Can Republicans Save Their Majorities in Congress?

0:01Everyone wants health care to be simpler and easier. That's why UnitedHealth Group is fast-tracking more than 60 % of children's procedures that used to need pre-approval. So more kids get the care they need when they need it. And speeding up procedure approvals and payments for more than 1 ,500 rural hospitals. So they can focus on caring for their communities. And that's just the start. Learn more at uhg.com slash access. From the opinion pages of The Wall Street Journal, this is All Things with Kim Strassel. Labor Day has come and gone, and that means we are now officially in all politics, all the time, and this upcoming election.

0:45Republicans are meeting this week for a midterm convention, yet the polls look grim for the party in power. Can they do anything to save their House and Senate majorities? How much is the socialist label undermining Democrats? And what is really on voters' minds? Welcome to All Things with Kim Strassel. And we have the perfect guest this week to set the scene for the coming eight weeks, the fabulous pollster, Scott Rasmussen, president of RMG Research. Scott, thank you for joining us with the very small task of explaining everything to us about this midterm. Well, it's always great to talk with you, Kim.

1:21I mean, you know, you set it up a minute ago by saying we're now at Labor Day and it's beginning this season. One of the biggest problems people in our world have in understanding the political dynamic is we live in a 10-10-80 nation. You know, you've got 10 percent who are on the left who are at war with 10 percent on the right. The 80 percent really just try to avoid politics. They are just beginning to tune in. So some of us can tell you all the details of everything that's happened going back for the last year or two since the last major election. But a lot of these voters, again, they don't know who James Tallarico is.

2:01They don't know some of the issues that are popping up. And so they are going to be quite volatile as we go through this season. A most excellent point that not everybody are political junkies like we are. In fact, most people are not. And also, I think what you're saying, too, is that, you know, some of those results that came out of primaries are being driven more by those 10-10 sides on either side and that this could be a different environment. So not to put you on the spot, but I'm just going to put you on the spot. What odds do you actually give Republicans right now for holding, A, the House and, B, the Senate?

2:36Well, if you're asking about odds, you know, that's something I don't like to talk about. But the but heavily the Democrats are heavily favored to win the House. OK, the Republicans, I think, have a decent shot or probably slight favorite still to take the Senate. But it's nowhere near as secure as it was a few months ago. We're releasing a new product called Scott's Scoreboard, where we're going to be showing every race that's out there. What are our ratings for each Senate race, each House race, and the governor's races? And right now, our numbers show the Republicans are kind of in good shape for 47 Senate seats, Democrats for 46.

3:21That means there's seven toss-up races. Obviously, control could go either way. And some of the races, like Texas being a toss-up right now, we didn't expect. So things are looking a little bit grim from a Republican point of view. And by the way, you can go to lyceumnow.com starting tomorrow, and you'll be able to see Scott's scoreboard and check our updates all the time. Well, I can't wait to go look at that. I think it'll probably be a useful alternate view to some of the other ratings that are out there as well. The GOP is handling some pretty tricky issues here. There's the inflation cost of living question, the ongoing Iranian war, fallout from the president's tariffs, which kind of feed into the cost of living question.

4:06When you look at your underlying data, what do you think the Republicans' greatest liability is right now? What's the biggest mistake they made over the past year of what they did or didn't do? Well, that's an easy one. The war with Iran. We can talk about it from a national security perspective. You can talk about it from any way you want. But in terms of politics and the midterms, That was the biggest single mistake. You know, the most important indicator for any election is the economy. James Carville said it in 1992. It's still true today. It's the economy, stupid. But when the Republicans won the 2024 election, people were very pessimistic about the economy.

4:50They gradually became less and less pessimistic. And right before the war with Iran began, we were at a place where 31 percent of voters told us their personal finances were getting better. 31 percent said worse. Those aren't great numbers, but they were a huge improvement from 2024. Well, that was long ago. Now the numbers a little bit more grim, just 27 % say things are better. Their finances are getting better, 35 % worse. Again, that's worse than it was before the war began, not quite as bad as in 2024. That's a real headwind for the Republican Party. Is there a disconnect there or is it real?

5:31And I only ask because, you know, we recently had this thumping jobs report came out. It was really very good, right? You've had a lot of deregulation that's helped sector by sector, certain things. People were saved from this enormous tax hike that had been coming at the beginning of last year. There's been some reports that wages have been rising a little bit faster than they had, but people just don't seem to be feeling it. You know, is this a real thing or a mood thing? Well, you know, I focus on personal finances rather than the economy because most people don't really know what the economy is.

