2024 President

KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — Presidential approval is typically a good predictor of the share of the vote an incumbent president will receive. — Recent presidents often ran a little ahead of their approval as opposed to a little behind, although the sample size is very small. — Assuming President Biden’s approval, which is mired in the low-to-mid 40s, does not spike to 50% or better before Election Day, he is likely going to have to perform well with those who only “somewhat” disapprove of his job performance. Democrats held their own with these voters in 2022. Biden versus his approval President Biden announced Tuesday that he would be seeking a second term as president. Biden’s announcement comes as his approval rating, which has been net negative in national polling ever since the aftermath of the collapse of the Afghan government in late summer 2021, has chugged along at a consistent and underwater level. According to the FiveThirtyEight national polling average, Biden’s approval today is 43% approve and 53% disapprove. That’s only marginally better than Donald Trump’s approval at the same time of his presidency, 41% approve/53% disapprove. Biden’s approval was clearly worse last summer than it is now

Dear Readers: Please join the Center for Politics and the Jefferson Council for the University of Virginia next Tuesday (April 25) at 7 p.m. for an evening with Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist George Will. He will be speaking at Minor Hall Room 125 on the Grounds of the University of Virginia. The discussion is entitled “The Bad Ideas Fueling Today’s Attack on The Best Idea — Free Speech.” The event is free and open to the public. Tickets are available via Eventbrite, and the event will be streamed virtually at https://livestream.com/tavco/aneveningwithgeorgewill — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — In the 2020 presidential election, Joe Biden carried 6 states — that were collectively worth 79 electoral votes — by a margin less than his national showing. In some ways, this made his electoral coalition less efficient than that of Barack Obama’s in 2012. — No state has been within 5 points of the national popular vote in each of the past 6 presidential elections, but Pennsylvania has come the closest, though it has taken on a slight GOP lean. — Aside from Virginia and Georgia, North Carolina, despite a persistent 6-point GOP lean in recent elections, seems like Democrats’ best southern

Dear Readers: New Center for Politics Professor of Practice Liz Cheney will discuss her time in Congress, her role on the Select Committee that investigated Jan. 6, 2021, and more in a conversation with Center for Politics Director Larry J. Sabato on Wednesday, April 19. The conversation will run from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Alumni Hall’s Jefferson Ballroom on the Grounds of the University of Virginia. Tickets are free and available to the public; those who would like to attend must reserve tickets in person at the UVA Arts Box Office, which is open Tuesday-Friday from noon to 5 p.m. and is located at 109 Culbreth Road in Charlottesville. There is a two-ticket limit. The program will also be livestreamed at https://livestream.com/tavco/conversationwithlizcheney. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — We’re continuing our series of looking at how the most vote-rich counties in a state vote versus those that make up the rest of the state by moving to the Southwest. — The region contains the key swing states of Arizona and Nevada, both of which are dominated by a single county that casts well north of half the statewide vote. — Both the top and bottom

Dear Readers: Join us on Tuesday, April 11 for a conversation with Nguyen Quoc Dzung, ambassador of Vietnam to the United States. The ambassador will speak on the relationship between Vietnam and the U.S. and issues impacting Vietnam and Southeast Asia. The program begins at 6:30 p.m. eastern at Minor Hall, Room 125, on the Grounds of the University of Virginia. It is free and open to the public to attend with advanced registration through Eventbrite; it will also be livestreamed at https://livestream.com/tavco/ambassadorofvietnam. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — After looking at the Midwest last week, we’re comparing the presidential voting trajectory of the bigger counties versus the rest of the state in a number of eastern states. — Georgia had exactly opposite top and bottom halves in 2020, with a very Republican (but stable) bottom half and Democratic-trending top half driven by changes in Atlanta. — North Carolina and Pennsylvania are mirror images on opposite sides of the political divide. — Florida’s turn toward the Republicans has been a bit more pronounced in its top half of bigger counties compared to its bottom half, making it an outlier among the states we’ve studied. — South Carolina’s

