistical notes. We will leave time at the end of each panel, the last 15 minutes, for questions from the audience. Please use the q a box. The website there is a link in the chats. With that, i will introduce the moderator of the first panel, steve mcmahon, longtime democratic strategist and the cofounder of Purple Strategies llc. You. thank we have a great panel today. People who have worked in politics on both the democratic and republican sites. People who are journalists and others that have then columnists and producers and in the case of betsy who is now the executive politics. F women in we are excited to have this conversation today. Were going to dig deep, but jonathan martin, one of our journalist panelist today, wrote a great piece in the New York Times the other day that looked at how joe biden won, with the key moments were. What the key moments were. Maybe a good way to start this would be to go to jonathan to give us a quick summary of how you think biden won this thing, what were the pivotal moments and how the campaign took advantage of those. And how did the Biden Campaign take advantage of those . Jonathan thanks, steve, and thank you guys for doing this again. Though this is a different environment than we are used to. We will make the best of 2020. I think the wisdom of the democrats nominating joe biden has come into focus the last week. This was a personal repudiation of Donald Trumps conduct. This was not a political statement on the Republican Party. Look no further than the difference between the republicans who were afraid to expected to lose eight to 10 seats in the house, but instead gain as many seats while President Trump loses convincingly. I think this was a split decision by a country that was fatigue by the conduct of the president , wanted somebody to bring some measure of normalcy political normalcy back to america, but at the same time, they were not calling for an expansive progressive government. We are now in a place where the democratic majority in the house has been reduced significantly. The senate will probably be about 5050, or 5149 republican. That depends on what happens in georgia in january. The question now is, was joe biden the only democrat who could have beaten trump . Given how close the race was in some of those swing states, would a different democrat have been able to put together that coalition of keeping the partys base of racial minorities in big cities, growing the hillary advantage in the suburbs, and doing the same or a little better than her in the rural areas . Would anybody else besides biden have done that . We will never know the answer, but biden did do it. That is a credit to him and his party. How did he do it . By being joe biden. Consensus oriented, centrist, centerleft democrat whose instinct was to heal the country, cool divisions instead of inflaming them. He caught hell for it last year in the primary. Every debate night, they were coming after him, saying he was naive. How could you think you could work with republicans . He never wavered from that message, and you know this from working campaigns. Campaigns that win have message consistency. If you look at his opening video in april 2019 and take it through the speech he gave on saturday the night claiming victory, youll will see a through line of joe biden running on restoring the soul of america, america is better than donald trump, and i am going to restore us to a more congenial, less polarized place. Obviously, it worked. Along the way, were there some challenges . Sure, but i think consistency was essential. The last point ill make is this. There is an argument to be made, and i could make it because i that the story in march, effectively, this election came ofan end in the second week march. Biden effectively ended the primary by beating Bernie Sanders soundly in michigan on tuesday the 10th, super tuesday in michigan. The next day, we all got hit in the head by covid. It was clear that next day that covid was real, the president gave a speech that night in the oval office, tom hanks was diagnosed with having covid, and the nba canceled its season. I think that week in march was really the turning point because it became clear that the whole trump theory of the case which was, maybe you dont like me but the economy is great and the other guys are crazy, that case came crashing down. Because the democrats did not nominate Bernie Sanders, they nominated joe biden, and he wasnt going to be able to run on the economy anymore because the pandemic crash the economy. You can trace the election back to that week in march. Thank you, jonathan. I want to call on todd. Todd is one of the best republican strategists out there and actually represented a number of candidates who outperformed donald trump and won their election. I remember when we were talking after the election you said you were not sure that your candidates could actually outperform donald trump and win. But, that is what happened. They outperformed donald trump and won. What did you see and do you think jonathans analysis is right, that it was over in march, or given the result and how close it was, it seems like it was never really over until the ballots were counted, but what do you think . Todd it did not feel like it was over in march. I think jonathan was exactly right in calling this i made the point in my notes, calling this a split decision election. We talked for ages about trumps problems in the suburbs. The problem republicans had in 2018 was that there was no way for suburban voters to express their disapproval of donald trump specifically, and so they voted against republicans generally as a way to show their disapproval. This time around, they could vote against trump. You have, in all types of swing districts and in swing statewide races, you have all of these suburban voters who did not like trump personally, although they did like his economic policies. But at the same time, they were not ready to embrace, though it may not have been bidens agenda, there was a sense among a lot of suburban voters that these kinds of cultural changes that the left had been talking about were an anathema to them. One of the things i think republicans did a particularly good job in terms of messaging on was keeping that conversation alive about cancel culture, defunding the police, the riots and all of t voters could vote against trump, but in state after state and race after race, they could then turn around. In state after state, they could turn around and vote republican. Whether it is look at maine for starters the minnesota house, the state legislature there. Wisconsin, pennsylvania, Ryan Fitzpatricks race, one of the swingiest of all swing districts. I think ryan is going to outperform the president by 14 or 15 points. Don bacon in nebraska too. Same sort of dynamic. The final point i will make is on that is one of the reasons why that dynamic worked both for biden and down ballot republican candidates is because the Biden Campaign did a good job of keeping the