Why Trump can Easily Win Reelection with an Approval Rating Below 50%

Aaron Rossiter | 1/24/17 | 1:17 PM

Donald Trump won the election on November 8th with a favorability rating of about 42%. Today, when combining an equal number of polls including all adults and those including only voters, he has an average favorable rating of 46.0%. The headlines in much of the mainstream media identify Trump as having the lowest favorable rating of any incoming president in history. I will explain why this does not matter for Trump's reelection.

Pundits Wrongly Treat Favorability Like an Ironclad Indicator

Favorability ratings represent a very broad and shallow measure of a deeply complicated political reality. These particular polls really do not tell us much about a president's real level of support and likelihood of getting reelected and that is doubly true for Donald Trump.

While Trump has relatively low ratings as compared to other presidents, favorable ratings have been inconsistently applied to only thirteen of the forty-five presidents, or 29% of them. That percentage does not inspire confidence in the measure. If we are going to look at history as a guide we need to do more than just look at a list of favorability numbers of less than a third of the presidents.

Other presidents who won close and contentious elections would have had low inaugural approval ratings if they were taken, but some of those presidents won reelection and became our greatest presidents. Jefferson and Lincoln come to mind. Favorability ratings didn't exist then so we have very limited data to judge the usefulness of favorability ratings.

Do the elections of presidents from the pre-modern era tell us anything? Sure, to the extent that this history helps to shape expectations for presidents, they are relevant. They are at least as relevant as the favorability rating of Franklin Roosevelt, a president who governed a country that only faintly resembles our modern nation.

Measuring the current president against presidents from pre-modern history, however, has obvious limitations as a barometer of whether the current president will win reelection. In much the same way, looking at favorability ratings of past presidents is fraught with problematic assumptions when comparing them to Trump's favorables in assessing re-electability.

Examining the Limitations of Favorability Ratings in General

As Nate Cohn writes about in the New York Times, most of the pollsters are polling all adults rather than just voters when it comes to approval or favorability. As I have written about numerous times, it does not make sense to poll all adults in a political poll. Political polls by definition should only measure the opinions of voters.

By definition, a Republican will always have a lower approval rating if all adults are measured because non-voters favor Democrats to Republicans when polled. Democrats consequently will always have a higher approval rating than their real approval rating when non-voters are included. There is no doubt that pollsters know this.

Looking at how a pollster measures approval is a good way of determining if a pollster wants to favor Democrats. You will find that most do. We should conclude based on this that Trump's real approval is higher than reflected in the surveys of all adults and Obama's is lower. One can fairly consider this a universally applicable rule that applies inversely to Republicans and Democrats.

Cohn acknowledges that Trump's actual approval rating may be closer to 46% for the preceding reason, incidentally where I show it at. Cohn then asks if Trump has an appeal to voters that traditional polling misses. He points as evidence for this hidden appeal to consistently higher approval for his policies and optimism about the next four years as compared to his personal approval ratings.

I think it's clear that poll respondents are disapproving of Trump personally while simultaneously viewing his policies and impact on the country more positively. We see this with Obama just in reverse, where his approval is very high, between 55 and 60%, but the person promising to continue his policies could not muster 50% of voter support or enough electoral votes to win.

The ubiquity of any president's image and personality represents an explanation for the bifurcated view, personal verses policy, of a president within one person's mind. Now that everyone carries a constantly current high resolution screen media device in their pockets, the president is always a click away. We develop what feels like a personal relationship with presidents that transcends policy. We carry a strong opinion of the person that often will diverge from our opinion on policy and likely impact on the country. For Trump, this split makes him look less popular than his policies and expected impact. For Obama it's the reverse.

The approval rating disconnect from electoral results is glaring, profound and undeniable. Trump did not need a 50% approval rating to win and he defeated Obama's handpicked successor while Obama had a 55-60% approval rating. Polling adults instead of voters and the transcendence of the personal above policy both help explain this, but with Trump there is yet another factor to consider.

Favorability is less useful for Trump than even other Presidents

The first two reasons for the disconnect, namely transcendence of the personal to policy in our hyper-media age and polling all adults, apply to all presidents and presidential candidates. There is a third reason that Trump can dismiss approval ratings as a measure of his likelihood for reelection, one that applies uniquely to him.

Mainstream journalists and pundits fail to understand this approval rating disconnect with respect to Trump for the same reason they mistakenly panned Trump's inaugural speech as a failure. These elites simply refuse to recognize the political power of Trump's appeal to a typically non-voting segment of the electorate and also to a portion of the old Democratic coalition.

They called the speech dark because of his use of the word "carnage" in describing the devastation wrought by constant inner city social turmoil in Democratic governed cities. The called speech "Hitlerian" because of his use of the phrase "America first."