6:10It's hard to grasp or think in those terms. And what people tend to forget is that just over half of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. And if you're in that environment, what that means is you pay your mortgage or your rent, You pay your car payments, your insurance, all the basics. You have a limited amount of disposable income every week. And if the price of gas goes up, as it has in the last six months, well, guess what? You have less money to spend on groceries. If you're a little more affluent, you have less money to spend on going out, so you eat home more often. These impacts, they may not affect a lot of people in the political bubble, but they do impact half of Americans.

6:58So when you talk about the economy in a context like this year, people are feeling a real pinch. It's not that they're thinking about the jobs report or the tax site that didn't go into effect. What they're thinking is, I have less money to spend this week than I did a week ago out of my disposable income. We're going to take a quick break. When we come back more with pollster Scott Rasmussen, president of RMG Research. Everyone wants health care to be simpler and easier. That's why UnitedHealth Group is fast tracking more than 60 percent of children's procedures that used to need preapproval.

7:35So more kids get the care they need when they need it. And speeding up procedure approvals and payments for more than 1500 rural hospitals. So they can focus on caring for their communities. And that's just the start. Learn more at uhg.com slash access. This is Matthew Hennessey, the editor of Free Expression. I want to personally invite you to come check out what we're doing. Signing up for the newsletter couldn't be easier. Just go to our homepage. Directly below the Wall Street Journal logo, you'll find the magic words. Free Expression, wedged between opinion and arts. There's an option to sign up for the newsletter right at the top of our section.

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8:43Welcome back to All Things with Kim Strassel, and I am here with Scott Rasmussen. This midterm convention that Republicans are all gathering for this week in Dallas, Texas, from all accounts, what I can read, it looks as though they're going to be devoting a great deal of their time to talking about past accomplishments. And by the way, to give the administration its due, there have been some important past accomplishments, right? I mean, There was the one big, beautiful bill, which did save the country from the stabilitating tax hike. The border is now secure. That was something that a lot of voters cared about back in 2024.

9:21We've had some positive changes on some cultural issues that people feel like the 80 percent feels pretty strongly about, like boys and girls, sports, etc. The president is going to be talking about all of that and all of the people on the stage saying, you know, look what we've done for you. My question is, is that anywhere near enough? Because voters usually are like, that's nice, but what are you doing for me now, next? Ought they to be using this moment to come out with future promises or more of an agenda? You know, when you ask it that way, sure, there are some big accomplishments. The dynamics around the boys playing girls sports have changed pretty dramatically.

10:01For most voters, that's simply a return to common sense. When you talk about immigration, absolutely the border is more secure and it is perceived as more secure than it was a couple of years ago. In fact, when Joe Biden was in office, only about one out of four voters thought the government was even trying to secure the border. But as a political issue, what that means is it's less important. People aren't paying as much attention to immigration today because the issue, at least a significant portion of it, has been addressed. There's more to do, but dwelling on that doesn't get you where you need to be.

10:38I think the Republicans right now need to focus on a couple of things. Number one is creating a contrast with the Democrats on a vision for the future. Second is they need to figure out how to get the more traditional Republican voters to the polls. You and I have talked before. My firm does a question in all of our surveys. If you had a choice between four candidates of equal character and competence, would you prefer someone who advocated Donald Trump-like policies, traditional R, traditional D policies, or policies like those of AOC? The people who say they prefer Trump-like policies, that's the president's face, they are fired up about the election.

11:22They are ready to crawl across glass to vote for the president's party. even if they don't like some of the nominees they want to help the president, they are as fired up as the Democrats are fired up to oppose. The more traditional Republicans, the people who said, well, I wasn't really enthusiastic about Donald Trump in 2024, but it was better than Kamala Harris or the lesser of two evils, they're just not engaged. And I think the Republican challenge right now is the strategy seems to be we've got to fire up the base. That's actually the wrong strategy. They need to figure out a way to get those other Republicans to show up.

12:00And that means creating a contrast on some of the issues that are popping up. Can I dig into a couple of those points you just made on the question of the contrast? Isn't it also about how you frame that contrast, how you present it, how good a job you do of framing the issue. Because to me, it strikes me that just standing up there and say, oh my gosh, Abdul El-Sayed is a socialist and a communist. Okay. I mean, there are some voters in America, in particular, I think older voters in America who those words resonate more strongly. Okay. Because we've lived through not just the, you know, the evil empire and Russia and everything, but we've read our history and we know about all the various atrocious failed socialist experiments around the world.

