Think it’s too early to start looking at how November is shaping up? It’s never too early. Besides, Election Day is closer to 5 months away than you think.
CNN:
GOP operatives worry Trump will lose both the presidency and Senate majority
Republican strategists are increasingly worried that Trump is headed for defeat in November and that he may drag other Republicans down with him.
Seven GOP operatives not directly associated with the President's reelection campaign told CNN that Trump's response to the pandemic and the subsequent economic fallout have significantly damaged his bid for a second term — and that the effects are starting to hurt Republicans more broadly. Some of these operatives asked not to be identified in order to speak more candidly.
Several say that public polls showing Trump trailing presumptive Democratic nominee
Joe Biden mirror what they are finding in their own private polls, and that the trend is bleeding into key Senate races.
Nothing will happen without putting in the work. But this can happen. We can win. We must.
Think the polls are off? They’re not that far off . This, from Alan Abramowitz/Crystal Ball:
• Recent polling in 13 swing states shows a consistent advantage for Joe Biden over Donald Trump.
• The recent 2020 polling results correlate much more strongly with the 2016 election results than with the final 2016 polling results.
• This suggests that pollsters have adjusted their sampling and weighting procedures to correct for some of the problems that occurred in 2016 in light of the 2016 results.
• However, the election is still five months away.
So much more to be said on this that hasn’t been written yet, but for starters:
WaPo:
Police chiefs react with disgust to Minneapolis death, try to reassure their own cities
Where once police executives may have stayed silent, this time, they denounced the officers’ actions
In years past, police officials probably would have called for full, time-consuming investigations and patience from angry citizens until all the facts were in. Not this time.
Minneapolis Police Chief Medaria Arradondo fired four officers within 24 hours, and the heads of the International Association of Chiefs of Police and the Major Cities Chiefs Association promptly issued statements of support for that move and denounced the prolonged suffocation of Floyd captured on cellphone video and soon streamed around the world.
Steven R. Casstevens, head of the IACP and chief of the Buffalo Grove, Ill., department, expressed his sympathy to Floyd’s family.
“Law enforcement officers are trained to treat all individuals, whether they are a complainant, suspect, or defendant, with dignity and respect,” Casstevens said in a statement. “This is the bedrock principle behind the concepts of procedural justice and police legitimacy.”
Progress of a sort, I suppose.
Eileen Rivers/USA Today:
Video of George Floyd pinned by Minneapolis cops is shocking but not surprising
The images are shocking, even for those of us who have been steeped for years in coverage of police brutality.
George Floyd, 46, was handcuffed and pinned down by Minneapolis cops. One officer pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for several minutes as three others stood by. Floyd said he couldn’t breathe. Then he died.
Shocking, but for black people in America, sadly, not surprising.
Weeks before, the name of a different young black man became a household one for similar reasons. Video was released of Ahmaud Arbery, 25, jogging through what appeared to be a picturesque Georgia community. He was confronted by two white men – Travis McMichael and his father, ex-cop Gregory McMichael – and gunned down.
Add Floyd’s and Arbery’s names to the growing list of blacks in America whose deaths have prompted nationwide activism and hashtags: Sandra Bland. Philando Castile. Eric Garner.
Greg Sargent/WaPo:
Trump’s latest display isn’t just deranged. It’s also an abuse of power.
First, let’s note the truly deranged nature of Trump’s lies. Republicans have falsely screamed about voter fraud for many years, to justify all manner of voter suppression. But now Trump is doing this amid a pandemic — that is, to dissuade states from relieving people of having to choose between exercising the franchise and protecting their health and lives.
And so, Trump is not just actively hoping the pandemic helps keep voter turnout down in a way that will help him win reelection. To serve these designs, he’s also pushing states to refrain from taking actions that would protect the public health by limiting the novel coronavirus’s spread.
David Roberts/Vox:
Joe Biden has a chance to make history on climate change
All he has to do is embrace the consensus that’s waiting for him
On the other hand, former Vice President Joe Biden effectively won the Democratic primary. He might not have been the climate left’s least favorite candidate — does Howard Schultz still count? — but he was pretty far down their list. He just won without them.
But he will need their help to win in November. Much like Hillary Clinton in 2016, he is polling low with youth voters in key swing states. Especially in a largely online election, in which he is denied the hand-shaking retail politics at which he excels, he will need youth enthusiasm and creativity to break through in a crowded media environment. And nowhere are they more organized, enthusiastic, and creative than around climate.
Youth voters need Biden, too, to gain power and get anything done in 2021. He must overcome their longstanding mistrust of him, and they will have to learn to love a flawed vehicle. Can this star-crossed romance ever work?
WaPo:
The Health 202: Americans are not expecting a quick return to normal. Or a vaccine next year.
Only 1 in 5 Americans believe Trump's promise to have a vaccine available by the end of the year.
A poll from Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that only 20 percent of Americans believe that goal — what public health experts call a very ambitious timetable — would be met, John writes.
There are brighter hopes for 2021: As John writes, 61 percent expect a vaccine to become available sometime next year, though 17 percent think it will take longer than that.
But only half of Americans say they would definitely get vaccinated against coronavirus once it becomes available.
Just “49 percent plan to get vaccinated while 31 percent say they are not sure,” John writes of the AP-NORC poll. “Twenty percent say they will not get vaccinated.”
Stu Rothenberg/Roll Call:
Memorial Day 2020: Presidential race still leaning Biden
Despite coronavirus and multiple scandals, essentials of presidential race are virtually unchanged
That doesn’t mean the outcome is inevitable. A dramatic development could change things. But for now, Trump’s options are narrowing as Election Day approaches. The White House will need to do something dramatic to alter the trajectory of the race.
NY Times:
You’ve Probably Heard Socialists Won’t Vote for Biden
We may not like him, but we don’t want Trump to win.
Such noise distracts attention from the real work that Democratic Socialists of America chapters across the country are doing this election cycle. Contrary to stereotypes, we are not pushing a third candidate or eager to see Mr. Trump’s re-election. Instead we are campaigning for core demands like Medicare for All, saving the U.S. Postal Service from bipartisan destruction, organizing essential workers to fight for better pay and conditions throughout the coronavirus crisis and backing downballot candidates, mostly running on the Democratic ballot line.
Have to say, it’s pretty fascinating watching the pundits evolve on the election. We’ve gone from Trump favored to Biden favored in a mere month. (Well, not all of us. Some of us saw this coming, Stu Rothenberg among them. But most were afraid to say so.)
Now comes the “lawn order, this changes everything” backlash (which will depend on the Minneapolis portrayal, made much more complicated by the arrest of a black reporter from CNN this morning).
And a reminder: Twitter captures the stories not yet written.