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Both of these elements of the speech, however, strongly appeal to this typically non-voting or Democratic voting portion of the electorate. First, some Democrats see the profound failure of Democratic governance in most big cities and find Trump's focus on those failures refreshing. Second, only liberal elites recall the nearly century old "America First" Nazi-friendly movement when Trump uses the phrase.

That phrase is so generic that to assign specific racist motives for its use, especially when those motives have been repeatedly condemned by Trump and the phrase so clearly describes Trump's economic vision, amounts to deeply un-serious analysis bordering on propaganda.

These unlikely Republican voters like the idea of putting our nation first and do not see racist motives in using the phrase. As such, they vote for Trump. Trump's speech will likely redound to Trump's benefit politically for these reasons.

Trump Defies the Two-Party System, Rendering Favorability Less Useful

Traditional pollsters in the US are captivated by the two-party view of the political world in much the same way as our government and media institutions. One can usually label each media organization as pro-Republican or pro-Democrat with a high degree of credibility. Our Congress is bitterly divided into two parties. Our high Court reflects the same division. In every case, our institutions are split down the middle into two teams.

Our pollsters look at polling with the assumption that the people are divided into red and blue teams who will ultimately come down on their own team's side. The 50% threshold, therefore, represents the gold standard for presidential approval. In a bifurcated system the guy with half the votes wins in every case. With 50% approval the electoral success in midterm and the reelect seems likely. Without a 50% approval the other team will absorb all dissent and by default will hit the magical 50% number.

But unfortunately for the Democrats and the media Trump doesn't need a 50% approval rating to win or really anything near it. About one-fifth to one-third of the Republican coalition views Trump negatively for personal reasons but supported him in the election. The reluctant Trump voter represents part of the reason he has an approval rating well under 50% but still won the presidency. There are others who vote for him but disapprove of him personally in polling. Let's look more closely at that.

The Trump Coalition Defies the 50% Favorability Threshold

The 42 to 46% who approve of Trump represents the portion of the Republican coalition that openly supports him plus some voters who usually do not vote and some who usually vote for Democrats. His wins in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan demonstrate that Trump's coalition includes some Democrats and some people who normally do not vote.

Trump won these states despite an unprecedented avalanche of negative attention from nearly all segments of our popular culture, academic and media establishments. The American elite establishment spoke in virtual unanimity in opposition to Trump, but despite this, Trump poached three of the Democrat's biggest electoral pillars, states they cannot win without.

He achieved this masterstroke of political strategy by seizing this non-traditional portion of the vote, a portion composed of infrequent or typical non-voters and a portion of Democrats. This non-voting portion will often not show up in approval ratings because they are unlikely to answer pollsters. The Democrats who vote for Trump are likely to be shy about it, or unwilling to admit that they favor him.

On top of that, you have Republicans who will vote for him but who disapprove of him because they dislike that alternative even more and they are disgusted with elite culture. All three of these factors add up to a lower approval rating than a Republican would normally experience, but an approval rating that really doesn't accurately indicate Trump's current electoral strength.

He doesn't need a 50% approval rating to win. He does need to maintain his populist appeal to voters who typically do not vote and some populist-leaning Democrats while preserving his hold on most of the GOP vote. He achieves these political goals by continuing to buck the system and boldly fighting the arrogant elites. His harsh and blustery condemnation of elites, in other words, represents Trump's greatest political strength while at the same time pushing down his personal approval or favorability numbers.

It is this component of Trump's political winning formula that leaves the elites flummoxed. The most visible elites in our nation have brazenly opposed Trump at every point in his political life. With each new day comes a new example of a celebrity or journalist loudly denouncing Trump, and often his supporters, in an effort to not only oppose but to mock Trump and his supporters. This elite seemingly holds no fear of backlash. It is this very blindness to the widespread backlash spawned by their smug disregard for regular America that will under gird Trump's reelection campaign.

Ultimately Trump's chance of winning will stand in inverse proportion to the disdain the American people have for the liberal media, cultural and political elite. The more celebrities, academia and high-profile political journalists show disdain for middle America, the more Trump will benefit.

The common thread running through all elements of Trump's coalition is fear and disgust for the coalition of Democrats and pop culture, academic and media establishment elites. While each group within Trump's coalition has motives to not answer pollsters or to voice an unfavorable view of Trump, they will ultimately come out and vote for him because of the existential threat to American freedom posed by the coalition of Democrats and elites. Trump has pieced together a coalition that much more likely to elect him privately but disapprove of him when asked in public.

Outline of the Two Dominant American Political Coalitions

Trump Coalition = Anti-Establishment (infrequent voters) + Some Democrats + Typical Republican voters. Probably about one-fifth to one-third of the Republicans are voting against the Obama coalition and voice disapproval of Trump in polling.

