34 Felony Convictions Will Not Determine the Election

An alarming New York Times article shows that some political thought leaders are fooling themselves.

I had planned to take this Sunday off from Dispatching, but I want to weigh in on an alarming article from yesterday’s New York Times ($) with the headline, “Democrats Push Biden to Make Trump’s Felonies a Top 2024 Issue.” The subhead is “Interviews with dozens of Democrats reveal a party hungry to tell voters that Donald Trump’s conviction makes him unfit for office, and hopeful that President Biden will lead the way.”

These are bad ideas.

Only people who have already made up their minds to vote against Trump will find the convictions another compelling reason. Likewise, the people who have already made up their minds to vote for Trump will buy into his baseless claims that the trial was rigged.

For the slim percentage of people who—incredibly—haven’t made up their minds about Trump, his 34 felony convictions won’t matter because those convictions don’t affect their lives.

As The Times notes, “for many voters, the importance of the trial pales in comparison to issues like the economy and immigration.”

The article goes on:

Mr. Biden’s comments on Friday about the conviction indicated that he plans to stick with his strategy: Leave the most biting attacks on Trump’s legal troubles to allies and outside groups while emphasizing the rule of law. Campaign aides say abortion rights, democracy and the economy will remain the central focus of the president’s re-election message.

Frankly, while I agree that Trump’s anti-democratic rhetoric is beyond alarming, I don’t think that preserving democracy is a sufficiently big issue for undecided voters.

Nobody believes that their democracy is vulnerable until after it is too late.

Immigration is an issue in the election because the Republicans are making it so. The Biden campaign therefore cannot ignore it, but nothing the campaign says about immigration will tip votes.

That leaves the economy, which is doing better than the "Vibecession" ($) would have many of us believe, and abortion access.

Both high prices and reproductive freedom are issues that directly affect the everyday lives of Americans, unlike Trump’s legal troubles.

The economy is a projection test, depending in part on where you get your news. It’s a hard issue on which either side can campaign because the economy hits different people differently.

That brings us to abortion access, which is a different sort of projection test but one that is clear, concrete, and compelling.

The Trump administration stacked the Supreme Court with justices that said Roe v. Wade was settled law during confirmation and then voted to overturn it in 2022. Since that time, abortion access has plummeted in Red States even though frequently majorities of the voters in those states are pro-choice. This affects people’s everyday lives.

Speaking personally, reproductive freedom is my number one political issue, which tells you how I’m likely to vote.

And from a strategic perspective, which is my project here, abortion access is the most viable (no pun intended) issue to get undecided or ambivalent voters to come to the polls.

According to new research by Pew, 63% of Americans believe that “abortion should be legal in all or most cases.” Given gerrymandering, that popular belief will run into different math in the Electoral College, but it should be enough to tip the balance on the pro-choice side if the Biden campaign hits the issue hard.

Trump’s legal troubles, although fascinating, won’t change minds at the ballot box.

Thanks for reading. See you next Sunday with all the usual extras.