How civil unrest during the pandemic will change the election

How civil unrest during the pandemic will change the election

Video transcript

RICK NEWMAN: From Yahoo Finance, this is "Electionomics." I'm Rick Newman.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: And I'm Alexis Christoforous. Thanks so much for joining us on this edition of "Electionomics." Today, we are going to talk about how the civil unrest unfolding in our country may impact the presidential election this year.

And joining us now to talk about that is Ted Johnson. He is a senior fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice. And Ted, it's so good to have you with us. There's so much to get to. I almost don't know where to begin.

But let me start by asking-- in life, we say a lot of the time, timing is everything. Is the timing-- the confluence of this pandemic, the economic recession, the civil unrest-- is the timing working in favor or against President Trump.

TED JOHNSON: It's a big question. And it's hard to know the answer. So first, thanks for having me. So what political scientists and historians like to do is look to history to see if there are any clues. And all of us now, we're talking about 1968 and the riots in the hot summer of '67 into '68.

There was a war, unpopular war, going on. The incumbent president at the time was not running for office. And you had-- who was Lyndon Johnson. And you had Richard Nixon, who was running on a platform of law and order for the Republican Party. And you had George Wallace, who was running a third party sort of segregationist ticket for the south.

And Nixon ends up winning that, appealing to the essentially white conservatives who were really uncomfortable with the amount of racial tension and anti-war rallies happening around the country, even at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. What does that mean for us today? We don't know, because of a few things.

One, in political science, we know that usually when white voters are angry, their turnout in election goes up. But black voters, when they're angry, usually protest or find external ways to exert pressure on the political system, and not necessarily run to the polls to create change using the democratic processes available.

The other thing-- in terms of this election, black turnout is probably going to be what determines whether Trump wins or Biden wins. And because we can't assign higher turnout to the current anger that we see, we'll have to look towards maybe Biden's VP selection, maybe the state of the economy, which is usually a good bellwether on whether the incumbent president stays or not, as to whether turnout will be high generally, and whether turnout will be high among black voters in particular.

RICK NEWMAN: Ted, just as a baseline, where does President Trump stand with black voters? I mean, black voters, we normally associate them with the Democratic party. And Joe Biden is popular among black voters. But Trump has some support among blacks, doesn't he?

TED JOHNSON: He does. So he received about 8% of black votes in 2016. That's 4% from black women and 13% from black men. What Trump will tell you is that he did better with black voters than both Romney and John McCain, the previous two Republican candidates, which is true. The difference is he ran against Hillary Clinton, who was, shall we say, less popular among black voters than Barack Obama, the first black president.

So in reality, Trump underperformed every Republican nominee or incumbent for the presidency since Richard Nixon in '68. So he has not improved the prospects for the Republican Party and black voters, despite the change, the seemingly positive change between 2012 and 2016. Currently his unfavorables are extremely high among black voters, in the range of 85% to 90%. So I don't think the Republican Party or the president can expect anything more than 8% or 9% among black voters.

And the question won't be whether or not he can increase that to-- that 8% to 10% or 11%. The question will be whether the black voter turnout, which dropped from 2012 to 2016 by seven points, whether it rebounds at all. Because whoever the Democratic nominee is, and we know it's going to be Biden, is going to get at least 89%, 90% of the black vote. So turnout is the bigger question, more so than whether Donald Trump can cut to the share of the Democrat's-- share of the vote.

RICK NEWMAN: Is the margin of turnout among black voters, is that significant enough in the swing states? We know it's the six or eight swing states that are going to determine the outcome. Is the margin of turnout among black voters enough to make a difference in those states, or some of them anyway?

TED JOHNSON: Absolutely, absolutely. So if we look at 2016, Donald Trump wins Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania by 77,000 votes. We also know that those three states have high-- areas of high black concentration in Milwaukee, Detroit, and Philadelphia. And we know turnout among black voters in Michigan and Wisconsin alone was down 12% each between 2012 and 2016.

