“It wasn’t because Biden voters shifted to Trump—but because so many of them stayed home.”
We must not repeat this same mistake again. Remember to always vote in every election and consider volunteering to knock on doors. It can make a difference. There are elections that are decided with just a small number of votes.
Biden had Covid votes, that is likely why he won at all, not because a moderate candidate is a winner.
What is a COVID vote?
People actively upset with how Trump handled (or didn’t handle) COVID. Including initial price hikes.
That active rancor was missing the second go.
“This evidence is detrimental to my argument so I’m going to ignore it.”
This isn’t a plea not to vote. The issue is, like Trumps base, the number of people who will already vote “their side” is pretty constant.
It’s the capacity to lure new voters outside of their houses. Inspiring the energy to give a shit beyond their front door that defines it. Kamala didn’t do that.
Here, we’re pretty much preaching to the choir. I’m not the one you need to yell at or convince.
One things was clearly rooted in evidence, the reduced participation on voting.
I feel like the rest might have been a bit more Shakey ground.
In 2020, the working poor were largely not going into jobs and also had easiest access to voting. They were both easiest to vote and everyone was pissed that the pandemic sucked, so they were able to and motivated to vote.
The working poor put lives on the line going to work at McDonald’s and hospitals, then when they asked for living wages and sane schedules, they were unskilled labor again.
What’s fascinating is data on vote by mail. You would think it would be near to 100%. It’s not.
Sitting on your sofa eating chips, drinking a beer, laptop open to look up candidates, in yoga pants or even no pants. People still can’t manage to find the energy. You can even, in many cases, mail letters from your own mailbox. Minimal energy required. And yet.
Per Stanford, the participation difference was “modest”.
https://siepr.stanford.edu/publications/policy-brief/how-does-vote-mail-change-american-elections
Politifact cites a mere 3.3-15.5% increase in turnout with all mail in voting, and it doesn’t favor either party.
https://www.politifact.com/article/2020/may/18/does-voting-mail-lead-higher-turnout-red-blue-and-/
Only 4 states had increased turnout between 2020 and 2024.
https://ballotpedia.org/Voter_turnout_in_United_States_elections
West coast, NV, HI, CO, DC, VT, UT are vote by mail states.
My point is, voters clearly need to believe, fear, or be really excited to bother.
That’s how inspiring the candidates are.
People keep ignoring this fact and it really irks me. How many of those Biden voters who didn’t turn out in 2024 would have actually voted for Harris? Every leftist and liberal I heard from were all saying we needed to stop Trump.
For some reason, political analysis keeps glossing over the fact that most USAmericans live in the day-to-day. The country sucks right now, and if you even begin to get into why you lose 40% of your listeners because our social spheres fundamentally curate ignorance.
In a nation as divided and selfish and stupid as the USA, the most popular position is opposition. That’s how Obama beat Bush; how Trump beat neolib Dems; how Biden barely beat Trump barely in 2020 by a few states’ electorates; and how Trump beat the Biden/Harris pairing in 2024.
Even Bernie Sanders, who I would have loved, was running on an opposition platform in 2016 and 2020. Bernie just lost because corporate Dems got the majority of Democrat voters to support Biden, by turning their opposition to Trump into fear that Bernie “just couldn’t win” like an establishment Democrat could.