Impact2020: May 6, 2020
Welcome to your Impact2020 briefing for Wednesday, May 6. Donald Trump and Joe Biden return to the campaign trail in different ways, New York’s June presidential primary is back on, and why Democrats may want to exercise caution when looking at national polling.
On the Ground
Diverging strategies
President Donald Trump and Joe Biden are taking different approaches to campaigning in key battleground states this week amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Trump and his team have begun to make in-person visits again despite the threat of COVID-19. The president toured a Honeywell facility, which has a contract with the Department of Defense to make N95 safety masks, in Phoenix, Ariz., on Tuesday. As McClatchy’s Charles Duncan points out, Trump himself did not wear a mask.
The Arizona Republic’s Yvonne Wingett Sanchez and Ronald J. Hansen have more on whether Trump was able to bolster his standing in the state.
And Vice President Mike Pence is scheduled to travel to Des Moines, Iowa, on Friday to meet with faith and food supply leaders, the Des Moines Register’s Brianne Pfannenstiel reports.
Meanwhile, Joe Biden and his surrogates aren’t ready to hit the traditional campaign trail yet, but they are ramping up their virtual events in battleground states. First up: Florida and Michigan.
The former vice president will hold two events over video conference Thursday “aimed at supporters in Jacksonville and Tampa, Biden’s first attempt at engaging with local voters in a swing state since he became the presumptive nominee for president almost a month ago,” Steve Contorno reports for the Tampa Bay Times.
And today, Jill Biden “will hold three Zoom events with Michiganders, including a roundtable with nurses focused on the pandemic, a meeting with the Michigan Democratic Black Caucus and … a training with organizers and volunteers,” Adrienne Roberts writes for the Detroit Free Press.
Back on
A federal judge has reinstated New York’s June 23 Democratic presidential primary after considering a lawsuit filed by former presidential candidate Andrew Yang, the New York Daily News’ Stephen Rex Brown, Denis Slattery and Chris Sommer report.
Yang had “argued that even though … Biden is already the party’s presumptive presidential nominee, the state Board of Elections’ cancellation of the primary sets a dangerous precedent and precludes Bernie Sanders and other since-dropped out candidates from the ability to collect delegates.”
Manhattan Federal Court Judge Analisa Torres largely agreed, writing in her ruling that voters “will be deprived of the right to cast a vote for an otherwise qualified candidate and the political views expressed by that candidate.”
‘Wasted’ votes
McClatchy’s Alex Roarty takes a closer look at a new study that comes with a warning for Democrats who are excited about Biden’s national polling lead.
The study from the center-left think tank Third Way quantifies exactly how many votes Hillary Clinton “wasted” when she lost the Electoral College to Trump in 2016, despite winning the popular vote.
“About 17% of Clinton’s total vote total from the 2016 election was ‘wasted’ in states where she ran up huge margins of victory. … That percentage was higher than the share of wasted votes for Trump that year and some other recent presidential candidates in tight races.”
Credit: Evan Vucci, AP
“Wasted” votes referred to any of those cast above the necessary total for victory in a state.
“Looking ahead to 2020, Democrats have to be wary when they see their candidates ahead of Trump in the national polls,” wrote Third Way Senior Political Analyst David de la Feunte, the author of the study. “In today’s climate, it is possible that a Democrat could win the national popular vote by 2-3% and still lose the election in the Electoral College.”
For more on the battleground states and their importance in the presidential election, I highly suggest downloading the Beyond the Bubble podcast (on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Google Podcasts) or signing up to get election news texts from McClatchy’s David Catanese.
Trail Mix
Election disruption
In Nevada, Democratic aligned groups temporarily dropped a lawsuit “asking a state court to implement multiple changes to the planned all-mail primary election in June after Clark County election officials agreed to expand in-person voting sites and other changes,” Riley Snyder writes for the Nevada Independent.
A campaign for a ballot initiative that would allocate $5.5 billion in funding for stem cell research in California has finished collecting signatures. Learn more about Proposition 71 from the Sacramento Bee’s Andrew Sheeler.
Michigan saw a record-breaking absentee voter turnout of just over 22% in its local May 5 elections, MLive.com’s Gus Burns reports.
Universal mail-in voting could cost Massachusetts $30 million for the November election, the Boston Globe’s Matt Stout reports.
Left-leaning groups filed a federal lawsuit challenging parts of Florida’s vote-by-mail rules, arguing that ballots should be valid as long as they are postmarked on or before Election Day. Jim Saunders has the story for the Tampa Bay Times.
Reopening challenges
Four Republican lawmakers sued Washington Gov. Jay Inslee in federal court, arguing that his stay-at-home order violates the U.S. Constitution and “that there is no longer an emergency in the state because of COVID-19,” James Drew reports for the Tacoma News Tribune.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court will take a look at another lawsuit that seeks to block Gov. Tony Evers’ stay-at-home order, Meg Jones writes for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Number of the Day
32%
How many voters approve of the job Congress is doing, according to a new national Monmouth University poll. That may seem low, but it’s actually up from 20% in February, before the pandemic hit.
For planning purposes
May 6
Jill Biden holds virtual events in Michigan
Joe Biden holds a virtual fundraiser and a virtual event with the Human Rights Campaign
Trump meets with Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds at White House to discuss the state’s coronavirus response
May 7
Joe Biden holds virtual events in Florida
May 12
Nebraska primary
May 19
Idaho and Oregon primaries
May 22
Hawaii primary
Music selection — it’s a thing
Is that Guns N’ Roses’ version of “Live and Let Die” playing during Trump’s mask factory visit? You bet. The story on that here.
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