choice every election is about a choice. The most famous one from 1984, are you better off today than you were four years ago . The Biden Campaign did a really good job of making sure that the choice that the voters were thinking about was an up or down vote on donald trump. This was a referendum on donald trump, not a binary choice between two candidates. Compare that to 2016, where you truly did have a choice. The entire last 10 days of the race were all about Hillary Clinton. From january onward of this year, the entire thing has been about donald trump in an up or down vote. Steve in that up or down vote, one of the things as a democrat im excited about in addition to mr. Joe biden, the history making that occurred with Kamala Harris. I want to talk about a couple of important subgroups the Democratic Party constituency, women and minority voters. I want to go to joel the pollster. Before we talk about the polls, joel, lets talk about some of the voters that made this possible, joel, and doug. Joel is a democratic pollster, one of the best and finest there is anywhere in the world. Doug was involved in many races as a partner at skdk, heavily involved at the Biden Campaign. Doug did many Congressional Senate races as well. I would like to get from the two of you, if i could, a little bit on the turnout and which demographic groups made the biggest impact, and what that portends for both the Democratic Party and the republican parties Going Forward . Doug . Doug sure, it is great to be a part of this group. Again, its always fun to break down the election with so many smart folks. Appreciate you guys having me again and i agree with almost everything folks have said so far. You know, look. I think that a lot of the gains we saw in 2018 that the Democratic Party made in the suburbs and actually, started with Hillary Clinton in 2016, but then certainly increased in 2018. Able toseen biden was build on those gains in the suburbs in 2020. Second, when we look at turnout, numbers are still coming in. But when you look at places like milwaukee and philadelphia, and when you are looking at detroit and flint, we are seeing the numbers of black voters definitely increased. There is some question about the percentage of those that went for trump, but the overall number in many of those places have increased. That was, in part, due to an emphasis by the Biden Campaign early on to reach out and connect to those voters. We also saw that among asianamerican voters and outside groups. I work closely with the naacp with turning out black voters. They had a concentrated effort on pennsylvania, michigan, wisconsin, and georgia. They spent early, mobilizing volunteers to transition that program to communicate an actual persuasion program for black voters and then a turnout program, infrequent voters. That started at the end of september. I think those are some particularly in the suburbs a place where democrats biden in particular needs to feel good about the campaign he ran. You know, i think we can have a conversation about polls being off and whatever, but i think the strategy of the Biden Campaign should be looked at and applauded in the sense that they had a strategy to focus on three states. They did five or 10 other places, but michigan, pennsylvania and wisconsin, and when you look at arizona, those were four components of the Biden Campaign. Look at where biden was the last 24 hours of the campaign, he was in pennsylvania. There were polls that showed democrats up pretty soundly in pennsylvania, but the Biden Campaign was not taking anything for granted. They were in pennsylvania. They were all over pennsylvania and that made a huge difference. While there may have been indications from other polls that there were other states in play, i think there are many things i would give credit to the Biden Campaign, but they did not get distracted by shiny objects. Yes, they did invest in texas and ohio, but the overall strategy of their focus on those three blue states that was critical to biden winning remained from the start. They also knew they needed another one just in case one of the blue states didnt work out, so they focused on arizona and they also had a focus on georgia. There is a lot to unpack overall, but i think the message discipline that jonathan mentioned was right on. But, you know, look. I also think that one of the biggest strategic errors the Trump Campaign made was undermining vote by mail. The Biden Campaign ran a major vote by Mail Campaign and it made a huge difference. You know, there was a time when republicans used to vote by mail a lot, or at least had confidence in it. That is why florida in many ways runs such a sophisticated system. They get results. They have older voters and voting by mail is not something that is strange to them. That was a big tactical mistake by the Trump Campaign, one that biden took advantage of and potentially is the reason why he won the presidency, along with a number of other things. Steve joel, looking at michigan, wisconsin, and pennsylvania, how does it look different to you since 2016 . Joel i think let me take that, but first say overall, i often say to people we forget we are a 5050 country. We are probably 4040, with 20 to consider themselves moderate and independent. To win elections in this country, you have to win the middle and that is particularly true when you look at those three states. On a national level, joe biden improved his performance over Hillary Clinton with independent voters by 12 points, from 42 to 54. Similarly, among moderate voters self identified moderate voters, clinton got 52 . Biden got 64 . I think when you look at those three states, those were the blue wall. You have to win those three states if you are a democrat. As i said a couple of years ago on this panel, it was a monumental blunder by the Clinton Campaign thinking we had those states locked up. She didnt campaign in those states, but you have to win the middle. In this election in particular, even though joe biden is not from the left wing of the party, donald trump is so far to the right, in a way, in his extreme behavior, he is not ideological, but in his behavior he acts in a way that is alienating to voters in the middle. I have been talking about suburban voters early on. He plummeted in the early days of the coronavirus and the aftermath of george floyd, donald trump plummeted with suburban voters, falling behind with a group he had won by four points and they make up half the electorate generally in president ial elections. He had plummeted in most polls, including fox news, which i think is the best media polling out there. He was down 16 or 18 points. With those suburban voters. The margin was not anywhere near that big on election day, but if you look at the gains biden made with suburban voters across the country, they make up half the margin of victory for him. Half of that margin is coming from the suburbs. I think to todds point about a lot of really smart republican campaigns out there, i agree with that