12:49There's a lot of younger Americans that those words just, you know, blow past them. How do Republicans specifically, how do they frame this in a way that resonates with voters and actually makes people stop and think about the choice in this election? You hit it on the nose. Talking about labels doesn't do anything. About 31 percent of voters right now say they have a favorable opinion of socialism. But when you ask them about what it means or about what policies are like, it's not anything like the socialism in the history books. It's not anything like the people who fled from Cuba think of socialism.

13:30In fact, most people who say they like socialism don't even think it's an economic system. They prefer free market economics. So when somebody stands up, as you suggested, and just throws out a label, it is a meaningless gesture. It has no impact. So you need to talk about specific policies. You need to talk about a contrast on an issue. You need to show something that the candidate has said about some other issue that voters care about and drop the labels because the labels just aren't effective. Well, let me ask you if Republicans were to do that effectively. And by the way, I'm not holding my breath, but let's just say, you know, that everybody finally got the memo and they knew that they needed to talk about this in a specific way, make those points to voters.

14:20Stepping back, how big of a problem is it for Democrats that they are getting tagged with this this year? I mean, and that's partly of their own making, right? We've seen the growth of these democratic socialist candidates. In my mind, you have not had senior Democrats do anything near enough what they need to disavow that wing of this movement to say there's no room in the traditional Democratic Party for the anti-Semitism we're seeing there, for the kind of crazy policies where you want to abolish the Senate and change the Constitution and no longer have checks and balances. That's nutso. The way James Carville came out the other day, these people are not in my party, right?

15:08But they haven't done that. How big of a liability could this be for them in this election if Republicans were to get that right? Well, I want to start by answering the question about after this election, it's a huge problem for the Democratic Party. As they try to gear up for the 2028 elections and have this internal battle that has been brewing for a long time, it's going to be a problem. Up until now, the only thing that has held those wings of the Democratic Party together is Donald Trump. He will not be on the ballot in 2028, and I think the infighting will continue. For this year, the real impact will come to some individual races.

15:48Can a Republican candidate tag a Democrat with issues and views that are wildly out of touch with the constituency? I think Ken Paxton in Texas, you know, he's a flawed candidate. There's lots of baggage there. But if he can help voters, the 80 percent who, having tuned in yet, understand more about Tallarico, he can have an impact and he can win that race. But I don't think he wins by saying, well, the Democrats in New York nominated a Democratic Socialist. We don't like Mondani. Well, that has no impact on Texas voters. We're going to take one more break when we come back. How much should you trust those polls?

16:30Everyone wants health care to be simpler and easier. That's why UnitedHealth Group is fast-tracking more than 60 % of children's procedures that used to need pre-approval. So more kids get the care they need when they need it. And speeding up procedure approvals and payments for more than 1 ,500 rural hospitals. So they can focus on caring for their communities. And that's just the start. Learn more at uhg.com slash access.

17:02From the opinion pages of The Wall Street Journal, this is All Things with Kim Strassel. Welcome back. The other thing you had mentioned, turnout, getting to those more mainstream, not mega type Donald Trump obvious voters. I wanted to ask something more particular about that. And I'm not quite sure if it only maybe applies to those voters you were mentioning that are more the traditional Republicans or if this isn't a mistake that maybe Republicans made more broadly in turnout. And it's this question. I totally appreciate that the many in the Republican base conservative world are incredibly enthusiastic about the Save America Act, which is obviously this proof of citizenship when you register to vote, voter ID when you go to the polls.

17:49Great. But, you know, having done this a long time, there's lots of things that are incredibly popular among Republicans out there, but they're never going to pass Congress because there's 100 percent Democratic opposition to it and because of Senate rules. Has the president's kind of obsessive focus on this issue, banging on Republicans for failing to get it done, talking about how terrible it will be in an election if this has not been passed and is not on the books? Was that a miscalculation? Because if I'm a GOP voter and I'm just tuning in or have just been watching the headlines all year, what I've been told by the president is that the only thing that will make this election safe is the Save America Act.

18:32And now I know it's not on the books. So why should I go vote in what the president has suggested will be an unsafe election? You know, I think that entire SAVE Act issue has been a mistake. The way it's been handled by the Republican leadership or the Republican activists promoting it. To start with the fact, all of the individual provisions about citizenship requirements, photo ID, all of those things are very popular. However, only 23 percent of voters know what the SAVE Act is. is. When we ask people to describe it, you know, a lot of them thought it was a national security matter, some other types of issues.

