There comes a time in every campaign cycle that we start seeing untruths reported and repeated, to the point where it’s worth tackling some of the more common ones.
Myth #1: Turnout figures are terrible for Democrats and great for Republicans, so Democrats will have a hard time in the fall.
Reality: There is little correlation between primary turnout and general election turnout.
Harry Enten:
But Democrats shouldn’t worry. Republicans shouldn’t celebrate. As others have pointed out, voter turnout is an indication of the competitiveness of a primary contest, not of what will happen in the general election. The GOP presidential primary is more competitive than the Democratic race.
John Hagner and Paul Tencher:
There actually is no historic correlation between primary turnout and general election turnout. None. The highest turnout in a Democratic primary—before the outlier of 2008—was in 1988. Gov. Michael Dukakis got killed in November. Democratic primary turnout was actually lower in 1992—two million fewer Democrats voted in the primaries that year. The drop in turnout didn’t stop Bill Clinton from winning the general election convincingly.
Myth #2: Donald Trump will scramble the electoral map and win.
Reality: He’s scrambling the map, all right, but not in the way he intends.
Look at Utah, for example, as reliable a red state as there is. Now, I’m not a big fan of head to head polling this far out, and in the end I suspect Utah would stay red. But (as Richard M. Nixon would say) “My God! These numbers!”
If Donald Trump becomes the Republican Party's nominee, Utahns would vote for a Democrat for president in November for the first time in more than 50 years, according to a new Deseret News/KSL poll.
"I believe Donald Trump could lose Utah. If you lose Utah as a Republican, there is no hope," said former Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt, a top campaign adviser to the GOP's 2012 nominee, Mitt Romney.
Do Republicans win elections without Ohio and Forida? No, they do not. And yet look at these findings from the most recent Monmouth polling.
Ohio:
If Trump emerges as the GOP nominee, fewer than two-thirds of Ohio Republicans (64%) say they would get behind him in a general election against Hillary Clinton. Another 10% would actually vote for Clinton, 12% would vote for an independent or 3rd party candidate, 6% say they would not vote at all, and 7% are not sure what they would do. Only 43% of Kasich supporters say they would definitely vote for Trump in the general election while 19% say they would vote for Clinton. One-in-ten (10%) likely Republican primary voters say they have given serious consideration to voting in the Democratic primary instead of the GOP contest, including 14% of Kasich voters and 7% of Trump supporters. This group would be somewhat more likely to back Sanders over Clinton if they did in fact choose the other party’s ballot on Tuesday.
Florida:
If Trump emerges as the GOP nominee, 3-in-4 Florida Republicans (74%) say they would get behind him in a general election against Hillary Clinton. However, 8% would actually vote for Clinton, 9% would vote for an independent or 3rd party candidate, 4% say they would not vote at all, and 5% are not sure what they would do. Only half of Rubio and Kasich supporters say they would definitely vote for Trump in the general election, while three-quarters of Cruz voters would back Trump.
Check out the graphic at the top of this story. It’s from NBC News March 15 exit polls:
Looking first at Trump, across the five states, about one in four voters overall, and more than three in 10 among those who voted for someone else today, say they would not vote for Trump if he is the party's nominee. Just half overall say they would definitely vote for Trump in the fall.
CNN polled nationally and found 35 percent of Republicans would not vote for Trump, and 20 percent of Democrats would not vote for Hillary (q. 8 and 12). Sure, we’re tribal and those numbers will change. But you can’t win if your ‘definitely vote against’ numbers are more than 1.5 times the other person’s.
This is especially true when the harshest criticism about Trump is coming from Republicans and conservatives. The question remains, “how many will not vote for Trump in the fall?” But that such a #Nevertrump movement from the Republican side exists is not in doubt.
These are all signs and portents, and not proof, but they certainly carry more weight than the “I talked to my brother-in-law and he’s going to vote for Trump over Hillary” anecdote. If you’re going to make the case that the Democrat will a priori lose, you’d better come armed with data.
Myth #3: A third party run, especially by a conservative Republican, could toss the election to the Democrats just like Ross Perot did.
Reality: Ross Perot didn’t affect the outcome, according to exit polls.
Steve Kornacki did a pretty good debunking of this a while back:
Surely, you’ve encountered the claim recently – that Ross Perot’s third party bid in 1992 cost George H.W. Bush a second term and allowed Bill Clinton to win with a mere plurality of the vote. Typically, it’s invoked to underscore Trump’s potential to play spoiler next year, draining critical support from the Republican nominee. Once again, we are told, a Clinton may end up securing the White House by default.
But the comparison is bogus. Yes, Perot did rack up a significant share of the vote in 1992 – 19%, the best for an independent since Teddy Roosevelt in 1912. But there’s never been a shred of evidence that his support came disproportionately from Bush’s column, and there’s considerable evidence that it didn’t.
It’s a zombie myth, though, and and you can’t kill it even with salt. It will be back.
UPDATE: To be clear, certain third party configurations could possibly affect what happens in November (although they are not likely to really happen this year despite the hype. That would take organization and planning that doesn’t exist on the GOP side), but don’t bring Perot into the discussion. He is not a clarifying example to look at.
We’ll be back with more myth busting as circumstance warrants. In the meantime, back to your regularly scheduled election.