The “Who is running in 2020?” tea leaves thread, Part 2

[Mr. Morden]

Harris is on a Middle Eastern swing, and stopped by to visit Al-Quds University in the West Bank:

https://www.maannews.com/Content.aspx?id=779517

[Mr. Morden]

Sunday morning talk show watch: Tom Steyer will be on "State of the Union" on Sunday:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_NEWS_SHOWS?SITE=AP

[Mr. Morden]

Steyer asked about running for Senate against Feinstein:

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/361846-steyer-dodges-questions-on-senate-run

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[Mr. Morden]

On Facebook, Klobuchar posted a pic of herself as a kid:

https://www.facebook.com/amyklobuchar/photos/a.469152126190.251159.7606381190/10154759791216191/?type=3&theater



I'm not saying that means she's going to run for president.  I just thought it was a funny pic, and wasn't about to start a separate thread just to post it.

[Mr. Morden]

Bernie makes moves pointing to 2020 run.

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To clarify, that's a quote from this story:

https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/27/bernie-sanders-2020-elections-258160

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[Mr. Morden]

Just a few weeks ago, Mark Cuban was giving himself a 10% chance of running for prez in 2020.  Now he says it's 40%:

http://www.talkmedianews.com/white-house/2017/11/27/cuban-floats-40-percent-chance-2020-run/

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[Mr. Morden]

Just a few weeks ago, Mark Cuban was giving himself a 10% chance of running for prez in 2020.  Now he says it's 40%:

http://www.talkmedianews.com/white-house/2017/11/27/cuban-floats-40-percent-chance-2020-run/

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I'd love to see him challenge Trump in the Republican primary.

He'd be about as relevant as Jim Gilmore was.

What do you mean by "relevant"?  Will get about as many votes?  Will get about as much media coverage?

If Trump has one and only one challenger who's able to get on the primary ballot in more than a couple of states, then said challenger is the de facto non-Trump option in the primary, and will probably get a non-negligible number of votes, presumably many more than Gilmore got.  Now maybe that's only ~10%.  I don't know.  But that's still way more than Gilmore.

Now if there's a large field of challengers to Trump, then yeah, maybe Cuban is only getting ~1%.  But I don't think we're likely to get a slew of challengers.  Maybe one or two.

[Mr. Morden]

Just a few weeks ago, Mark Cuban was giving himself a 10% chance of running for prez in 2020.  Now he says it's 40%:

http://www.talkmedianews.com/white-house/2017/11/27/cuban-floats-40-percent-chance-2020-run/

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I'd love to see him challenge Trump in the Republican primary.

He'd be about as relevant as Jim Gilmore was.

What do you mean by "relevant"?  Will get about as many votes?  Will get about as much media coverage?

If Trump has one and only one challenger who's able to get on the primary ballot in more than a couple of states, then said challenger is the de facto non-Trump option in the primary, and will probably get a non-negligible number of votes, presumably many more than Gilmore got.  Now maybe that's only ~10%.  I don't know.  But that's still way more than Gilmore.

Now if there's a large field of challengers to Trump, then yeah, maybe Cuban is only getting ~1%.  But I don't think we're likely to get a slew of challengers.  Maybe one or two.

Cuban is a joke. Even the small chunk of anti-Trump Republicans and the even smaller chunk of those that will actually vote in the primary likely wouldn't vote for him.

I don't know.  We'll see (maybe....not really convinced he's actually going to run).  If there's some discontentment with Trump, then I don't think it matters who the opponent is.  They would get a few %.  (Yes, Gilmore would too if he ran against Trump.  The difference being that if he was the only opponent to Trump, he'd get a fair amount of free media attention, and people would actually know who he was.)

[Mr. Morden]

I agree, he'd get smoked. People overestimate the number of anti-Trump Republicans. They overestimated them in the 2016 primary...

I mean, the majority of Republicans voted for someone other than Trump in the 2016 primaries.  It's not like the entire party was in love with him.  So if you're talking about whether a challenger (even Cuban) could get more than a few % in a primary challenge, I don't see why not.  I'm not talking about even winning a single state.  I'm just talking about getting more than a few % (the original claim was "as relevant as Jim Gilmore was").

The polls so far have Trump getting between 50 and 70% in hypothetical primary matchups:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2020#National_polling

Of course, it's ridiculously early, but that gives you a sense of the fact that even now, with his "rock solid support among his own party", there's a double digit %age of Republicans open to other options.  So I don't see why Cuban cracking 10% is so unthinkable.