Anti-Trump Coalition = Pop-culture, media and academic elites and the low information voters they persuade through advocacy and propaganda + Left Wing of Democratic Party. *The low-information votes, or non-ideological Democrats, are mostly voting against the Trump coalition out of anger. Many of these low-information voters will disapprove of Trump in favorability polling but will not show up to vote.

Why CNN's report was even worse than BuzzFeed's unsubstantiated report

Aaron Rossiter | 1/13/17 | 7:30 PM

CNN reported that a two-page summary of a political opposition research file compiled by Trump's political opponents was included in a presidential level classified briefing. In the CNN report, they indicated that the intelligence chiefs considered the political operative who compiled the file credible and his sources credible.

WATCH JAKE TAPPER'S REVIEW OF THE REPORT

Because it cited the intelligence chiefs as likely believing the political operative, the CNN report left a strong impression that the file probably contained true information. The BuzzFeed report, perhaps unintentionally, demonstrated that the dossier was full of disinformation. CNN and the intelligence chiefs knew the contents of the dossier when they concluded that the source was credible. It is obvious that somebody is playing politics here, and it's probably both CNN and the intelligence chiefs.

After informing readers that the political operative was credible in the eyes of the intelligence chiefs, the CNN report also indicated that the intelligence chiefs wanted to alert Trump that the Russians were claiming that they had contact with Trump's staff throughout the campaign. So now the CNN report is putting words into the mouths of Russian operatives who were never monitored, alleged words for which no evidence exists, to smear the next President as conspiring with Russia to undermine the US election. That "factual" conclusion was made based solely on the discredited thirty-five page dossier. Outrageous.

Next, CNN claims intelligence chiefs wanted to alert Trump that this sort of harmful information is being circulated in intelligence circles. This seems like the only legitimate reason to have included the two-page summary of the dossier, to warn Trump of a disinformation campaign. CNN, however, interpreted the inclusion of the two-page summary in the classified report as an endorsement of its truth value. More on that below.

The problem is that the summary was of a thirty-five page opposition file that is full of demonstrated false claims, unverifiable claims and some unverified claims. It has zero demonstrated true claims. The summary should be treated with equal contempt by journalists as the full thirty-five page dossier with respect to its truth value. CNN should not have mentioned the summary or the dossier if they wanted to confine their reporting to true facts. They certainly shouldn't have reported that intelligence sources consider the source credible without verifying its credibility.

CNN is guilty of blindly trusting intelligence sources, sources that have a history of selectively leaking information to create false impressions for political reasons. CNN is in the best case scenario a willing dupe, and in the worst case, a willing ally to distortion. They are casting shadows on Trump's credibility with no grounding to do so and they know it.

HOW CNN TRASHED TRUMP WITHOUT REPORTING THE DOSSIER DETAILS

CNN used a clever trick to suggest that the dossier had true information without actually detailing the allegations of the dossier. As the amended report now suggests, the CIA included this in the briefing primarily to show Trump that this type of opposition dirt was circulating, not primarily because it was plausibly true.

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The key part of the CNN's story is this, "classified documents . . . included allegations that Russian operatives claim to have compromising personal and financial information about Mr. Trump." CNN plays up the fact that the two-page summary was classified to make them seem important and likely true. The documents were probably classified by CIA to conceal their contents and keep them out of the public eye because they are so explosive and very likely unsubstantiated, not to raise the public profile of the documents.

But somewhere along the line an intelligence analyst or an intelligence chief decided to label the political operative as credible, thereby suggesting this disinformation might be true. It's hard to know because intelligence is shadowy and concealed. CNN knows this and should have been more careful with its reporting.

This is CNN's trick. CNN used the classification to justify raising the public profile of the documents, reasoning that the mere classification of a document suggests its newsworthy. But intelligence classified the documents to conceal them from the public because of their lack of credibility, a fact which should make them less newsworthy, not more so. Unless their intent was the same as the political operative who compiled them, to smear the next President with false claims, CNN should not have reported on their existence.

All the allegations were made by one man, a political operative paid to produce dirt for Trump opponents. No Russian operatives are sources, only this political operative. No Russian operatives ever claimed to have compromising information of any kind.

Liberal reporter Glenn Greenwald put CNN's report in proper context, "Once CNN strongly hinted at these allegations, it left it to the public imagination to conjure up the dirt Russia allegedly had to blackmail and control Trump." This gives Trump's opponents the ability to propose all sorts of horror stories to undermine Trump.

CNN also knows that if they raise the public profile of the documents, non-journalistic websites would publish the details of the dossier. CNN knew the false allegations would fill the public sphere because of their report. They probably did not anticipate that such a high profile media website run by a political journalist would have published them, and thereby invite intense scrutiny on the information.

