Will The November Midterms Be Full of Close Contests?

WSJ Opinion: Free Expression

Gerard Baker, Editor at Large, The Wall Street Journal

Society & Culture, News

4.6 • 591 Ratings

🗓️ 21 September 2022

⏱️ 23 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On the latest episode of Free Expression, pollster Mark Penn talks to Wall Street Journal Editor at Large Gerry Baker about the messages both Democrats and Republicans need to convey to voters in November, why Joe Biden's anti-MAGA speech in Philadelphia may backfire on the President, and why the GOP is still in search of a national leader to unify the party. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	From the opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal, this is Free Expression with Jerry Baker.
0:08.9	Hello and welcome to Free Expression with me, Jerry Baker from the Wall Street Journal editorial page.
0:13.4	Thanks very much for joining us.
0:14.7	If you're not already subscriber, please be sure to subscribe at Apple Podcasts, Spotify and elsewhere.
0:19.5	Please leave us a favorable review.
0:22.0	This week, with less than 50 days until us a favourable review. This week,
0:26.3	with less than 50 days until the US midterm elections, we're going to look at the latest trends and data that might provide clues to the outcome of these crucial contests.
0:32.2	Now, for almost a century, there's been a familiar pattern in US midterms. The President's
0:35.8	party tends to lose seats in the House
0:37.8	and Senate and, of course, in state houses around the country. There have been exceptions, of course,
0:42.1	but usually the voters' tendency to want to kick the incumbent in the pants combined with
0:46.7	differing levels of motivation on the part of those voters whose party is in opposition and those
0:51.3	are in power, that tends to mean that the party in the White House does lose on average about a few dozen seats in the House and a handful in the Senate.
0:58.9	Now, a few months ago, Joe Biden's Democrats look set for a shalacking to coin a phrase used by
1:03.9	a Democratic predecessor of his. But in the last month or so, a funny thing seems to have happened
1:08.7	on the way to the Republican landslide. Polls suggest that Democrats may be able to sharply limit their losses in the last month or so, a funny thing seems to have happened on the way to the Republican landslide.
1:14.9	Polls suggest that Democrats may be able to sharply limit their losses in the House,
1:17.6	may even break even or make gains in the Senate.
1:19.1	So what's going on?
1:23.2	Well, I'm joined by veteran pollster, political consultant, marketing executive Mark Penn.
1:29.0	Mark is the chairman and CEO of Stagwell, a media and marketing firm with sales of more than $2 billion.
1:34.4	He was chief pollster and strategist for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign in 2008,
	...

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