totally, but i would also say when i say we are a 5050 country, americans do not love it when one party has all three branches of government. And i think they if the system is supposedly built on checks and balances, voters often make sure those checks and balances are there. I think that is a lot of what happened. I also think in terms of congressional seats, and the senate probably goes hand in hand on this 2018 was a big win one. For democrats. They picked up a huge number of seats. I think this was, again, a check on it. A governor, if you will. Carhave speed control in a to make sure that this does not run away too much in one direction. I think those dynamics were at play. We are probably going to talk more about this being a referendum on the president. Any campaign were an incumbent is running for reelection, it is a referendum on the president s performance. There is a predisposition toward incumbents. Over the course of history, we have had few landslides. The seventh being to be elected and reelected with more than 50 of the vote both times. We have a history going back to 1900, before trump, only seven president s who sought reelection sorry five out of 19 lost. Lost the reelections. There are a lot of dynamics here structurally that could have been in play for trump, but more importantly with the events we had, the pandemic, the economy, which is trumps strength falling apart. More households with somebody out of work than at any time since the great depression. Hes out there every day saying he built the greatest economy. It was tone deaf and out of touch. Steve i want to take a peek underneath the hood for a second on female voters. Betsy, you are the executive director of the women in Politics Group and before that, the executive producer of meet the press. You know politics, subgroups, you know voters, you watch this closely. How would you characterize both the turnout and performance of female voters in the suburbs and elsewhere . And in particular, what role do you think they had in georgia. We know anybody who has done Democratic Politics knows the most reliably dependable democratic voters are black women. Women in general usually make up a majority of any electorate. Could you talk to us about the role of women in turnout and what you saw . Betsy yeah, absolutely. Happy to be with you guys. As you mentioned, women are the most steadfast of voters. Outnumbering men in both Voter Registration and voter turnout. That was certainly true this election cycle, women making up about 55 of the electorate. Looking at the exit polls, but there was a lot of discussion earlier this year not only about the blue wave, but the female tsunami. That was coming into the biden column, because we saw these preelection polls showing biden up between 15 to 26 points among women. They will do a postmortem on other panels, but for comparisons sake, in 2016, Hillary Clinton won women by 13 points. A lot of polls were saying it is much higher than that. What we ended up seeing from these preliminary exit polls, the big caveat being it is early, trying to make sense of it all is not necessarily completely scientific, but biden winning women by 11 or 13 points staying the same since as 2016, or shrinking slightly. Interestingly in terms of gender , the movement into bidens column and away from trump really came from the male vote, which trump won by 11 votes in 2016 and polls showing now him male vote by a much smaller margin. And as you mention of mentioned in the setup to the question, we know black women in particular supported biden at the highest race. It was a year to win among white women, maybe trump again appeared to win among white women, maybe even doing better than he did in 2016. But the black women definitely coming into play in terms of organization and support in some of the key urban areas. You mentioned georgia, but also certainly saw that in philadelphia, organizing, adding the vote out. We also mentioned Kamala Harris earlier. I think that was significant in terms of motivating black women to turn out and we certainly saw over the last couple of days, with celebrations about, you know, Vice President elect Kamala Harris giving her speech, showing up in suffrage white, little girls watching that, black women excited and proud. I think that was a real special moment we saw. Steve todd, i want to go back a second, if i can. You were involved in a senate race there and were paying attention to polling on a daily, certainly weekly basis, and you saw how these things were moving. Can you tell us a bit about what you were seeing . I dont know, doug, if you were involved in georgia at the same time, looking at the polling from the other side, but to the extent that you were aware of polling, can you tell us what you were seeing . We occasionally get these moments, like at the nyu conferences, to compare notes about heres what the republicans were seeing and what the democrats were seeing in the same place at the same time, so lets just see if it lines up. Todd . Todd so, i think it is an open question, because we just dont have the data yet, to definitively say in georgia, that its ultimately the reason why biden, who is going to carry the state, they havent called it yet, but is the reason he biden kerry georgia, is it because of a massive increase in africanamerican turnout . Or is it more to do with the dynamics i was talking about before that a few others have mentioned, with the suburbs turning against trump . While it is true that there were massive mobilizations of africanamerican voters, particularly in and around atlanta, there were equally massive mobilizations of rural white voters. There is some suggestion again, we dont have the data yet, that those two things likely cancel each other out, by and large, and if that is the case then the reason why biden won is because of the suburban vote. All you have to do is look. I have the data here. As of yesterday, i think it was, trump in the atlanta suburbs, trump is underperforming purdue by almost a point and a half. And underperforming purdue in the exurbs by a little north of half a point. When you just look at the raw numbers, hillary narrowly won cobb county, which cobb county is 25 africanamerican. 60 white. Middle to upper class. Hillary narrowly won cobb in 2016. Biden pretty overwhelmingly won cobb county. The story has yet to be written and it could be that it is both, a combination of the massive africanamerican turnout and trump losing support in the suburbs. But at the same time, i know everyone pays a lot of attention to georgia and people talk about like, it is so close, it is so close. Its been heading this way for a long time. Ago innvolved two years brian kemps governor race which, you know, was probably the most competitive governors race in the country. So, this is not anything new. The challenge for republicans is going to be that it is only probably going to continue trending this way. Steve what like to hear from doug, and jonathan the times did a big story in georgia recently, and joel, you look at the exits so i want to hear from you. Doug, can you tell us what you and the campaigns you were involved in were seeing at the same time . Doug yeah, i mean so if you start in 2018, i think we saw for the you could even go back to 2016, but we have seen incremental growth in terms of democrats picking up voters in georgia since 2016. 