Mistakes Were Made

It’s Friday, August 9. We are ten days from the start of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, four weeks from the scheduled September 10 debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, and twelve weeks and four days from Election Day.

Time for some overdue mea culpas.

• I was wrong when I wrote that Joe Biden would never ever drop out of his reelection race: Joe Biden folded.
• I was wrong when I said that IF Biden dropped out, Democrats would lunge for a stronger and more electable option than Kamala Harris: Over the last three weeks, the Democratic Party has swooned for Kamala Harris.
• I was wrong when I wrote that Donald Trump’s streak of almost unbroken good luck could almost make one “believe that the universe is conspiring to put Donald Trump in the Oval Office”: Trump’s run of good luck has ended with a thud. (Okay, he did survive an assassination attempt almost immediately after I wrote that, so maybe I was right after all?)
• And I was wrong when I said the trajectory of the race meant that Donald Trump was on track to win the election “decisively.” As of this writing, the race has moved from “leaning Trump” to “leaning Harris.”

Fear not. My pundit seppuku is scheduled for tomorrow morning (i.e., taking the three toddlers to Costco on my own while their momma gets a massage).

Now for Four Election-Season Predictions. (Feel free to hold onto your receipts!)

1. Kamala Harris and Donald Trump will debate only once — on September 10 — and the other debates will be canceled. Both campaigns are running what can only be described as base-turnout-maximization election strategies. And both campaigns will come out of that debate feeling like their candidate has done enough to motivate their base without suffering any below-the-waterline damage. Kamala Harris will lean into her “Excuse me, I’m talking now” shtick, and Donald Trump will be a boor. Few Americans will find anything that happens or is said very edifying. But Trump will score some points on Harris’s border policies, and Harris will be able to say that she “stood up” to Trump. After that, both sides will return to trying to energize their own voters into swamping the polls in November.
2. Republicans will win the Senate, but lose their House majority. Republicans need to net two seats to win the Senate. The West Virginia seat held by retiring senator Joe Manchin is a GOP lock. The rest of the map heavily favors Republicans, but they will only pick up one additional seat: Jon Tester’s Montana seat. Vulnerable Democratic incumbents in Ohio (Sherrod Brown) and Nevada (Jacky Rosen) hold on and survive in what should have been very winnable races. But the razor-thin Republican House majority disintegrates as the 2022 midterm tide recedes. Notably, Republicans will struggle to hold on to four seats in New York State that they won in ’22 that lean Democratic.
3. The October surprise will be a Biden health scare — and Kamala Harris will become president. Some in the chattering classes are predicting that Democrats will force Biden to resign late in the race in order to give a stumbling Kamala Harris a boost and the bright glow of incumbency. I don’t think that’s going to happen because I don’t think the Democrats can force Joe Biden to give up the presidency. But a major health event could force Joe Biden out of the White House whether he likes it or not. Buckle up. Americans will have a chance at three presidents in a four-month period.
4. Kamala Harris will win the election comfortably. American voters have been telling both political parties for two years that they prefer different choices than Joe Biden and Donald Trump. The Democrats ended up giving them one. Yes, Kamala Harris has been shown consistently to be a lightweight on the national stage. Her policies, such as they are, are those of a California progressive. She has no answers for the issues that are hurting the American middle class: inflation, unchecked immigration, the difficulties in forming and growing families, and the coarsening of our national culture. But she’s nearly 20 years younger than Trump and can be hyped as the “change candidate” running against a quasi-incumbent in Trump. In a year in which almost any Republican should have been able to prosecute the case against Joe Biden or Kamala Harris, the Republican Party chose a compromised and over-the-hill 78-year-old Donald Trump. We will all end up paying the price.