BuzzFeed put it all out there at once to be seen by everyone and it was a massive stink bomb. BuzzFeed unintentionally exposed CNN's dishonest and partisan political strategy by drawing heightened public analysis of the information CNN was basing it's report on. Whoops. Colossal MSM fail.

BuzzFeed's publication of the full thirty-five page report demonstrated why CNN's report was so dishonest. CNN was giving the impression that there was something to it when there wasn't. The intelligence chiefs seem to have been doing the same thing. CNN and the intelligence chiefs couldn't have imagined that a media source would publish the full report. What BuzzFeed did was terrible, but it had the silver lining of demonstrating why CNN's highly suggestive report was even worse. BuzzFeed's silly story was going nowhere. CNN was trying to take Trump out.

What CNN did was worse than what BuzzFeed did because the BuzzFeed report presented the bogus facts on which it was based. BuzzFeed shouldn't have done that either, but at least it was obviously bogus. CNN relied on the same disinformation but presented it as likely reliable information, and that is worse than just laying out the disinformation for readers to judge for themselves. Neither organization was right, but CNN was a greater offender to truth.

Ben Smith's journalistic standard: If it hurts Trump, publish it!

Aaron Rossiter | 1/12/17 | 12:46PM

WHO IS BEN SMITH?

Ben Smith is an undisputed member of the journalistic establishment. Ben Smith once worked for Politico as one of its most pronounced reporters. In 2014, the Hollywood Reporter listed Smith as one of the thirty-five most powerful reporters in New York media. With connections within the media that any reporter would envy, Smith no doubt has the clout to push a story into the mainstream of American news media.

BEN SMITH SWINGS AND MISSES

In the past two days, Ben Smith attempted to spearhead an attempt to defame and discredit President-Elect Donald Trump just before his inauguration. Smith chose to publish through Buzzfeed unsubstantiated reports of the existence of an anti-Trump dossier that, if accurate and existing, would have demonstrated that Trump could have been blackmailed by Russia to cover up highly salacious sexual activities. There was absolutely no evidence to support the report. CNN reported that US intelligence have a a two-page report detailing incriminating information that Russia could use to blackmail Trump.

Russia said the reports were false. Trump emphatically denied the reports stating that CNN and BuzzFeed are fake news.

BuzzFeed has been roundly criticized both by Trump supporters and the rest of the media. CNN has claimed that it did not do what BuzzFeed did, specifically, publish the details in the dossier. But CNN did substantially raise the profile of the BuzzFeed story with its report.

BUZZFEED IS NAKEDLY PROFITEERING ON PROPAGANDA

What BuzzFeed published was propaganda in that it was false information that promoted the political goal of harming Trump. They are now using this propaganda to profiteer by selling shirts with the label, "failing pile of garbage." Trump called BuzzFeed this in the press conference yesterday.

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WHAT OTHER MEDIA SAID ABOUT BUZZFEED

BuzzFeed's deceptive hit piece has been widely criticized. Even the New York Times, a media source that has professed to journalists that they should take an oppositional stance to Trump as a matter of course, has strongly criticized BuzzFeed. The executive editor of the New York Times said the paper would not publish the details in the dossier because the allegations were "totally unsubstantiated."

Glenn Greenwald, a very liberal journalist who is no fan of Trump, really sunk the knife into BuzzFeed's credibility. He wrote, "It’s almost impossible to imagine a scenario where it’s justifiable for a news outlet to publish a totally anonymous, unverified, unvetted document filled with scurrilous and inflammatory allegations about which its own editor-in-chief says there “is serious reason to doubt the allegations,” on the ground that they want to leave it to the public to decide whether to believe it."

BEN SMITH SHOULD RESIGN

For journalism, it doesn't get any worse than this in a free nation. If journalists actually wanted to police their own industry in the interest of acting on their claimed role as guardians of the First Amendment, Ben Smith would be shamed into resigning. He published a story about the soon-to-be President of the United States designed to undermine his ability to govern the country.

He did this with wholly unsubstantiated reports while implicitly relying on his credibility as a journalist. He also professed this type of reporting by writing that he decided to publish this because it comports with the proper role for reporters in 2017. Based on this statement, he seems to be saying that if it is potentially hurtful to Trump it ought to be published, regardless of the truth behind the allegations. This approaches defamation of a public figure. If the facts were known to be false and severe damage intended, it would be defamation of a public figure.

Clearly, Smith believes the media has a responsibility to stop Donald Trump by any means necessary. He is attempting to undermine a President with false reporting and has destroyed the credibility of news media in general in the minds of many. He is a disgrace to his profession and his country and he should apologize and resign.