2018, we had a couple of really important congressional wins, we had a really close gubernatorial loss there. Close nonetheless. And there was a lot of effort posts that election by people like Stacey Abrams to grow the Democratic Base there and register voters. As we saw over the last couple of months, that was a state that became increasingly one of those states that, unlike ohio, which i never thought was a place we could win this cycle, given the makeup and demographic of the state, it looked like a place democrats could do exceptionally well. The numbers i was seeing sort of showed that. For one of the projects i was working on, we made, we made a big investment over the last couple of weeks on digital programs to communicate directly with those 18 to 39yearold black voters. Many of them infrequent black voters, to get them to turnout. While the numbers are still going in, you can probably have two things be true. Biden did well in the suburbs but also well with turning out black voters. So, you know, i think georgia became one of those places, like arizona, where i was more bullish on those two than i ever was on florida, or, for that matter, iowa or ohio. Just because of the makeup of the state, you know. What we were seeing trend wise. The campaigns made their decisions to invest there. The work that they did to mobilize there was, it made a huge difference. A lot of the outside groups that played there made a huge difference. Steve joel . Joel yeah, georgia is a state i have been looking at for a while. In fact, in 2012, 2016 in the hillary campaign, at one point people were feeling so bullish, they wanted to do a head fake and put some money in a red state to try to get the republicans to invest there and they chose arizona. I argued against arizona. I said no one in the press is , people like jonathan martin, arent going to believe that arizona was competitive in 2016. Georgia was a much more credible state at that point. I think the Biden Campaign made the right choice in playing their. The other factor is that between the last election and this one, we did some analysis of Population Trends in the country and postfinancial crisis, for the First Time Since reconstruction, africanamericans were moving more from north to south than south to north. Those were states like North Carolina, georgia, florida. Obviously virginia, if you call it a below the masondixon line state. And people say that the reason is during hard economic times, people move to where they know people, family and friends, who are more likely to connect them to jobs and a social network. To me georgia was going to be wasnt going to turn blue, but was going to be very competitive in this election and i think the Biden Campaign definitely played the right hand by investing there. Turns out arizona was a pretty good investment this time as well. Those Population Trends mattered a lot in the gains georgia have been lot and the gains in georgia have been younger, the millennials, things that are happening in the demographics of the state that will make it more competitive Going Forward over time. Steve jonathan, did you have anything you wanted to add . Otherwise, i am going to go to betsy. Jonathan i spent time in georgia and arizona over the last couple of months in the campaign. It was clear they were both going to be competitive and biden was smart to make that investment in time and money. What is striking is that because of the covid, he only got to phoenix once the entire campaign. Do you guys realize biden and by the way, this is detailed and i think, which story is the sin . This is the story that hopefully you guys will have in your sunday paper. The lead all. Do you guys realize, well, you would if you read the story, that biden only went west of the central time zone once the entire campaign . He went once to vegas and phoenix in september, and besides that, he never left central time. Extraordinary. But he did get out there. He was in warm springs and atlanta. The numbers were there. You had a combination of nonwhite voters and suburbanites who didnt like trumps conduct and it was a math thing. It made a lot of sense. Whats striking to me, guys, is the kind of knew that arizona and georgia were coming. What im curious about is why North Carolina cannot get its such a hard state for democrats to win. You know, they elect democratic governors there every four years. If cooper serves fullterm, they will have had democratic governors for 28 of 32 years and in North Carolina. They have elected one democratic senator in this century in 2008, the year that obama carried the state. Democrats of a problem in North Carolina with federal elections. They cannot win senate races there. They have a hard time winning the presidency there. Even though the demographics seem to be about as good as georgia. Part of the difference is theres less of a black cloud vote there than in georgia. Its about 20 of the population. [no audio] betsy i dont know where he went. Steve hes probably still talking. Betsy his laptop is dead. So well let him come back when he comes back, but betsy, if you could for a second, one of the interesting things i always thought was the high wire act for gop candidates who are women, separating themselves from what i would call the misogyny of donald trump and being able to run a sort of independent persona and win as republicans. Can you give us a little perspective on that . Betsy yeah, you know, todd mentioned this earlier. We did see some support coming in these down ballot races towards republicans, improving their numbers, of course, in the house and senate. The effect of that essentially is that there are even more republican women who have been elected to congress. When you run an institute on women and politics, thats a good thing because theres no way to get to that parity in congressional representation unless you have both parties bringing women into the process. So now, we are on track to having more women in congress and i think the Record Number right now is 127 and with a couple of races left to be decided, up to 132. So not a huge difference, but moving in the right trajectory. Still under a quarter total. Im back. Steve welcome back. I missed florence. Betsy wait your turn, now. [laughter] the republicans, smartly after 2018, when they saw a republican women elected to congress, they really just put a lot of focus, money, resources, and effort into recruiting some good republican women candidates. Having those women in place to take advantage of the electoral winds that were moving their way, you saw 13 new republican women, some in races that have yet to be decided, coming at the expense, frankly, of