They run this same story about third party candidates every election year. The problem is they never show that the people who voted for the third party candidate would’ve definitely gone to one party or the other. People know what’s at stake, why do you assume people voting for RFK Jr would’ve voted for Biden? There’s nothing about his platform that is very left leaning. The most left leaning thing about him is his last name.
Edit: Just as an example, I voted for Nader in 2000. I’m someone who would’ve voted for Gore otherwise. But guess what? I was voting in a state that wasn’t in close contention at all, so I could vote for a third party without really changing the calculus of who would get elected. The idea that votes for third parties are fungible with votes for major party candidates is just not accurate.
Because it’s true every time, and it works a lot. Gore would have won if Nader wasn’t on the ticket, and guess what? The Republicans have been propping up third-party candidates for years.
Hell, in Florida they got some random dude on the ticket just because he had the same name as the Democrat – and it worked.
Intuitively it doesn’t even make sense in this case though. Biden is running as the safe ordinary establishment candidate. Trump and RFK Jr are going for the right wing wacko conspiracy theory crowd.
Unless I see data to the contrary, I’m going to assume that RFK Jr siphons more votes from Trump.
Pollsters do ask “if the election was held today, between X and Y, who would you vote for”, for multiple combinations of candidates, so you can infer some of those opinions. I don’t think they explicitly ask people to rank their choices, or at least I haven’t seen those polls.
That’s kind of the problem we have now. Why would someone that was a Biden supporter flip to RFK, when RFK is very clearly significantly to the right, and way off in crazy-land compared to Biden? I don’t know. But given how likely Trump supporters are to show up, Biden really can’t afford to lose too many to RFK. Or West, for that matter, who is closer to what I’d prefer politically.
They run this same story about third party candidates every election year. The problem is they never show that the people who voted for the third party candidate would’ve definitely gone to one party or the other. People know what’s at stake, why do you assume people voting for RFK Jr would’ve voted for Biden? There’s nothing about his platform that is very left leaning. The most left leaning thing about him is his last name.
Edit: Just as an example, I voted for Nader in 2000. I’m someone who would’ve voted for Gore otherwise. But guess what? I was voting in a state that wasn’t in close contention at all, so I could vote for a third party without really changing the calculus of who would get elected. The idea that votes for third parties are fungible with votes for major party candidates is just not accurate.
Because it’s true every time, and it works a lot. Gore would have won if Nader wasn’t on the ticket, and guess what? The Republicans have been propping up third-party candidates for years.
Hell, in Florida they got some random dude on the ticket just because he had the same name as the Democrat – and it worked.
Intuitively it doesn’t even make sense in this case though. Biden is running as the safe ordinary establishment candidate. Trump and RFK Jr are going for the right wing wacko conspiracy theory crowd.
Unless I see data to the contrary, I’m going to assume that RFK Jr siphons more votes from Trump.
I know several people that have fallen for his bullshit who voted for Biden last time.
Pollsters do ask “if the election was held today, between X and Y, who would you vote for”, for multiple combinations of candidates, so you can infer some of those opinions. I don’t think they explicitly ask people to rank their choices, or at least I haven’t seen those polls.
Well, there were a certain number of disaffected Sanders primary voters that switched to Trump when Clinton “won” the primary in 2016. It’s hard to believe, given how diametrically opposed Sanders and Trump are, but there it is. Why would they go from a moderate candidate to a far right one? I don’t know, and it’s really hard to pin down in the data.
That’s kind of the problem we have now. Why would someone that was a Biden supporter flip to RFK, when RFK is very clearly significantly to the right, and way off in crazy-land compared to Biden? I don’t know. But given how likely Trump supporters are to show up, Biden really can’t afford to lose too many to RFK. Or West, for that matter, who is closer to what I’d prefer politically.
I feel compelled to point out—because a certain subset of people continue to blame progressives for Trump’s 2016 win—that in the 2008 election, 25% of Clinton’s primary supporters voted McCain in the general.*
*See table on page 9