[Mr. Morden]

Biden says he's deciding on a 2020 "in the next calendar year":

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2017/11/28/joe-biden-tells-toronto-audience-that-only-those-who-can-devote-whole-heart-should-run-for-us-president.html

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[Mr. Morden]

The Hill: McAuliffe serious about 2020 run

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[Mr. Morden]

Biden has a new website aimed at promoting economic ideas that benefit the middle class:

https://bidenforum.org

And he's commented yet again on 2020:

https://www.bloombergquint.com/politics/2017/11/29/new-biden-website-caters-to-middle-class-amid-2020-speculation

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[Mr. Morden]

The Hill: McAuliffe serious about 2020 run

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Will the McAuliffe Campaign consider eighth place in Iowa a victory?

A victory for him IMHO would be beating Chris Dodd's 2008 Iowa showing:

https://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=19&f=1&year=2008&elect=1

[Mr. Morden]

Jason Kander's doing an event in Iowa right now:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/w4s-fundraiser-meet-greet-w-jason-kander-tickets-39891029142

[Mr. Morden]

https://www.usnews.com/news/the-report/articles/2017-12-01/kamala-harris-navigates-the-2020-presidential-landscape

The story includes this Biden pose:

[Mr. Morden]

Here’s this week’s #2020Vision column:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/01/politics/2020-vision-bernie-sanders-luis-gutirrez-joe-biden/index.html

Lots of good stuff in there this week.  First, John Kerry is in Iowa today:

http://www.weareiowa.com/news/local-news/john-kerry-campaigning-for-ag-miller/871068728

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Next, Mitch Landrieu will be in South Carolina next weekend:

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Joe Biden saying that he’s currently a “no” on 2020 (though that doesn’t rule out him deciding to run between now and 2019):

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Finally, Chuck Schumer met with both Mark Cuban and Howard Schultz:

https://pagesix.com/2017/11/27/chuck-schumer-not-sold-on-mark-cuban-or-howard-schultz-for-white-house/

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[Mr. Morden]

Moulton gives a present tense denial:

https://www.buzzfeed.com/lissandravilla/rep-seth-moulton-pelosis-response-to-conyers-allegations

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[Mr. Morden]

More McAuliffe non-denials:

http://www.wusa9.com/news/local/virginia/mcauliffe-2020-virginia-governor-may-run-for-president/496830036

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[Mr. Morden]

Hillary Clinton did a book signing in New Hampshire, her first trip there since the election:

http://www.wmur.com/article/hillary-clinton-returns-to-new-hampshire-for-book-signing/14093880

Vermin Supreme led a protest of the event:

http://nhpr.org/post/vermin-supreme-hosts-pony-parade-protest-outside-clinton-event-concord

[Mr. Morden]

Inslee taking over as chair of the DGA, leading some to speculate on whether he might use his perch to push Inslee for president 2020:

http://www.king5.com/article/news/politics/inslee-raising-national-profile-with-new-role/281-497143397

[Mr. Morden]

Inslee taking over as chair of the DGA, leading some to speculate on whether he might use his perch to push Inslee for president 2020:

http://www.king5.com/article/news/politics/inslee-raising-national-profile-with-new-role/281-497143397

Why did you mention his name and then refer to him in the third person

Why wouldn't I refer to him in the third person?  I'm not Jay Inslee and (I assume) neither are you, so I'm not going to use the first or second person when I talk about him.

[Mr. Morden]

Iger may well stick around at Disney beyond 2019 if the Disney-Fox deal happens:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-fox-m-a-walt-disney/disney-ceo-likely-to-extend-tenure-if-fox-deal-happens-wsj-idUSKBN1E030Y

Which I guess would mean no presidential run by him.

[Mr. Morden]

Any indicators that Gavin Newsom is looking to jump in the race?

Not that I'm aware of.  He was asked about the presidency a year ago, and sounded pretty down on the job:

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=233345.msg5447343#msg5447343

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[Mr. Morden]

Garcetti says he hopes some mayors run for president (including possibly himself):

http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/07/politics/eric-garcetti-axe-files/index.html

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[Mr. Morden]

Here’s this week’s #2020Vision column:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/08/politics/2020-vision-deval-patrick-alabama/index.html

Most interesting quote:

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Also, O’Malley’s making yet another early primary state visit:

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