So if in 2012, black voter turnout across the country was about 66 and 1/2%, and it was down to 59.6% in 2016. If it holds steady or decreases less in those three urban areas I've just described, Hillary Clinton is probably the president today. If you extend that and look at North Carolina, which has a significant black population, as well as Florida, which were also-- both states were pretty closely contested, Biden, if he can increase black turnout, has a chance of winning those five states. And that, of course, would win him the White House, assuming everything else holds.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: One of the big unknowns here, of course, is who is going to be Biden's running mate. And there was talk that it could perhaps be-- he did say during a virtual debate with Senator Sanders-- I believe we were already virtual at that point, right? They didn't have a live audience there.

TED JOHNSON: That's right?

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: He said-- but they were in the same room. And he said it was going to be a female. So we know that much of the puzzle.

And then there was talk, well, who will that female be? There was talk perhaps Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, which comes with its own challenges now that we see what's happening in Minnesota. But there was also talk about a black female, perhaps Kamala Harris, perhaps Susan Rice, a former-- she was with the Obama administration, a national security advisor there.

What are your thoughts on what Biden needs to do at this point? Would having a female black VP help his chances?

TED JOHNSON: So I think the answer is yes. And not just any black female VP. I don't think-- Stacey Abrams and Val Demings and Kamala Harris are not interchangeable-- so it has to be the right VP with the right set of experiences, the right and ability to mobilize and engage disengaged communities.

But I think the bigger question the campaign is going to have to wrestle with is which bloc of voters is going to deliver them the White House? Is it going to be getting the progressives, the Bernie Sanders supporters off the bench and supporting Biden? Is it going to be winning those white working class Obama-Trump voters in the Rust Belt back into the Democratic camp? Or is it going to be increasing black turnout from where it was in 2016?

There's no one candidate that does all of those things. We know from poli sci that VPs usually do not deliver their home state, or they are not the tipping point for a battleground state. So selecting someone from Michigan and hoping that that selection is going to give you Michigan is not how it works.

So what we know about black voting behavior, though, is that black voters that live in highly concentrated areas with the black population represented by black local officials, or congressional officials, will turn out at higher rates when there is a black person on the ticket, on the Democratic ticket. So what that all means is that we can only look at this from senatorial races that are statewide, as well as gubernatorial races, because we've never had-- and from Obama, of course. But since we've never had a black VP, some of this is guesswork.

But we know that if Biden were to choose a black woman who then engages these states that I just talked about-- Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Arizona, and Florida, the black populations in those states-- and mobilizes them, ensures the campaign and the party is funding grassroots resources to get folks out, registered, et cetera, then black turnout likely goes up. And not just by a percentage point or two, which is going to happen in my estimation anyway, just as a rejection of Donald Trump, but maybe three or four points, which again can flip maybe four or five of those states.

I don't know that a selection of say Elizabeth Warren in hopes that she brings in the Sanders progressives can create that same advantage. And I don't know whether or not selecting someone like Governor Whitmer from Michigan or Amy Klobuchar can reconvert those Obama-Trump voters back to the Democratic party. For every 10 black votes you turn-- you get off the couch into the voting booth, nine of them are going to support the president.

The net advantage that a black candidate could deliver the campaign, if done correctly, is just a much more efficient way of trying to win an election than maybe some of the other methods, in my estimation.

RICK NEWMAN: So guys, here's my handicapping-- two weeks ago, I thought Amy Klobuchar would have been a good pick for Biden. She's very qualified, Midwestern. She would be a good complement to him.

I think she's out. I don't think she could possibly be the vice presidential nominee anymore, because of her record as a prosecutor in Minnesota, and just that she's from Minnesota. I mean, why create that sort of controversy?

I think it has to be Kamala Harris. It just fits way better than anything else. Anybody disagree?

TED JOHNSON: I don't.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Sounds like [INAUDIBLE]. I was going to say the same thing. And that was my follow up question to Ted. You said that the right black female vote-- woman matters for VP. And who might that be?

