The Daily - Swing Voters and the Supreme Court Vacancy

Episode Date: September 22, 2020

This episode contains strong language and descriptions of sexual violence. The death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the ensuing battle to fill her seat is set to dominate American politics in the lead up to the election. A poll conducted for The New York Times before Justice Ginsburg’s death found voters in the battleground states of Arizona, Maine and North Carolina placed greater trust in Joseph R. Biden Jr. than in President Trump to fill the next Supreme Court vacancy.Now that it’s longer a hypothetical scenario, what impact will the vacant seat have on the thinking of swing voters?We take a look at the polling and ask undecided voters whether the death of Justice Ginsburg and the president’s decision to nominate another justice have affected their voting intention.Guest: Nate Cohn, a domestic correspondent for The Upshot at The New York Times. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily Background reading: In surveys before Justice Ginsburg’s death, Joe Biden led by a slightly wider margin on choosing the next justice than he did over all against President Trump.

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. For the past few months, The Times has been polling voters in swing states and tracking how the events of the summer are influencing key voters and the issues they care about. Today, how will all of that be reshaped by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg? It's Tuesday, September 22nd. The Supreme Court is on the ballot and the outcome will impact everything from health care to civil rights, affecting generations to come. The question is, what will be on the minds of voters over the next six weeks? The virus or this court pick? So what do polls tell us about whether voters support a Senate vote on a Supreme Court nominee?

What does it mean for the election and which voters will it energize? Supreme Court nominee. What does it mean for the election and which voters will it energize? Given what we know that voters think about this court, the importance of the court, could this change the course of this election? Any way you look at this, we are going to be spending a lot of time over the next six weeks talking about this Supreme Court nomination. How does that change the 2020 election? Nate Cohn, in order to understand where the voters are now, it seems like we need to first understand where they were right before Justice Ginsburg died. So naturally, we called you. You're

our resident polling expert at The Times, and you have helped oversee a series of New York Times polls of swing states. And I understand that a new batch of those polls came out last week, just before Justice Ginsburg's death. That's right. And those polls showed that Joe Biden was ahead in every battleground state that he tested, including Wisconsin, which was the sort of decisive pivotal tipping point state of the last election. We found him ahead by a really wide margin in Minnesota and Arizona, two states that the Trump campaign is either desperate to flip or desperate to hold on to. And we also found that Biden was ahead more narrowly in a number of other states that the Trump campaign is targeting, like North Carolina and Nevada and New Hampshire. And when you put it all together, it suggested that Joe Biden was probably ahead

in states worth well over 300 electoral votes, well over the 270 that you need to win, and well ahead nationwide in terms of the national popular vote, probably up by seven points or more. So these were pretty good polls for Joe Biden. probably up by seven points or more. So these were pretty good polls for Joe Biden. They're pretty good polls for Joe Biden. They weren't the spectacular polls for Joe Biden that we had over the summer, but they are still better than any presidential candidate

has been able to say that they were receiving at this point in a presidential race in about 20 years. And so I'm curious what the polling that you're describing tells us about the effectiveness of President Trump's strategy of law and order and painting Joe Biden as the enemy of law and order. That's a great question. I thought our polling suggested that the president's strategy was surprisingly effective, but that there were real limits to what it could accomplish for him. Our polling found that voters were basically split between whether the coronavirus or maintaining law and order was a more important issue to them in the presidential election,

which is something that I wouldn't have guessed. Our polling also found that voters in Minnesota and Wisconsin thought that Joe Biden had not been tough enough in condemning violent rioting. They said that they thought that Joe Biden supported defunding the police, which he does not. And so I think that in a lot of ways, a lot of the things that the Trump campaign was hoping to accomplish, they sort of did. And yet at the same time, our poll also found that the president did not have a lead over Joe Biden on the issue of law and order. Because at the very same time, the voters thought that the president had been encouraging violence

and they thought that he was doing a poor job of unifying Americans. So the end result of all this is that, yeah, the president succeeded in defining Joe Biden, but his own weaknesses prevent him from really fully capitalizing on the issue. And he still has the coronavirus hanging over him for a huge number of voters. And so he's in a better position than if the election had been focused exclusively on the

coronavirus, but he's not even able to really win on the issue that's best for him, or at least the issue that they want to fight the election on. So the president understands that he has to change the subject. And this experiment with law and order hasn't worked enough so far. So is there an issue on which Trump consistently wins and which could serve as the issue that would change the subject in this moment? as the issue that would change the subject in this moment? The only issue that the president pulls really well on is the economy. Every poll shows that voters trust him to do a better job on the issue.