19:14Messaging has to be very clear because, again, you've got people who are tuning in late, who are, they have better things to do with their life than worry about the legislative games that are being played in Washington. So a SAVE Act doesn't convey this is about photo ID requirements. And yes, when the president then goes on and says the Republicans are letting us down, John Cornyn let us down, John Thune is letting us down, that is likely to have an impact on turnout and not a good one from the GOP perspective. I want to ask you, too, about your industry. Your industry, most of the time people are just bashing on my industry, but I actually, and I don't think pollsters are quite as despised as journalists, but, you know, So there's been a lot of questions, obviously, going on now, essentially since Donald Trump was elected the first time about the accuracy of polling and everything.

20:11But we have noticeably had some big misses this season so far, mostly to do with primary races. But when they were off, they were like way off and off to the extent that, by the way, like candidates were dropping out and then because they read a poll and then they were getting back in. And then, of course, we're getting the results and they're very, very off. My understanding is that some of those polls, the worst of the inaccuracy has been overestimating turnout among certain groups, in particular younger voters. But first of all, tell us what's been going wrong. And also tell us how accurate you think most of the polling is out there right now going into the midterms.

20:51Well, let's start with the big misses that we've seen lately. They've been in Democratic primary polls, primarily, mostly. And the problem there is primary polling is the most difficult of all because hardly anybody takes part. You know, you have in Michigan, maybe 6 % of the state's voters show up to vote in a primary. That's why you have more extreme candidates have a chance of doing well and, you know, pulling off an upstep. Trying to decide who the 6 % or 7 % are going to show up is very difficult. On top of that, you mentioned candidates dropping out. Well, we know historically that if there's, say, five candidates in a primary, as you get closer and closer to election day, people's opinions shift.

21:42They begin to move away from the lower-ranked candidates and move towards the higher ranked candidates. When the early numbers are off, it throws everything off in that calculation. I think some of the polls were just horrible. In fact, a couple admitted they were fake, and it's very problematic for the industry and their level of credibility. Now, I want to go back, though, to something else you said about Donald Trump and the legend that the polls were way off in 2016, and that was the beginning of the problem. Actually, the polls in 2016 were very good. The analysis of the polls was horrible.

22:22If you went to the real clear politics average on election day, it projected nationally Hillary Clinton would win by three points. She won by two in the popular vote. 47 of the states were very clear which way they would go from polling. There were three surprises that we all know well, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. In Pennsylvania and in Michigan, the RCP average showed the race was a toss-up, and the last poll in each state showed Donald Trump ahead. Only in Wisconsin was the polling up. So what went wrong? The analysts just didn't believe it. I sat in the green room at Fox on election morning that day, And the discussion was generally along the lines of, well, the polls show her up by three, but there's a margin of error.

23:13She's probably going to win by six. And a few people thought the polls were off. She would win by double digits. It just was beyond their comprehension to think of things heading the other direction. So polling and analysis are two different things. Looking ahead to this midterm, if you're talking about general election polls and you are looking at a polling average rather than an individual poll, you should take it as a guideline. You should take it as an indication that this is a race to watch or it's not. And I think you can feel very comfortable with that. But you, as an individual consumer or an analyst, shouldn't apply undue precision to any polling number.

23:59You know, years ago when Burgess Allens won his first house race, My last poll showed him winning by one point. It was a shock to me. Everybody thought he was going to lose. And Burgess was kind enough to win by a point to make my poll look good. And I could therefore say my poll was so great. Well, actually, it was a three and a half point margin of error. All that my poll told you was it was a toss up race. And you should keep that in mind looking at all the polling for the midterms. Well, all good advice. Nice. I can also promise you, Scott, that I will not look at any poll as a precise measure of anything.

24:36Scott Rasmussen, president of RMG Research, thank you for coming in and joining us this week. We want to thank all of our listeners. We are here weekly. If you like the show, we'd appreciate it if you'd hit the subscribe button. And if you'd like to write to us, you can at atkim at wsj.com.

25:01everyone wants health care to be simpler and easier that's why united health group is fast tracking more than 60 of children's procedures that used to need pre-approval so more kids get the care they need when they need it and speeding up procedure approvals and payments for more than 1500 rural hospitals so they can focus on caring for their communities and that's just the start Learn more at uhg.com slash access.