democratic women, incumbents that were beat. Five of them. We will have more women than ever in congress. But still the way to go. Steve jonathan, you were in the middle of a compelling point. It wasnt that compelling. The point i was making was that like these states are fascinating to me. Why was georgia ripe enough . Why was arizona ripe enough at , both at the margins . North carolina, a state that you would think would be as favorable, doesnt get there for democrats. Youve really got to drill down on these county by county votes. Looking at North Carolina, biden did better than not just hillary, but better than obama in 2012 in two of the big metro areas. But why isnt he coming closer to winning . I think the answer is that trump has got a hold on rural voters that not only is intense, but it is also drawing more turnout, too. I think trumps turnout of his base is what really kept this election and those kinds of states closer. Hes giving up ground in the metros, but hes making up for it in a lot of these rural areas. Again, not just on the margins, but in terms of the definite depth of the turnout. Steve ok, im going to go to todd and then doug. Todd to jonathans point, i was thinking a lot about this, the day after the election i was in iowa. I was flying home and at that time, it looked very much like trump might be reelected and i was thinking about the hold that he has, the connection that he has to a big chunk of the republican base, specifically white workingclass voters. It reminded me of something i hadnt thought of in a very, very long time that im surprised i remembered at all, from my College Economics class, but its something called loss aversion theory. What loss aversion theory says is that people are more motivated to protect they already have than to get something new. There have been all kinds of studies about this. They can even drill it down by like a factor of like three or four times more likely to want to protect what you already have. So, rightly or wrongly, and people can have a debate about this, but if you are a white can workingclass voter, in many ways your vote for trump is to protect those things that you feel you already have. To protect the kind of country you grew up in. To protect the kind of culture that you have always known and always loved. More and more, a lot of these people feel that that is slipping away from them. Whether it is immigration or, you know, the idea of sort of political correctness, or just the mere fact that whites will not we will be a majority nonwhite country in the coming years. There are all kinds of reasons people are worried that they are going to lose that and trump speaks to that in a way that really no other candidate certainly in my lifetime has. So, the connection that they have with him is not based on economics. It is not even based on politics. Its cultural. And its very, very powerful. Steve ok, i want to go to doug, then joel, then back to this intensity thing you mentioned. It is a whole other topic. Go ahead, doug. Doug one thing i want to point, that i want to raise, the democrats had to run their campaigns much differently than in the past. In the past, democrats relied on voter contact methods like going door to door, doing rallies to help with Voter Registration and for turnout. For most campaigns on the democratic side, we werent doing that. We werent doing a lot of direct voter contact in terms of going door to door. Definitely increased towards the end. And we werent doing the rallies that democrats had become accustomed to. A lot of things like souls to the polls and organizing with churches, that was something democrats chose not to do as much because obviously of the pandemic. I think trump and many republicans took a different approach and i wonder, this race, at the president ial level, likely from a popular vote standpoint wont be that close. Obviously its closer from an electoral vote standpoint. But when you look at some of these places, did that make a difference . The fact that democrats didnt do a lot of those Traditional Voter contact methods that we are used to, that democratic voters are used to . Yes, we phoned in and did virtual calls, but not as much doortodoor and it makes a huge difference. Its a lot more effective than doing phones or texting. Facetoface conversations make a difference and i just wonder in a noncovid era, if we were doing that whether some of the numbers would have actually been better for dems. Steve joel . Joel i want to go back to something that todd said and i dont disagree with most of it and i agree wholly on the loss aversion theory that ive read about as well, but one thing thats interesting, and look, trump is his own worst enemy, we all know that. Its unfathomable to me that their campaign didnt know that 60 of voters said their would have said their Economic Situation today was the same or worse than four years ago. Keep talking about building the biggest economy on earth, the the economy in history, when six out of 10 voters dont feel that way is bad politics and will be disastrous at the polls. And when you look at how those voters voted, whether they said their situation was worse or the same, those who said the same voted two to one for joe biden. Those who said worse voted 74 to 23 for joe biden. All the rules that work in his trumps favor when he blows them up, it doesnt mitigate the need to use common sense in your campaign and understand where the voters are. But hes just not a controllable or malleable candidate. Most of us as consultants would look and say to somebody, hey, you think you built the greatest economy on earth, but americans dont believe that anymore. Stop saying it, and most of them would listen. Thats not the case here. You know, i think whether those things work Going Forward to the we haves advantage, often done well with middle and workingclass voters, particularly when republicans want tax cuts at the highend, which most voters dont like, e giving tax cuts to the wealthy and corporations. I think that one of the dynamics at work here that contributed, and one last point that we havent touched on, but the plurality of voters made up their mind in the exit polls in the month of september and i really wonder how much trumps demeanor and performance at that first debate just put the nail in the coffin for a lot of middleoftheroad voters, who just said i cant take this guys behavior. If my kids acted like this, i would ground them for three weeks. I think they decided to ground donald trump after that. Steve yeah. Todd, i saw you raised your hand, but im going to ask you a question and if you can leave it in, thats great, because you mentioned something thats really interesting. I hope the people watching think so, too, but since im the moderator, right . You talked about intensity and the intensity of rural voters and their commitment to and attachment to donald trump. Its a twopart question. It starts with this. I was always struck by the fact that ever since he got there, he seemed more interested