1980

In 1980, an incumbent President ran for re-election in the midst of a crisis he had failed to contain. And it was not for lack of trying. If you go back and read about the Iran hostage crisis, you will find out that Jimmy Carter tried very hard to bring that dark chapter in our nation’s history to an end. He tried diplomatic means. He green lit a risky rescue operation that went horribly wrong. He gave up the time and energy he might have otherwise directed at campaigning to try and solve a problem that made him (and our nation) look impotent and weak.

Carter may have been fortunate in his competition. Ronald Reagan was thought to be some combination of an intellectual light weight, over the hill, and a right wing extremist. Even late into October, Carter held a small (3 point) lead among likely voters in polling done by Gallup, which, at the time, was the gold standard in the field. Reagan gave a polished performance in the competitors’ lone debate (his rhetorical question of whether voters were better off than they were 4 years before is still cited in presidential races to this day) that moved lots and lots of late deciding voters into his camp. He destroyed the image of him as bumbling (or dangerous) and his message of an America with better days ahead resonated with an electorate exhausted by years of inflation, high interest rates, and unemployment. 

Media types are always looking to compare the present day to history and that is understandable. Joe Biden’s healthy polling lead over Donald Trump has many reporters eyeing 1988 as a cautionary tale of calling a race too early. There, Mike Dukakis was ahead in one poll (also Gallup) by up to 17 points late into the summer, only to lose 40 states (and the election) to then-Vice President Bush in November.  

But to me, and something I have tweeted about a few times, 2020 is far more likely to look like 1980 than 1988. Why do I say this? For several reasons. Trump, like Carter, got elected promising to shake up Washington. Carter, a little known Governor when he ran for the Democratic nomination, offered a fresh start after the convulsions of Watergate (and to a lesser extent, the Vietnam War). Trump, while certainly better known, also offered himself as an outsider who would “drain the swamp” and draw on his supposed business acumen to grow the economy. 

One of the reasons Carter ultimately faltered is that he failed to make good on his campaign rhetoric. Even before the Iran hostage crisis, the nation remained mired in slow/little economic growth and the psychic wounds from Vietnam had sapped our belief in our military and its use as a force for good in the world. Trump, by contrast, has had an ocean of corruption and scandal follow him into office at a level unseen since Nixon, and arguably, ever. Between his impeachment, the ethics scandals of people like Scott Pruitt, Ryan Zinke, and Alex Acosta, and the wanton grifting of the public fisc, the “swamp” Trump promised to drain was an ever-deepening cesspool before COVID hit. 

Second, Carter was, charitably, a bit of a prig. A born-again Christian, Carter often came off as a scold. This happened most famously in his “malaise” speech, a word he did not actually use, but became associated with the overriding message of moral rot in the country that was eating away at the fabric of our community. At other times, whether it was lecturing people about lowering their thermostats or personally reviewing requests by aides and elected officials who wanted to use the White House tennis court, Carter looked like a nag and a wet blanket. Trump, is, charitably, a bit of a prick. The quotes are well known, but his glaring racism, misogynism, xenophobia, and so much more make him as popular as herpes with all but his MAGA followers. Caging kids. Calling white supremacists “very fine people.” Shithole countries. In the same way Carter’s parsimony turned off Americans who were already suffering and did not want to be treated like children, Trump’s odiousness runs counter to who we like to believe we are as a nation - charitable, progressive, open minded, and welcoming of all people, regardless of race, creed, ethnicity, or sex. 

Third, their opponents share similarities. While Reagan and Biden’s politics will never be confused for being the same, both were experienced hands at politics. Reagan with two terms as California Governor under his belt and Biden having two terms as Vice President after a long career in the U.S. Senate. Much was made of Reagan’s age (as the Trump people are trying to do with Biden) and the fear that he would steer the country in a rightward direction (as the Trump people are trying to portray Biden as a dupe of the left). 

Finally, and most importantly, are the crises Carter and Trump faced. While Carter was hands on and did all he could to get the hostages freed from Iran and Trump has checked out on doing anything to mitigate COVID, voters’ reaction has been the same - widespread disdain for both. What Iran exposed with Carter and what COVID exposed with Trump is the same thing - incompetence. For Carter, it cemented the view that he was simply in over his head. That his lack of experience and inability to bring a small country like Iran to heel even with our military might, made America look small and weak. For Trump, his indifference to COVID has revealed all that people knew about him - his narcissism, his obliviousness to facts, his laziness - that some looked past in 2016 but cannot do now because this is not a reality show, it is literally a life and death situation that other countries, with competent leadership, have gotten a handle on while we have not. It has exposed a different kind of weakness, a different kind of impotence, than Iran did, but the result is no different. Americans by wide margins, see our nation heading in the wrong direction and see a man standing at the White House podium saying things utterly divorced from their reality. 

Looked at in this way, the late October breakers who abandoned Carter and swung to Reagan appear to be making their judgment about Trump’s failures earlier in the race, perhaps owing to Biden’s credentials as a former Vice President to a still popular former President who is a safer alternative than Reagan was viewed to be until that debate performance. It explains why polling shows the closest states from 2016 like Michigan and Pennsylvania swinging sharply to Biden’s camp, but the true canaries in the coal mine for a 1980-like sweep are in places like Arizona, Georgia, and even Texas. If those states abandon Trump, then you could see a Biden victory that may not reach the 489 electoral votes Reagan won in 1980, but could fall comfortably in the 360-380 won by Bill Clinton (twice) and Barack Obama (once).

There is one other consequence to that scenario. While Reagan’s victory is remembered as the birth of modern conservatism, a less remembered result of his landslide victory was the 12 Republicans who won U.S. Senate races that night too. Democratic incumbents like six-term incumbent Warren Magnuson, four-term incumbent Frank Church, three-term incumbents Gaylord Nelson and Birch Bayh, and the Democrats’ 1972 Presidential nominee, George McGovern, all lost. In 2020, so-called purple state Senators like Cory Gardner and Martha McSally are viewed as highly vulnerable, but as polls show Republican incumbents like Joni Ernst (Iowa), Thom Tillis (North Carolina), and Susan Collins (Maine) trailing their opponents, you can start to see the ripples of larger waves forming. If Trump continues to repel all but his ardent base, a 1980-like tsunami might take out other thought-to-be safe Senators like Lindsey Graham and Mitch McConnell while under-the-radar races like Alaska could also swing blue. 

Of course, as we are constantly reminded, there is still a lot of time between now and election day. But early voting starts in six weeks and COVID is not getting any better. Trump may have modestly changed his ~ tone ~ this week, but tone does not change the facts on the ground or the continued misery we are all experiencing. If, on election night, Biden is declared the winner early and down ballot races not even thought to be competitive for Democrats break in their favor, expect to hear a lot of flashbacks to forty years ago.

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