So you seem to think it's Kamala. Why Kamala Harris?

TED JOHNSON: Yeah, so a few things. Number one, no matter the race or given any set of demographics, most voters want the VP to be someone with proven experience to govern. And if you look at Susan Rice, Stacey Abrams, Val Demings, and Kamala Harris, who appear to be the four black females in consideration, black women in consideration-- Kamala Harris as a-- who's been elected statewide as AG and elected statewide as a senator seems to have the governing experience over the other candidates for consideration.

Her name recognition is higher than the others because of her presidential run and because of the attention that President Obama, when he was president, sort of allowed her to have, or shared the spotlight with her a little bit in some instances. So I think it's her.

The question, though, is whether the selection of a black woman will spur racial resentment among white voters, and folks that may have decided to vote for Biden may decide to stay home because they don't want to vote for a black woman, who they may feel is too in allegiance with Black Lives Matter protesters, for example. Or black men may feel that Kamala Harris's AG background and the prosecutions for marijuana possession or truancy or some of the things that's just in the enforcement of California law that she did.

So even Kamala Harris, even though she seems like the right choice at the moment, is not a slam dunk. And a lot of campaign work and work on behalf-- on her own behalf in engaging black communities will need to be leveraged if it's going to render the advantages that seem apparent. But I think among the four considerations, she has the best upside for delivering victory for the Biden team.

RICK NEWMAN: So Ted, are you saying that if Kamala Harris is Joe Biden's running mate, the risk for the Biden campaign is that that could alienate some of the Rust Belt voters they're trying to convert from Trump supporters to Biden supporters?

TED JOHNSON: It's a possibility, for sure. I mean, we watched through surveys, regression analysis of these big data sets how white voters that Obama won in 2008, once he started talking about the Cambridge Police treating the Harvard professor Skip Gates poorly when they had that run-in at Skip Gates' house when he was trying-- he was locked out and trying to get in, and someone called the police saying there is a black man trying to break into my neighbor's house. And it was Skip Gates house.

When Obama said the Cambridge Police acted stupidly, his support among white voters fell seven points and never recovered for the rest of his presidency. When he said Trayvon Martin could be me or my son, he experienced a decline in support among white voters. We've looked at things like Obamacare and how folks that register high on the Racial Resentment Index view Obamacare versus the Affordable Care Act. And whenever something is associated with Obama, he sees there was a drop-off in support of policy just through that association.

And then we looked at 2016, which areas went from Obama to Trump, and the biggest swings. And they tended to be the areas that accepted most of Trump's immigration arguments and his view that black teenagers needed more spirit to be productive in this economy.

So all of that is to say that there is a real chance that rejecting a black candidate will be part of some voters' calculation. And I don't know that the upside of Kamala Harris in bringing black voters back to the polls will negate the downside of white voters with racial resentment staying home altogether or continuing their support for Trump.

If I am a strategist-- and I'm not-- and if I were in Biden's camp-- and I'm not. I'm nonpartisan, just a political science analyst here. I think the advantage to be gained from increasing black turnout is worth the risk of any white voters who may be disenchanted with the selection of a black woman.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: We started our conversation talking about timing, right? So just before all of this civil unrest and before the death of George Floyd, Biden was on a radio show where he said something very controversial. He scolded African-Americans, saying, quote, if you have a problem figuring out whether you're for me or Trump, then you ain't black. He got a lot of backlash for that.

Is that something that's going to stick in voters' minds, do you think, specifically black voters, Ted, come November? Did that swing the pendulum at all for Joe Biden?

TED JOHNSON: No, no, I don't think so. And so for a few reasons. One, the black voters writ large tend to be more pragmatic. And they are more willing to accept the lesser of two evils than holding out for the ideal.

And I mean this is why black voters essentially catapulted Biden to the nomination, not because ideologically he was most proximate to what black voters believe-- which, I mean, we're a heterogeneous political bloc, just like the rest of America is-- but because the perception is he was best positioned to beat Donald Trump. And that alone, as well as his name recognition, being the first black president's VP, helped him win black voters.