sorry . Ok, he seemed more interested in appealing to his base than he was ever interested in getting new people into his coalition. It doesnt seem like thats a very good way to win a reelection campaign. My question is, as he went further and further into the base, it seemed like he got stronger and stronger among the base, but it was a small group it wasnt growing. Its a twopart question. Number one, could any other republican in the future match that intensity among that group of people and turn them out the way he did, a, and b, and do you believe the democrats match that intensity on the other side with an intensity to get rid of donald trump that was equal to or greater . And i want to ask jonathan to comment on that as well, because jonathan, you interview a lot of these folks and obviously you will have a perspective as well. Todd . Todd honestly, the second one first. If you subscribe to the applicability of loss aversion theory to voter behavior, the answer would be no. That people who are voting in order to gain something they dont already have are not ever going to be as motivated as those voters who are, rightly or wrongly, perceiving that they are voting to protect something that is at risk. If, if that theory holds true, it would certainly explain why no matter how motivated people were to either get rid of trump, no matter how motivated the progressive base was, to vote in favor of the kind of country that they wanted, it was never going to be as motivating as those who were voting to protect something they already had. As far as the coalition that trump was able to put together, i would love to be able to say yes, that, you know, other republicans can match that coalition, but im not sure that thats the case. At least insofar as you look at those candidates who ran in 2015. I dont think that any of them, and i worked very proudly for marco rubio, but i dont think we would have been able to build the kind of white workingclass coalition that trump did. And certainly we would not have had the intensity that trump has. Steve ok, jonathan and then betsy. I thought you had your hand raised. Jonathan you know, i think that trump himself is going to be the one that keeps this going. And i dont i mean look, how much could it be transferred . He couldnt transfer it to the midterms, the same way barack obama couldnt transfer his appeal in 2010 or 2014 or 2016. If we are being candid, he couldnt transfer it in florida last week, either. I think these president s have a unique old on their voters because they are unique figures. Im skeptical that trump himself could pass it on. You know, theres a discussion going on right now in the white house because republicans are trying to incentivize Good Behavior with trump now by saying that you can get a reward later if you are good now and the reward later is that you can run again for president in 2024 if you dont completely [bleep] this up now and botch the transition. Interested is he in running . In 2024, his run kids are going to be interested or something. Not going away. M a cretin moderate republicans have deluded themselves that i defeating him, somehow you will they are in this deal for the long run and they will be a huge part of the party. Steve whether he runs again in 2024 or not, my guess is he will keep the door open for a very long time. Which well make it difficult, if not impossible, for every any other republican to like marco rubio, for example. Like, hypothetically speaking, marco rubio or anyone. It would make it hard to do. Jonathan the comparison i would use is the 20092011 sarah palin experience. If you guys can think back a decade, there was so much hype in 2008. Rah palin what is she going to do . She quit the governorship in the summer of 2009, what is she going to do, is she going to iowa . She is endorsing the South Carolina governor. Oh, i mean, there was a time she was a big deal in the party. I think were going to go through that. The same experience, an order of magnitude bigger with the former president and the most famous person in the world. Is he going to run again in 2024 . Of course, he is the consummate showman. Why what he ever say, i am good and i will go play golf in florida. Of course hes going to drag it along. One of the things i am most fascinated to watch, given that dynamic, which i totally agree with, is how does fox cover him post white house. If they continue covering him, m the way that they have, you virtually ensure that no other republican can get any left. So, that will be something. Betsy well, speaking of fox, and there are two different realities we are living in in america, it goes to the point of where we are divided. I mean of the big things that , one jumped out to me on the exit poll very early in the night, which made me think that this is going to be a closer election than maybe we thought, was the question about the handling of the coronavirus. There was a very simple question on the exit poll, what is your opinion on the u. S. Efforts so thus far to contain the coronavirus . How do you think it is going . And it was 5050. 50 of the people in this country think that efforts to contain the coronavirus are going well. This is a time when, when you look at the math, it is everywhere and 50 of the country thinks the efforts to contain it are going well. It is living in two different realities. Steve doug . Doug one of the things i remember, that people were skeptical about was joe biden being good at is raising money. You saw that during the primary. Outlapped in raising money by people like Bernie Sanders, elizabeth warren, everybody, basically. And you can go back to his race in 2008, he had a hard time raising money. Marks of the big question hovering over the Biden Campaign was whether or not they would be able to raise money. And i think that actually ended up being like, when you step back and look at the election, he was able to compete extremely well and by the end of the race, was a far outraising the trump republican apparatus. If you look at the last month of the campaign, he raised 130 the first half of october, biden raised 130 million versus 43 million for donald trump. I think the other point was how that money was managed or mismanaged in the case of the Trump Campaign. By the end, they were barely able to compete i mean, they were not competing on the airwaves in these states that became battlegrounds. Interesting enough, to your jonathan, to tell you how point we can argue about how Important Television advertising means i take it means a lot, because i am a Media Consultant but if you look at two states, the two states that ended up being very close, North Carolina and georgia, the Trump Campaign actually outspent biden in North Carolina pretty substantially, almost by 20 million or 30 million. In georgia, it was substantial. It was 20 million. From a question as to why didnt we do better in North Carolina, i dont know what the numbers were for cunningham and cooper, but at the president ial level there was, at least on