Dear Readers: Join us on Monday, April 3 for “Drawing the Lines: Political Cartoons in the Digital Age,” a conversation with 4 of the nation’s top political cartoonists. Center for Politics Director Larry J. Sabato will moderate the discussion with Lalo Alcaraz, winner of the 2022 Herblock Prize and two-time Pulitzer finalist; Darrin Bell, Pulitzer-winning political cartoonist and creator of the comic strip “Candorville”; Ann Telnaes, Pulitzer-winning editorial cartoonist for the Washington Post; and Matt Wuerker, Pulitzer-winning staff cartoonist and illustrator for Politico. The program begins at 6:30 p.m. eastern at Ridley Hall, Room G008, on the Grounds of the University of Virginia. It is free and open to the public to attend with advanced registration through Eventbrite; it will also be livestreamed at https://livestream.com/tavco/thepowerofpoliticalcartoons. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — This piece analyzes recent presidential voting patterns in the Midwest by comparing the big counties that cast roughly half the statewide vote with the smaller counties that cast the rest of the statewide vote. — In Illinois and Minnesota, more than half of the statewide vote comes from dominant metro areas, and improvements in those areas from 2012 to 2020 allowed Democrats to maintain their strong

  KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — The American electorate has changed dramatically over the past 40 years, and a pair of factors — race and education — have driven the changes. — The electorate has become more diverse and more highly educated. Democrats rely heavily on nonwhite voters and have improved with white college-educated voters, while Republicans have cut deeply into Democratic support with non-college whites. — Racial and cultural issues, rather than economic ones, have fueled Republican gains with the non-college white electorate. How the electorate has changed The American electorate has changed dramatically over the past 4 decades. This transformation has involved changes in both the demographic composition of the electorate and the party loyalties of major demographic groups. In this essay, I describe long-term trends in the demographic composition of the electorate and in the party loyalties of key demographic groups, focusing on two crucial demographic variables: race and education. I then examine the forces driving the striking shift in the party loyalties of the group that still makes up the largest share of the American electorate — white voters without a college degree, a group often referred to as the white working class. Demographic change

KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — The calendar year before the presidential primary voting begins is often defined by winnowing, as contenders emerge and then fade. — But Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis are taking up so much oxygen that we may already have the top contenders, with everyone else who runs essentially an afterthought. — DeSantis is polling well for a non-candidate, but we need to see how he actually performs before assuming that his support is solid. — If another candidate supplants DeSantis (or Trump), or at least vaults into their stratosphere, don’t necessarily assume it will be someone who is currently well-known now or has a lot of formal political experience. Assessing the GOP presidential primary It feels late — and also early — in the race for the Republican presidential nomination. It may be late because despite the fact that we are still nearly a year away from the actual voting, the top 2 contenders seem to be so clear. The winnowing process that so often defines the year in advance of the primary voting may have effectively already happened – it’s just that the winnowed candidates, some of whom aren’t even candidates yet, don’t know

KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — One of the big stories of American politics over the past half-century has been a growing ideological divide between Democrats and Republicans. — This has also led to more ideological cohesion within parties, including a dramatic increase among Democrats between 2012 and 2020. Democrats are now as ideologically cohesive as Republicans, which is a big change from a decade ago, when Republicans were significantly more cohesive than Democrats. — While white Democrats have moved more to the left than nonwhite Democrats have on some issues, both groups have become more liberal since 2012. Ideological congruence in the American electorate Growing partisan-ideological congruence has been one of the most important trends affecting American politics over the past several decades. The ideological divide between Democrats and Republicans has increased dramatically since the 1970s as Republicans have grown increasingly conservative and Democrats have grown increasingly liberal. This increase in partisan-ideological congruence has affected rank-and-file voters as well as party elites and activists. In this article, I use data from American National Election Studies surveys to examine trends in partisan-ideological congruence among Democratic and Republican voters since 2012. To measure partisan-ideological congruence, I examine trends in ideological identification and

KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — President Biden’s successful State of the Union address suggested he’s full speed ahead on running for a second term. — Despite polls showing that even many Democrats would prefer Biden not to run again, he has no real opposition within his own party — and the State of the Union is unlikely to help generate any. — Biden’s best friend is weakness within the Republican Party, which was on display once again on Tuesday night. Biden’s State of the Union There are competing realities at the heart of the president’s annual State of the Union address. It is both typically unmemorable, yet also is probably the biggest scheduled event on the political calendar. This is particularly true in odd-numbered years, in which there are few elections of national import. Content-wise, State of the Union addresses are typically formulaic, a laundry list of presidential accomplishments and asks. While many inaugural addresses have stood the test of time, State of the Union addresses typically have not. The Library of America’s American Speeches: Political Oratory from Abraham Lincoln to Bill Clinton includes only a single State of the Union address in its collection: Franklin Roosevelt’s Jan. 6, 1941 address to Congress in

KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — Donald Trump’s bid for a third Republican presidential nomination opens the 2024 presidential election. — The former president achieved only limited victories in the 2022 national and state elections. — But the structure of the Republican party provides him with many institutional advantages in the nomination race. Trump: A weak 2022, but promise for 2024 A week after the 2022 congressional elections, Donald Trump announced his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024. The former president will seek to replicate the trifecta of Grover Cleveland in 1884 (win), 1888 (lose), and 1892 (win). His chances of winning the bet will be affected by at least two factors: his record in the elections just concluded and the institutional structure of the Republican nomination contest. The first will hamper his bid for power. The second may strengthen the odds of winning victory within the party. The Elections of 2022 Trump is both the also-ran of the presidential election of 2020 and an unrelenting sore loser who refuses to acknowledge his defeat. In 2022, Trump seemed primarily interested in revengefully defeating those who had opposed him politically, especially those who voted for his impeachment. His attention

Dear Readers: Join the Crystal Ball’s Kyle Kondik, J. Miles Coleman, and Carah Ong Whaley for a Twitter Spaces at 2 p.m. eastern today. They will be wrapping up the best and worst moments from politics in 2022, and listeners will also get the chance to answer trivia questions and win some Center for Politics swag. If you cannot join us live, we will release the Spaces as an episode of our “Politics is Everything” podcast. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — The United States is in an extremely competitive era of presidential elections. — In the 6 elections this century, the popular vote margin has been less than 5 points in all but 1 of them. — Many of the states have been consistent in their presidential voting since 2000, although there have been key shifts that have altered the roster of most competitive swing states. — Relative to the nation, much of the West has become more Democratic over the past 2 decades, along with some other pockets of the country, while many states in the Northeast, Midwest, and Greater South have become more Republican. — The most competitive states in 2020 may be the

Dear Readers: We’re excited to feature an essay from a distinguished UVA alumnus, David Peyton, on the challenges election prognosticators face in an unstable and fast-changing geopolitical environment. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — American elections are becoming harder to predict. — Part of this is likely because of the immense changes and disruptions we are seeing not only in the United States, but in the world as a whole. — If the underlying social phenomena are less stable, then predictions become unavoidably chancier. The difficulties of forecasting in an unstable world Readers of the Crystal Ball have become accustomed to predictions of an extremely high level of accuracy. There were years one wondered whether the Center for Politics team could ever do any better. Predictions in 2022 have not matched previous performances. Numerous sources have discussed the difficulties in polling. A recent phone call for Center supporters included the exceedingly unwelcome news that some universities have abandoned their neutral polling efforts for fear of negative consequences from delivering what some officeholders would consider unacceptable news. But deeper, underlying reasons indicate that what one might call a Golden Age of political predictions has ended, not to be

Dear Readers: Join the UVA Center for Politics later today (Thursday, March 31) for a virtual panel, “Domestic Terrorism: How Vulnerable Are We?” The virtual forum will be streaming at https://livestream.com/tavco/uvacfp-domesticterrorism from 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. eastern. Former United States Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and current Center for Politics resident scholar Chris Krebs will discuss the ins and outs of protecting the United States from domestic threats with Mary McCord, Executive Director of the Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection and a Visiting Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center, and Clint Watts, Senior Fellow at the Center for Cyber and Homeland Security at George Washington University and a Foreign Policy Research Institute fellow. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — The U.S. Census Bureau recently reported changes in population from 2020 to 2021. — While the headline findings mainly dealt with population declines, a number of places (particularly in the Sun Belt) are still experiencing substantial growth. — A little more than 5 dozen counties with at least 100,000 residents grew by 3% or more from April 2020 to July 2021. These counties are spread across 20 states. — Almost all