The problem for the president, though, is how do you make that the only issue? The coronavirus is a major issue, and the president fares terribly on it. In our polls, he usually trails Joe Biden by double digits on whether he's trusted most to handle the coronavirus. And what's really interesting is how consistent it is. It doesn't matter where we poll, the president still has this huge deficit on the issue. I mean, take an example in North Carolina. It's a state the president won by four last time, and Joe Biden only led it by a point in our poll. But there it is again. Joe Biden, 52% say he does a better job on coronavirus. 41% say that the president does a better job on it. It's the same thing in every state, no matter where we poll. He fares terribly on other issues too, like unifying the country or race relations. And

those issues will also exact influence on the race. And so it's totally true that the president would like to distract from those other issues and focus attention on the economy. But the question isn't simply how do you create more focus on the economy. In this case, it would probably be how do you make the election only about the economy and get voters to forget about everything else. And I think that's a tall order for him. So the challenge clearly for the president is to find an issue that would overshadow and make up for the deficit he has on the pandemic. And so far, that has not happened with law and order, that has not happened with the economy. And so it seems like the Trump campaign would very much be on the lookout for a new winning issue that could overshadow the pandemic. And with the passing of Justice Ginsburg, I wonder, and I'm sure he wonders too, if he has now found that issue.

I mean, I think it's a big enough issue. I mean, this is going to dominate American politics for the next month. The question is obviously whether it's going to be that good of an issue for him. And we just don't really know that yet. But we did have some good luck. We polled Maine, North Carolina, and Arizona just last week, released it on Friday, the day Justice Ginsburg died. And we did ask voters in those critical states whether they trusted Joe Biden or Donald Trump to select the next Supreme Court justice. And on that issue, Joe Biden led in all three states. Interesting. And he led by a little bit wider margin than he was leading Donald Trump in the poll. So in North

Carolina, for instance, we found that Joe Biden had a one point lead against Donald Trump, but Joe Biden had a three point lead on who voters trusted to choose the next Supreme Court justice. Now, as you said, Nate, you asked this question in the poll before Justice Ginsburg had died. So this was a hypothetical question, and now it's not a hypothetical question, because there is a vacancy on the Supreme Court. So what are the caveats? I mean, I think the most important caveat is that the president has a tremendous amount of ability to shape the way he's perceived on this issue. If he chooses a nominee that is deeply unpopular, whatever they thought about his choice in the abstract could quickly change. And conversely, maybe the

president could handle this process in a way that led voters to reconsider their initial skepticism about his ability to handle it. Another caveat is that not only do we not know what kind of justice people would prefer, we also don't know anything that's relevant to this particular political context, which is that this nominee isn't being selected sometime next year. This is a nominee who could be chosen 40 days before a presidential election. And it's also a nominee who could be chosen four years after the same political party said that a president should not be able to advance a Supreme Court nomination during an election year. And that is a really important political context that has at least the potential to really shape the way that voters interpret this nomination. And all of this is going to play out in the context

of a deeply polarizing and partisan fight in the U.S. Senate. And that's going to shape the issue in its own right in ways that we can't even be able to predict. Though I do think that if I had to guess that the partisan acrimony would be bad for the president, that in general, voters don't want to watch, you know, another deeply polarizing fight in Washington. I think that's the sort of stuff that they're tired of in general and perhaps particularly during the last few months of the Trump administration. And isn't another question how this changes the level of enthusiasm among voters of both sides? Because I can easily imagine people who might have sat this election out before Justice Ginsburg died, but now that there is the question of a justice on the line, they will be motivated to come out on both sides. And I remember having this conversation with you

around the nomination of Justice Brett Kavanaugh ahead of the 2018 midterms. And I must confess, I don't remember what you said, but I know it was really interesting and smart. You're absolutely right that two years ago, during the midterm election, that the fight over Justice Kavanaugh played a big role in energizing voters. And in particular, there was a big question of whether it would energize Republicans.

