Despite months of daunting poll numbers, many Republicans remain hopeful that the final presidential debate was only the beginning of a strong closing push by President Trump that will defy expectations and return him to the White House.
“Best case, he wins 322 electoral votes,” said Republican strategist Mark Smith. “Worst case, 285.”
“I think he’ll win north of 300 electoral votes,” said Republican strategist Peter Hatzipetros, who wouldn’t rule out a popular vote triumph for the president.
It’s the flip side to Democrats who are nervous that the polls don’t tell the whole story of this election after Trump’s surprise victory in 2016: Republicans who look at big crowds and their own gut instincts are unconvinced that the president is really trailing Democratic nominee Joe Biden by 7.9 points, as the RealClearPolitics national polling average currently shows, in the closing days of the campaign.
“Oh my God, this means we can’t trust the polls,” is how one Democratic strategist characterized the reaction to Trump’s upset four years ago.
Some of those polls may be tightening in battleground states like Pennsylvania, where Biden has enjoyed a clear but not insurmountable lead. Although Biden’s national polling advantage is somewhat larger and has been significantly more durable than Hillary Clinton’s, he isn’t far ahead of where she was in the swing states at the same point last time around. Operatives in both parties will be looking for signs of a late Trump rally, especially in the Rust Belt, while Democrats hope they can pick off Arizona, Georgia, Ohio, and even Texas.
Several Republicans told the Washington Examiner that too many pollsters are using outdated models for parsing their data. “The enthusiasm gap is 2 to 1” in Trump’s favor, Smith said, adding it was a deficit not even Barack Obama can close. “You have a former president of the United States speaking through a bullhorn to 50 people in the streets of Philadelphia.”
Smith dismisses the national polling averages as “teardrops in the rain,” pointing instead to surveys where Trump has improved his share of the black vote and is winning around 35% of Hispanics, a key voting bloc in a number of battleground states, including Florida.
In any event, Republicans are hopeful that the last Trump-Biden debate would help focus the electorate on concerns about whether the former vice president’s environmental agenda will damage the oil industry and decimate working-class jobs. Democrats in competitive races distanced themselves from Biden’s oil industry comments. “Goodbye, Pennsylvania. Goodbye, Texas. Goodbye, Ohio,” Smith predicted.
“This past week, the American people learned that not only is Joe Biden committed to eliminating the oil industry, he is severely compromised and corrupt,” said a post-debate Republican National Committee statement.
“Trump was much more presidential in Thursday night’s debate than in the first debate,” evangelical author Stephen Stang said in a statement. ”I don’t think this debate changed many minds, but it did clarify the drastic choice Americans have to make on November 3.”
“My personal concern is not whether the president will win the election,” said Hatzipetros. “It will be the litigation. It will be another four years of trying to kick him out of office.”
Democrats are confident that they have done well in the early vote, which has been massive in some states, and that COVID-19 will prod voters to turn the page on Trump. Pollsters believe they have corrected many of the problems that plagued the industry in 2016. Some Republicans agree. “All things considered, I’d rather be Biden right now,” said a top GOP consultant in Pennsylvania.
But the fact that such widely divergent political analysis exists among campaign professionals with Election Day fast approaching is a testament to the uncertainty of 2020 and the pandemic, as well as the unpredictability of Trump himself. “I can’t wait to see the Hail Marys both campaigns will attempt,” Hatzipetros said.