Now this is the same Biden who had issues with busing that came up during the debate, same Biden that gave Anita Hill a hard time during the confirmation hearings for Clarence Thomas, same Biden that supported the crime bill in '94. But in the last decade, black voters know Joe Biden as the guy who helped the first black president have two successful terms.

He could have used his platform to undermine Obama. He could have used it to sort of shine the spotlight on himself in hopes of having future success, political success. And he didn't. And that loyalty over the last decade really trumps what he did in the '70s, '80s, and '90s for most black voters.

Now there are younger voters and those who are on the-- lean more progressive who may not forgive Biden for that in the same way that many didn't forgive Hillary Clinton for that. But the "you ain't black" comment by Biden a couple of weeks ago won't turn off any black voters that weren't already completely turned off. And I don't think it harms his prospects at all.

The biggest sin was that he spoke to black Americans as if he was a black American, because I can tell you that in barbershops across the country, black folks are saying if you vote for Donald Trump, I gotta question your authenticity in a joking way, in the same way Biden did. But he is not in the circle of trust in this way. So he just has to be a little bit more careful with his words. But I don't think he harmed his political prospects.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Diligently put, Ted. I like it.

RICK NEWMAN: OK, Ted, I'm going to argue with you a little bit on behalf of my son Robert, who's 21 years old. He follows all of this on Twitter, like a lot of kids, and on social media. And he says to me Biden totally blew it. My son is white, by the way, in case anybody's wondering.

He said Biden totally blew it, because Robert follows the show "Charlamagne tha God." I don't. Robert does. And he said, you know, if I hadn't made that stupid statement at the end, he said that's the only thing anybody is talking about instead of what they actually talked about during what was like a 45-minute radio interview.

But now he's-- he gets-- he talks to young people. And I don't even know if young white or black people are going to vote this time around. But that's their view.

TED JOHNSON: Right, yeah. And I think that-- and most of those young people were not Biden supporters prior to those comments. And so I think what those-- what his comment did was solidify the beliefs people had of Biden before. But I don't think they changed anyone's views.

So for that young voter that was willing to swallow their ideology and vote for the person who they thought best to beat Trump, or just the alternative to Trump, I think that person still going to show up. For folks like your son, who probably weren't enchanted with Biden going into a month ago, nothing he's done in that month has sort of won them over. And Biden is going to give them many opportunities over the next few weeks to point at why he's a sub-optimal choice.

But in the black community in particular, I think maybe 55% of voters tend to be over 45. And over half of black voters live in the deep south, which tends to be more moderate, higher levels of religiosity. Those are the folks that Biden needs to ensure mobilize, get folks to the polls, and vote, because they're going to support him, mostly because he's a democrat, but also because the views of Trump among that crowd are just really low.

And they're less tolerant. So younger voters may be more accepting of supporting a third-party candidate or looking at other ways to exert pressure on the political establishment. But older voters tend to recognize that you have to use all the tools at your disposal. And voting isn't one that you can throw away. You've got to use it, especially when Trump is so highly unfavored, or disfavored in the community.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Are you getting a handle at all on-- or any insight into how younger voters might vote this time around, particularly black young voters? I mean, since we're talking about our kids here, I've got an almost 18-year-old. He'll be 18 by the time he's able to vote.

This will be the first presidential election he'll be voting in. He's confused. But he's excited to be able to vote. He's still trying to figure it out.

Are you getting a handle on whether or not this year-- especially with the pandemic, and you think so many young people being affected in ways they wouldn't have been in the past-- no graduations. My son's not having a senior graduation from high school, or at least he's going to have one virtually, but you know what I mean. Are they affected in a different way?

Or are they looking at how the Trump administration is handling this? What might that mean for when they go to the polls?