I mean, you may recall that that was a midterm election. The Democrats were excited and energized. You know, historically, those are elections that the president's party loses. The Republicans were a little bit deflated in the polls. And so then there was this big galvanizing fight over the Supreme Court that helped the president rally the base and helped Republicans, I think, hold on to some deeply conservative districts where the Democrats had strong candidates. I don't think that's as likely to play a factor this time. I mean, this is a presidential election. Turnout's going to be really high. Just in general, there's less room for turnout to swing wildly and make a big difference. But more specifically, these polls show that,

you know, Trump's base is extremely enthusiastic and ready to vote. And it shows the same thing about the Democrats, by the way. So I think that we're already heading towards a high turnout election in which all of the, you know, likeliest voters are going to be energized to vote. And I think they'll come out with or without this as being that extra motivating factor. And I'd add one last thought, which is, I don't know just how much the typical swing voter really cares about the Supreme Court. You know, if you're a highly engaged partisan, you care a lot about, you know, the future of Roe versus Wade or something like that. You have memories about what the Republicans, how the Republicans handled Merrick Garland in

2016 or how Brett Kavanaugh was handled. Swing voters don't come to this with any of that. If they did, they probably wouldn't be swing voters. Well, so Nate, let's talk about what our team has been up to today when it comes to this question of how the Supreme Court vacancy might influence voters and might change the dynamics of the race. You and I have been talking about these Times polls that were just completed before Justice Ginsburg's death. And while we don't have new polling yet following her passing, what we do have is this list of voters who the Times has talked to in all of these states. And I wonder if you could just explain that. Yeah. So at the end of every interview, we ask the respondent whether they would be willing to be contacted by a New York Times reporter for follow-up interviews. And,

to be contacted by a New York Times reporter for follow-up interviews. And about a quarter of them say yes. Which is very nice of them. And it's very nice of them. And we often call these people back for all sorts of purposes. And today I have given you a list of the respondents from our main

North Carolina and Arizona polls that we did last week who were up for grabs, who either said they were undecided or who said they might still change their mind so that you could ask them whatever it is you've asked them. Well, what it is we asked them

was what feels like the essential question of the moment, which is how much does a Supreme Court vacancy affect how you might vote in this election, how you might think about this election, how you might think about this election, whether you would prefer Trump over Biden or Biden over Trump. And it sounded like your expectation, which I have to admit, I've been a little bit surprised by in this conversation,

is that a lot of the people we're going to talk to would say not all that much. Yeah, again, I think that if you're a swing voter, you probably don't care a lot about the Supreme Court. Those people exist, but I think they're at the margins. And so what I think you're going to find is that most of these people are disaffected by the candidates. They just aren't going to feel that strongly about who the next Supreme Court justice should be. Well, Nate, thank you for chatting with us and for providing us with all those names of voters. No problem.

And I'm excited to hear what they have to say. We'll be right back. Hello? Hello? Hello? Hi, is this Ms. Bowden? Hi, is this Bryce? Is this Lisa Folden?

This is she. Hi, my name's Sydney. My name's Eric. My name's Asta, by the way. My name is Robert Jimison, and I'm calling from the New York Times. How are you doing today? I am well. How are you? So we just wanted to reach out and ask if the news of Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death over the weekend has kind of changed your vote in any way?

No. No, it doesn't change the way I'm going to vote, no. I'm voting for Trump. Were you supporting Donald Trump, is that right? That's true. Well, I'm not thrilled with either. I'm going to have to vote for the devil I know rather than the devil I don't.

Does the news of Justice Ginsburg's death and Trump's decision to nominate a justice change your decision on who you were going to support for president in any way? No, it won't change my vote at all. I really don't think it does change my vote. I think, first of all, that Justice Ginsburg was an amazing justice and an amazing person. Even though I disagree with some of her decisions, I don't think that that takes away from her character or who she was as a person. Based on your responses, I understand you're an independent woman living in Maine. You identify as a Protestant, right? Yeah. So did the

news of RBG's passing and the president's decision to nominate a Supreme Court justice change your vote in any way? No. I haven't seen Joe Biden be able to stitch more than two sentences together without a teleprompter. So I don't see how he could be an effective leader. And so do you have a sense of who you're going to support for president in November? At this point, I don't. I'm still waiting to hear something that would sway me in another direction. But, you know, right now it's a toss up between these guys.

the direction, but, you know, right now it's a toss-up between these guys. I have a trust issue with Democrats, period, because as a Black person in America, we've been fighting against systematic racism for quite some time now, and even though I've continually lawfully voted for the Democrats,

they haven't shown me any progress as it relates to equal justice under the law for Black people. This Black Lives Matter thing, that's one thing. I just want you to stand up to the Constitution that you wrote. Between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, you're not planning to vote for either at this moment? I'm going to vote.

