Even if Trump pulls resources, your vote still matters

Well, we have a very interesting situation, given that there are still a couple of months until the presidential election, there are reports that the Trump campaign is abandoning New Hampshire, determining at this relatively early stage that they just can’t win, that Kamala Harris will win New Hampshire, numerous Trump officials, including volunteer Tom mountain, are saying it’s over. We’ve gotta leave it. Let’s focus on Pennsylvania instead. Now there are multiple interpretations of this, and I wanna go over them with you, also multiple interpretations of the fact that Donald Trump is reducing spending in North Carolina by several million dollars per month. And with all of these stories, with all of these news items, it’s really important to consider, what’s my reaction immediately about what this means, but is there another interpretation? Because with all of these situations, there is. So let’s talk about New Hampshire first, the most important takeaway about the New Hampshire situation is that Trump won in 2016 without winning New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton won it, and Trump lost in 2020 without winning New Hampshire. Joe Biden won it. So on the one hand, it would be an understandable reaction to say, Wow, if New Hampshire already looks so bad that Trump’s bailing from a political campaign standpoint, this must look terrible for Trump nationally. That may be true, but we don’t know that yet, and since Trump can wait, Trump has won and lost without New Hampshire before. It actually may be a very astute and shrewd reallocation of resources to say, win or lose. New Hampshire is not winner lose. Pennsylvania does appear to be winner loser, at least, is far more likely to be win or lose. Let’s reallocate resources there. So if your thought was, well, maybe I won’t vote if I’m voting in New Hampshire. Maybe I don’t have to worry about the outcome of this race, because Trump’s abandoning New Hampshire. That is very much the wrong interpretation, and it is that that that’s a caveat emptor buyer beware interpretation, which could lead to Trump getting four more years. Now I do want to mention one other aspect to this. There is kind of a kooky scenario where if Trump does win New Hampshire, and then a couple other states, I believe, I believe, don’t hold me to it, but it’s something like, if Trump gets New Hampshire, Michigan and Wisconsin, you can have a 269 to 269 tie. So it is true that there is a scenario in which New Hampshire is the difference maker. It’s just considered a very unlikely scenario. It’s considered an under 1% chance of that scenario happening. So it’s not that New Hampshire can’t make the difference it’s that it almost certainly will not second, uh, campaign happening very much worthy of some interpretation. There was, there were reporting. There were reports that Trump is cutting spending from August to September in North Carolina by several million dollars. And again, the initial instinct might be to say, Wow, if he’s bailing on North Carolina, then that must certainly mean that it’s very bad, or that here’s the important thing to understand about North Carolina, the fact that Trump is even spending money in North Carolina is really the important bit of news. North Carolina, for some time, has been a state where it’s been sort of assumed it’s out of reach for the Democratic candidate. And while some are saying, Oh, that what does it mean that Trump’s cutting spending? Does it? Is he cutting spending because he’s got it in the bag? Is he cutting spending because he’s bailing? It’s none of the above. North Carolina still very much leaning Trump, but it’s in play, at least since Joe Biden was replaced by Kamala Harris. The North Carolina take away. That is most interesting to me is that this time around, Trump actually has to go and fight for it. Now what’s the 30,000 foot view on all of this stuff? It does not matter. We must get out and vote. And this is why these sorts of following the national polling versus the battleground polling, versus the political spending versus the donations. It’s all fascinating. It’s all interesting. There’s historical implications, cultural implications, about the future of the country politically. I don’t deny that for a second, the risk is that hearing any one of these little bits and pieces gets voters to say, oh, you know what? X, state doesn’t need my vote, I will stay home. That’s the risk. Now, is it likely that if a Democrat stays home in California, it will impact who wins that state? No, it’s not likely, because there’s a millions of vote margin for Democrats in California. More relevant though, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, to some degree, no matter what our assessment is about, what’s going to happen, the only action that we really have control over is, do we go out and vote? I can’t determine. How will trump spending in October? Impact turnout. What I can control is, am I voting and am I convincing people I know about the importance of voting and making sure that they do so.