the advertising, there looks to be a big disparity between the two campaigns. I would go back to the point of the whole issue and small dollar donors by the end, joe biden was doing exceptionally well with the whole ability of the Biden Campaign to raise money, which was something there was already deep skepticism about, i think there was a huge that was a huge component to him winning. And being able to spread the field. We do not talk about the issue of small dollar donors, because it gives the democrats endless money in competitive states to run tv ads. But do you guys think that at some point, it is counterproductive in a place like carolina, kentucky or maine, where you have an element of rural conservatism . Is it counterproductive to have outofstate liberal money flooding those estates . Thats become a bigger news story than the money itself helps the democrats, i guess is my question. I think that there will be many, many studies and a lot people will be spending a lot of time looking at the just the avalanche of dollars that were spent, not just in the president ial race, but in the senate race. And in and some of these house races, where there are a handful of republican candidates the guy who ran against aoc raised like 10 million. Theres like zero chance for him to win. Theresa greenfield, the Iowa Senate Race between both sides ended up being 240 million. In the state of iowa. Its insane. And greenfield steve so todd, let me ask you a question. In a race like that, because you were doing that race, what happened . You have 150 million in iowa, president ial a campaign in one state. What do you do with all the money . You cannot buy that much television, you cannot spend that much money, right . Todd you cant. We raised a bunch of money, the earnst campaign that came in at the very end, and i called our buyer and they were only able to spend a fraction of what we wanted to spend. I dont think that its easy think it is very easy to say in retrospect that the democrats did not get their iowa. Orth in isla i do not think it is that simple. The sheer volume of spending, this cycle, i say this as a Media Consultant. Media consultants i will point out for the record. Todd you do not make any money when youre not able to spend it. Jeannie harrison was running 5000 points of television in a market, each week. 1400 points a week is considered a lot. 2000 is a lot. They are running 5000 points a week. They had five or six different ads. Overey graham did not roll either. They had 70 different pdfs going on. Amount to incredible run in that market. At one point they had a spot on about fixing potholes. They ran out of things to say. Is the thing as we go into the georgia runoffs. We know what will happen. Give 25 to 30. At some point, is that helping the candidate . Again. E trying to do it coastal liberals trying to buy the state. Point, does the money coming in help . I would just say that is a problem. Too much money. Exactly. They are going to make that argument. Let me ask you a question. You talked about how the middle is what wins president ial campaigns. There has been for a long time in our party about whether the middle whether we should be chasing the elusive, noneducated voter. That might be the wrong way of thinking about it because it used to be that the white middleclass voter did not have an interest any different. Improvebout trying to their lot in life. Possible andit is likely that the Democratic Party will find messaging that appeals equally to the white, noncollege educated male and the black or latino voter that is progressive and younger . Is that possible . I think it is possible and we do it more often than the Republican Party does in terms of hitting to voters. We have been fairly successful as a party. Winning in places that people did not expect us to win. You have to put together the right coalition each race. Reason why People Campaign in the suburbs more than rural areas. When they asked them, why do you rob so many banks he said that is where the money is. You have to campaign where the votes are. Path toan create a winning in a state or carry a as a like North Carolina democrat, did not spend your time and effort going to the rural area. You have to campaign their little bit. You have to find out the right combination to get to the. I do not think you should be married to anyone election in eachit is different race and each cycle. President ial elections, you probably have heard you say this , but i always say they are about big things and small things, the future, not the past. Not holds true in most elections. Whether you are talking to any group of voters, if you can connect, you will do well. If you fail, you will lose ground. As president of the u. S. , the biggest crisis we faced is the pandemic and he talked about rebuilding the economy. They thought it was more important to get the virus under control and focusing on the economy. You have to look at what they are thinking about for their familys future. There are states that we can do better, but at the end of the day, every one of us on this call on this session would say, you have to develop what it takes to win those elections. Think they were a lot less vulnerable. That is on you. You have to figure out what the right model is. It is not like there is only one path to victory, but you have to narrow your option. Did you have your hand up . Chin, but it on my do agree but he with what he said. The thing that nancy pelosi is so masterful at is telling her advice to all of her caucus. Race thato run the will win the race in your district. Of is getting a lot criticism for this election, but she always gives her candidate a lot of room to run their race. In order for us to win some state, in order for us to win some districts in virginia or to start the in some of the southern districts, we will have. O run i think that is how you grow a strong party. Orther it is the suburbs urban areas. On what islose eye the right ideology for the party the party is about a brand. Democrats need to work on our brand. I think we have to run candidates that can do well everywhere. If that means that we run certain folks who have different views on different issues, ultimately, as a strategist, it is about winning races, seeking have people making decisions so you can have people making decisions that matter. We need to find good candidates. These are tough places to win in 2020. That. Anted to pick up on we have heard that democratic , abigail coming out and winning a very tight race. Irginia, much more moderate the police messaging, that it hurt candidates like her. There seems to be a little bit of back and forth in the party. You are saying they will have to get the message. Brand atk there is a the Democratic Party needs to work on and it needs to be oriented around black and white and latino. Gains, reorienting the party. Think theythey mean bluecollar. Workng folks, black people in bluecollar jobs as well. I get what the moderately of the party is expect but you cannot them