I just haven't decided which way yet. And I'm trying to give Joe Biden the benefit of the doubt. The way I look at this year's political election, it's the lesser of two evils. Donald Trump is a maniac and Joe Biden is just too darn soft. And what about the fact that Donald Trump may nominate a justice who might choose to overturn Roe v. Wade? That argument does not compel you? Well, I believe that being pro-life means more than just abortion. That means having support for welfare and having care for people

and not separating families at the border, not referring to other countries as shithole countries, basically treating people with some respect. So probably racial justice is my second biggest issue that I look at after abortion. I mean, this is why I'm an independent, because I don't find a home in either party very well. Hello. Hi, Jennifer. Yes. Hi, my name's Nina. I'm calling from the New York Times and I got your name and contact information because you participated in a recent poll and you said it was okay for someone to follow up with some questions. Is now a good time? Sure. So based on your responses to the poll, I understand that you identify

as an independent voter, you're Catholic, and you live in North Carolina. Is that right? Yes. I'm curious, you know, before the news of Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death, what were the issues that were weighing on you as you thought about the 2020 presidential race? Honestly, I think just, well, for Trump, at least the way he speaks to people and about people is so rude. And I feel like granted he says what's on his mind, but he's the president of our United States and he has no coof. Like, just the way he talks about people is sick. But at the same time, I also hate the banter of the Democrats bashing the Republicans and the Republicans bashing the Democrats. Like, I hate that it's just this big fight. And you're either labeled as a liberal or a conservative. And I'm so undecided because I don't even think

half of us know what the truth really is. So for instance, there was a commercial, I think it was a Trump commercial, Republican commercial, and they were saying, no, Biden is going to raise your taxes if you're middle class. And then I said something to my mom. And my mom was like, yeah, well, if you want your taxes raised, and I was like, what are you talking about? So I was researching it. And it was, you know, it said, unless you make over $400,000, Biden is not going to raise anybody's taxes, especially for the middle class and lower class. And so I think it's just these commercials and the propaganda of people saying whatever they want about the other opponent. People like my dad who worked 24 seven. What does he do for a living? He's a general contractor. I mean, he's one of the most hard workers I've ever met.

He doesn't have time to research. So he just goes off of what he hears at the end of the day. And it's just really frustrating because nobody actually, I don't think, knows what they're voting for. And so, for instance, my family, being Catholic, I'm the oldest of seven. I would say they're very pro-life. They're not necessarily Republican, but because the Democratic Party is very pro-choice, my family has never voted Democrat solely because of that. But at the same time, my dad just has this negative connotation in his head. If you're a Democrat, you know, like you're a terrible person

or you're the bad guy. And it's like, not at all. How do you feel about Joe Biden? I don't know how I feel about Joe Biden. I like him. I definitely like him. But it worries me because it just looks, I mean, I know this isn't really politics, but it looks like he's aged so much. It just looks I mean, I know this isn't really politics, but it looks like he's aged so much.

And granted, I know Trump is very old as well, but it kind of his age and just the way he presents himself. I'm struggling with because if there's very important matters at hand, I just it worries me that he ultimately makes the decision, I guess. But that's probably my biggest factor. Other than that, I do like Biden. But again, I also come from, you know, a Republican majority family. And you hear things like, you know, Biden and Harris get nominated and we're gonna have a communist country and blah, blah, blah, blah. And that's in creating as well. And obviously that's a lack of knowledge, but it's also the media, I think, feeding into people's fears and it's driving me crazy. You know, you're talking to me about some of the concerns before Ruth Bader Ginsburg died and then comes Friday, news breaks that, you know, she's passed away. And I'm wondering if you could tell

me how you were feeling when you heard the news. At first, honestly, I think the first thing I saw was one of my friends talking just about how disgusted they were about the person Mitch McConnell is. But I didn't understand why they were so upset. And then I realized that he had died. And then I looked it up. And I realized, oh, they vaguely acknowledged her death. I didn't even learn about her death first. I learned about what the Republicans were trying to do first. So it was kind of this double whammy. And so I feel like there were definitely mixed emotions and just trying to process everything. What did you think of her, I guess, as a justice? I honestly feel like I learned a little bit more about her after her passing.