TED JOHNSON: Yeah, so I do think young voters are going to break in large margins for Biden, simply because he's the democrat, and young voters tend to be more liberal, more progressive than older voters writ large. So Joe Biden is going to win the under-30 crowd without a doubt. I think the question is twofold.

One is turnout. We don't know how young voters are going to turn out in this election. In 2008, they turned out at very high levels for Barack Obama. But in 2012, for his re-election, under 30 black and white voters decreased by 9% or 10%.

So the excitement that Obama generated in '08 decreased among young voters in '12, either because the historic moment had passed and they sort of felt like they'd moved on to other things, or because they weren't pleased with how Obama governed, and felt that he had not delivered on his promise. And so they stayed home. In the black community in 2012, it was 9.7% drop off among black voters under 30. But black voters over 45 over performed what they did in 2008 in 2012, which helped rescue-- ensure his re-election. So it remains to be seen on the turnout question.

The other is how much Donald Trump's presidency inspires young voters to not vote for third party. So even if they turn out at high levels, if some percentage of them-- 5%, 7% vote for a third-party candidate as a way of rejecting the establishment of the Democratic and the Republican Party, then that could end up helping Trump, since most of those young votes would likely have gone to Biden had they stayed within the two-party system. And we just don't know how much defeating Trump is top-of-mind above all else, including ideology matters to those young voters.

RICK NEWMAN: Since you mentioned Obama, I'd love-- I'd like to talk about Obama. My assumption is he will become a full-throated campaigner for Joe Biden at some point. He's obviously been very quiet during Trump's presidency. But I'd expect him to break his fast and come out and campaign.

So number one, do you think he will do that? And will that be-- will it be meaningful? Will it help with turnout or help convince some voters? Will it be somehow helpful to Biden?

TED JOHNSON: So I think he absolutely will. I would not be surprised to see him get the keynote speech on the penultimate night of the Democratic Convention. I wouldn't be surprised to see him making visits to churches in Detroit and Philadelphia and throughout North Carolina.

What I don't know-- and I think he's going to get massive crowds wherever he goes-- but on Election Day, will having seen Obama three and a half weeks ago in a church in Detroit get voters off the couch to go support Biden? And that is the open question. And this is why, based on black voting behavior and my own research, why I think a black vice presidential candidate can do for the Biden ticket what Obama-- or both of the Obamas, Barack and Michelle, won't be able to do on their own, despite how popular they are.

And it's because they're not going to be governing. After the election, they get to go back to their home and movie deals and book deals. And folks are going to be looking to the White House to make life better-- recover from the recession that we're currently in, the high unemployment numbers, ensure coronavirus doesn't rebound as soon as the election is over, and ensuring that the racial tension we see now in the streets doesn't consume all of 2021.

And the Obamas won't be the leaders ensuring those things-- the policies, the enforcement of regulations, et cetera-- occur as they should in a way that creates a more equitable society. It will be Biden and whatever team he puts together. So I think it will be meaningful for the Obamas to be on the trail, because their absence may speak more than their presence.

But in terms of turnout, I think the VP selection will probably have a larger effect among black voters than just the Obamas being on the trail.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Well, as far as I know, Biden said in August he's going to announce who his VP is. Is that right, Ted? Is that what you heard?

TED JOHNSON: That is. Yeah, August 1 is sort of the no-later-than date.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: All right, well, hopefully we can-- let's the three of us get together again and talk about--

TED JOHNSON: That'd be great.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: [INAUDIBLE] All right, cool. Thank you, everybody, for being with us for this edition of "Electionomics." Always a pleasure to be with all of you. And Ted Johnson, great to have you here, Senior Fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice.

Be sure to follow me @AlexisTVNews.

RICK NEWMAN: And me @rickjnewman. And Ted, do you want to put your Twitter handle out there?

TED JOHNSON: Absolutely. It's DrTedJ-- D-R-T-E-D-J.

ALEXIS CHRISTOFOROUS: Dr. Ted, all right. Thank you so much, guys. It was a pleasure. And we'll see you next time.