Back in March, I posted an article where I explained why I thought Biden would win. Many of the same reasons apply, but now that Harris is the candidate (as I had hoped), I can add a few more.
Trump’s support isn’t as good as it seems. The man lost the popular vote the first time he ran, never even reached a 50% approval rating his entire time as President (unlike every other person who has been President), and lost his second election by an even larger amount. A majority of Americans don’t want him.
And a large percentage of Republicans don’t want him this time, either. As a semi-incumbent, he should have gotten the numbers that Biden got in the primaries, but instead, quite often, he was lucky to get more than 50% of the registered Republicans voting for him. Many old-school Republicans (the kind who aren’t part of the Trump cult) can’t stand him, see the harm he will cause, and while they may not vote for Harris, they aren’t going to vote for Trump, either. They’ll probably just stay home.
Trump chose a terrible Vice President. Trump needed to win back those Republicans mentioned above who don’t like him, but instead, he got a guy who is even more extreme and worse, and who has a lot of former baggage, not the least of which is being anti-Trump in the past, calling him the “Republican Hitler.” He was right, of course, but that won’t help get more independent voters. There are only so many Trump cultists and the nomination of Vance was what the cultist wanted but it won’t attract others.
The Republican party doesn’t have a lot of money. People just aren’t contributing to them in the same way they are for the Democrats. There are stories all over the states where the local parties are going broke. Meanwhile, since Harris was announced as the candidate, Democratic money has been pouring in. Money means ads, workers, mailings, and many other campaign expenses. It’s tremendously important.
Trump has taken over the party. The head of the party is now Eric Trump’s wife. You remember Eric, who took money meant for a children’s cancer charity? Well, you can bet that any money the party raises isn’t going to go to the campaign. It’s going to go to Trump (and probably his legal fees, assuming he pays them).
Moreso, these people have no real experience in running a campaign, and they fired all those who do.
Trump’s legal worries may influence the undecided. The Trump cultists will never change, and as Trump once said, he can shoot someone on 5th Avenue and still have their support. It’s difficult to imagine how anyone can be undecided in this election, but apparently there are a lot of clueless folks out there who have no problem voting for a lying, cheating, raping idiot who wants to be a dictator, but perhaps the more Trump spends time in court, the more these undecideds may think that maybe they don’t want a criminal as President.
Trump is old. Hey, if they could spend all their time talking about how old Biden is, we can turn it around on them now and point out that he is the oldest person ever to run for President.
Everyone hates Project 2025. Republicans can’t run away from it. The more people learn about it, the more they hate it. Democrats are going to constantly remind everyone of what it is and how it is essentially the GOP Platform.
Democrats have done better than expected in recent elections. We’ve managed to win quite a few special elections and in those that we didn’t win (in very red areas) we did much better than expected and much better than the polls predicted. Some of that is because we’re angry and pissed, and that gets people to the polls.
And we’re tremendously angry about abortion rights. In red states where this was on the ballot, pundits were shocked to see that even conservative voters voted to keep abortion legal. Many states are putting the issue on the ballots in November, which hopefully will bring more Democrats out to vote to protect this right (and then they’ll vote for the Democrats running as well.)
And, let’s face it, there are still some reasonable Republicans and moderates out there who may come out to vote because while they don’t agree with Democratic policies, they don’t want someone in there who has vowed to be a “dictator on day one.” Some patriots will put the country’s needs over the party’s.
Harris is exciting younger and newer voters. Her poll numbers among the young are excellent and way beyond Trump’s. Harris is energizing younger voters in a way Biden couldn’t, and these voters don’t answer polls so they’re not always counted. (Polls still rely heavily on landline phones — which may also be why we have done better than expected in recent elections). Their presence along with people who want to vote for the first woman President may make all the difference. (Keep in mind many Republican women won’t tell others that they’re voting for her, but in the privacy of the voting booth…)
All we have to do is hold the states we won last time. All over the country, purple states are becoming bluer all the time. It’s not that hard. We can lose Georgia, Arizona and Nevada and still win. I am hoping Harris will chose Governor Shapiro as her running mate, as that should help secure Pennsylvania, a state we have to win. (Seriously, without purple Pennsylvania, there’s no way a Democrat can win.)
There are more of us than there are of them. Democrats have won the popular vote in every single election except one since Bill Clinton, and the only reason Republicans got into office was because of the electoral college. We can overcome that by showing up in huge numbers in the swing states where our votes are tremendously important, like we did when Obama was elected. A huge turnout will guarantee our victory.
If we lose, it will be because we stayed at home and didn’t vote, or wasted our vote on a third party candidate. And then we can scream and shout all we want as our country moves toward a Putin-friendly dictatorship, but it won’t do any good because it will be our fault.
And now, a caveat: The GOP knows all this, so they plan to use their secret weapon: cheating. They’ll do everything they can to make it harder for anyone to vote; they’ll use the judges they’ve appointed to throw out ballots whenever possible; they’ll lie in campaign ads and use connections in Russia and China whose goal it is to dismantle American power; and otherwise claim to have won if they lose despite all evidence to the contrary (just like they did last time).