to take on what you believe is the right message. To i am saying is you have find his candidates who are the perfect fit for their district. There needs to be an umbrella brand. In some places, you will be saying Different Things to win. Voters need to know what the Democratic Party stands for. Jobbiden has done a good pushing that message through. With republicans, it has been easier. Democrats have a harder time communicating that. This tugofwar will happen in the party. Day, i do notthe know how they can tell the people to not say certain things that people in their district want to hear and how they can tell people in moderate districts, you need to talk about medicare for all and defund the police. People have to have respect. Right. Todd would not do that. I will let you pick it up and close the comment part. We will get to as many as we can. Said, here thing i is where it is important. It is bybee did not pick up a single legislative house in this cycle. We have got to compete everywhere. We need to reach into those communities who feel like the party has not talked to them and does not care for them. In this world of technology, both parties have come of the extreme gerrymandering that takes place. We have to get our hands on that in more places to keep it balanced we can, or we will fall behind and to be consigned to a minority party. And q, everybody. I will ask a few questions that i am getting it on on the comment section. If i get to your question, that is great. Thatade the observation askedden i think you the question of whether or not it would have possible for anyone else to stay, except for joe biden. Do you think it would be possible . Himnybody standing against would win. ,hat is sort of what was 2016 so the question is, if Bernie Sanders had run and was nominated, would he have won . Anybody want to take a shot at that one . With her knee, he would have had a hard time locating the numbers in, especially around milwaukee that joe biden god. I mean, could he have done better with hispanics and meet up for it . Potentially. I think he would have had your child around milwaukee. Think others have a similar challenge. I kind of wonder. They would have been acceptable thise southern but with based turnout out, they have done better in the ro area . I look at the 2020 and to me, the story is what did not change . Look at i. Joe biden did not do too much better. Joe biden did not do any better with hillary. Didout the margin, where he with hillary in the suburbs. It is where he got his. His win. Good point. Our sponsor, i think they have a question. Considering for just a moment to diver from the candidate. So many of you have ringside seats. Apocalypse milltown melt down of our system. Vote. Ssion of the between snafu, down rules we were supposed to have a completely dysfunctional voting. Outside youre laying of expertise. Catastrophe that did not happen. The votinghype about process. Arizona and georgia typically have a longer count. Take longer to count. Heavy mailin ballot state. It took a few days, just because they would not let their county count the ballots, as they came in. F course it would take longer pretty. It has been i will jump defend the television network. I think they need some groundwork and letting voters know ahead of time that this might not be decided on election night. Really, as we followed along the last three or four days, really. Eing transparent postal workers kept us afloat march. Taking incoming fire versus actually following the law. Up. Ou had your hand a quick comment. I think the Republican Party has to come to a point where they stop perpetrating the notion that there is rampant voter fraud in this country. It hurt in this election. Asking if there are instances of voter fraud. Overwhelmingly, people say no. It is to the detriment of democracy. Absolutely no foundation for making such a case. Not about todd or any republican articulated. The president played that hand and it bit him in the but. In the butt. Two things. One has already been mentioned. A strategic problem for republicans that all of a sudden, mailin voting was demonized. We saw this in races all over the country. So than what ire have seen in any previous eggsion, we put all of our in that basket. Iowaave an ice storm in and you people cannot turn, that is a problem. So as far as accusations of fraud, my view is, lets see them. If they are problematic, lets investigate them. If they are illegal, ticket to the courts. But lets move on if not. It is time to i think she said, lets see the evidence. That message undermines that the republicans who won. You cannot have a system that has rampant fraud, but somehow it did not affect republicans who won. It is the idea that democrats created this elaborate conspiracy where fraud was rampant to elect joe biden, but we could not figure out how to apply it to the senate races. Its absurd. Betsy and for those people that voted for joe biden and joni ernst. Todd i made the point to a friend of mine yesterday. Explain to me how the fraud works where ballots are being manipulated to hurt donald trump, but to like have Massive Gains in state legislative races. Jonathan tweet that shit, dude. Seriously. Todd i am happy to do it. Jonathan lets do it. I want to see you. That stuff doesnt happen. [crosstalk] this sucks. Steve for those who are watching remotely, this usually happens in italy or greece somewhere, often over dinner and drinks. And we get a lot of real truth in of those settings and a lot of good friendships. We are just about out of time. I see that we have the term in chairman joining us. If there is anything they want to add or ask, we can take that, otherwise we will give everybody a minute back in advance of the next panel, which is starting in about five minutes. Six minutes, is that right . Karen, michael, did you have anything to toss in . Karen . I am glad that we won. Yay, black women. This is history making a menu new chapter. And the history for black women in america. She will enter the white house that was built by slaves as the Vice President of america. Steve it is an amazing thing. Everybody, thank you for your time and thank you for joining us. We really appreciate it. I do not know if you want to sign us out, but mic drop. Lets take a few minutes and we will reconvene in five minutes. Tom will orchestrate it. Steve one question, everybody stays on, right . They just stay . Everybody stays on, yes. Stay put. Good seeing you guys. Take care, everyone. See you, pal. Goodbye. Use your mobile devices, laptop, or phone and go to election. This panel from the New York University forum analyzing the results of the 2020 elections focused on political polls, campaign spending, and the role of social media in the election. Toasters, Political Science professors, and former pollsters, Political Science professors, and former rnc and dnc members spoke at this event. Start the next panel. A robust discussion for the future panels Going Forward, gave away a few too many secrets, but that is ok