I learned that she has done all of these things for women. Granted, I'm pretty sure she was pro-choice and I'm very pro-life, but at the same time, the older I've gotten, I also understand obviously why people are pro-choice. I have been severely raped, you know, when I was in college and I still stood to my ground of being very pro-life, but I had a family that backed me up and supported me. And if I was to have gotten pregnant, you know, I knew that I was going to be okay. But at the same time, now that I'm older, I realize people don't have that in their life. And it's extremely scary.

And I think that you have a lot of pro-lifers who were not a fan of her solely because of her being pro-choice. But I think people really need to dig deep and understand why people are pro-choice. People think that pro-choicers are pro-abortion. And I don't think that's the case at all. I think it's an extremely hard decision for people. And the more I've learned after her death, I've respected her as a person because I really didn't know. I'm very sheltered. And I mean, honestly, until probably the last couple of years, I really didn't even think racism was a thing. And so just hearing everything has really helped me come out of my shell and just acknowledge that she was a thing. And so just hearing everything has really come, like helped me come

out of my shell and just acknowledge that she was a great person. And that people who have negative things to say about her solely is for the fact that they are pro-life, in my opinion, and because they want to pro-life justice. And I think you also have to look at and realize and take care of the people that are alive today. And that's what she did. She might've been pro-choice, but she was very pro-life in the sense of life that's on earth now.

You have the pro-choice Democrats that want to expand healthcare and take care of the people that are alive. And you have the Republicans and the pro-lifers who don't seem to care about somebody who might be 16 and pregnant. They're very, very judgmental about abortion, but they don't seem to be kind of backing it up and helping these people once they have their babies. I'm curious, you know, you listed, I think, in the poll that was done earlier that you trusted Trump more with appointing the next Supreme Court justice. Does that still hold true?

No, not anymore. Not at this point. Can you say more about that? Like, what do you... So if Trump would have handled this differently and if he would have said, you know what, we are not going to appoint a new justice until the presidential election is finished and he was very fair about it, then it would be completely different. And if he, you know, said we need this time to grieve and respect

everything that she's done for our country and just went about it a completely different way and was actually like human about it. I think obviously that would have changed my mind. But the fact that it was like they were waiting for her to die and now they're like hyenas just trying to get, you know, their food. It just puts a very bad taste in my mouth and I don't like it. So does the news of Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death and Trump's decision to nominate a Supreme Court justice, does that change your vote in any way? I was still very undecided, but I do think it's in bad taste. And I think it's extremely hypocritical of what they like Trump and his administration is trying to do. Yes.

Can you say more about that? What do you mean by hypocritical? Well, if I can remember, I think it was the 2016 election. And I want to say, well, first of all, I'm a mom of three, and I'm very busy and don't listen to the news all that much. But I'm pretty sure that the Republicans blocked Obama from choosing a member and said that it needed to be chosen by the next president. And so I think the fact that they are going ahead and doing the exact opposite of what they did in 2016 is in very bad taste and extremely hypocritical. Will you be watching for who Trump nominates? And how would you feel if a pro-life justice were to be nominated? I mean, because I am pro-life, I couldn't really be opposed to it. But I, you know,

I've realized that there are other issues. And so just because they might be pro-life, what else do they stand for? And it's frustrating because I feel like the conservatives really are just trying to push on basically one thing and that's pro-life. And there's so many other issues out there. And can I ask you just to introduce yourself and say how old you are? My name is Jennifer Minton and I am 31 years old. Cool. Thank you so much for making the time. I really appreciate it. This was fun.

Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Have a good day. You as well, Jennifer. Bye. Thank you. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know today. The Senate has more than sufficient time to process a nomination.

History and precedent make that perfectly clear. On Monday, the Republican leadership in Congress said that it would move to confirm a replacement for Justice Ginsburg by the end of the year, saying that it had both the time and the votes to do so. That timeline held out the possibility that Republicans might wait until after the election to confirm a new justice, but not until a potential new president took office, as Democrats, including Joe Biden, have demanded. Meanwhile, another Republican senator who had previously said he did not support holding a confirmation vote during an election year, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, reversed himself,

joining Senator Lindsey Graham, who changed his position on the issue a day earlier. In a letter to Senate Democrats sent on Monday explaining his reversal, Graham said, quote, If the shoe were on the other foot, I am certain you would do the same. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.