Why Bernie can't (but might) win New York

[thesquanderer]

Last edited Tue Apr 12, 2016, 11:26 AM - Edit history (1)

Long time members of the Democratic party generally like Hillary, and she tends to come out ahead of Bernie specifically in polls of Democrats (whether in advance polling, or exit polling).

What helps Bernie the most is when he expands the voting pool to include more new (esp. young) voters and more independent voters. As he's said from the start, his campaign is about bringing new people into the process.

As usual, he did not begin campaigning in New York in earnest until this last couple of weeks (as is largely the case for most contests, the campaign gears up when the previous state or two has wrapped up). This being the case, New York presents him with two huge obstacles:

1. To the extent that his rallies and other campaigning motivate more new and/or young voters who have not voted before, it is too late now for them to register if they were not already registered. You have to have registered 25 days before the election, which was before the campaigning in New York started. If someone wasn't registered in March, and Bernie's campaign excites them now, too bad, it's too late for them to be able to vote for Bernie. And not only do they have to have registered by March, they had to have registered as as a Democrat besides! Which brings me to...

2. To the extent that his current campaign appeals to independent voters who have not declared any party affiliation (or to people who are registered with other parties, like the Green party, the Working Families party, the Liberal party, the Socialist party, etc.), these people can't now vote for him either... they would have had to change their registration to Democrat by last October in order to vote for him in this primary!

So in New York, regardless of all the campaigning, the only voters that matter in this primary are those who registered and declared themselves as Democrats before the New York campaign began, and mostly, those who have aligned themselves with the Democratic party at least six months ago. IOW, the party faithful. Essentially, his votes have to come largely from what would be Hillary's natural base.

Simply, more than most states, the rules in New York really favor the establishment candidate. An outsider candidate who gets people fired up can only get so far, when the only voters available had to essentially establish their desire to vote in the Dem primary well before that candidate began the campaign to persuade them. This is going to be a VERY tough state for Bernie. Which is why so many talk about it being impressive if he can just keep it close. It's not just the daunting poll numbers, its those facts behind those numbers.

There are a few factors in Bernie's favor that give him some hope, though.

1. there was a lot of excitement and publicity around his campaign on the national level in Feb and March, first when he won in New Hampshire, and especially when he won Michigan. Some new and young voters may have been sufficiently motivated to make sure they registered by the March cutoff.

2. There is still a large progressive wing inside the Democratic party in New York. Incumbent governor Andrew Cuomo was challenged in his last primary by the much more liberal Zephyr Teachout, who lost, but did far better than anyone expected, considering she was running against an incumbent and the "Cuomo" name, with almost no money, almost no press, and no acknowledgement from the opposition (Cuomo refused to debate her... I don't know that he ever even mentioned her name during the entire campaign). If she were more well known and better financed--as Sanders is--who knows how far her challenge could have gotten.

3. While both candidates have gotten some bad press lately, I think recent coverage has favored Bernie. Yes, he got bad press over the Daily News interview (Bernie supporters will say the knocks were unfair, with talking points pushed by the Hillary campaign... be that as it may, his public perception took a hit). And the whole "qualified" thing which, honestly, I don't think has played terribly well for either one of them. But Hillary meanwhile had the viral "angry Hillary" video, Bill's tone deaf BLM encounter, mainstream stories on the ongoing legal issues around her email, the subway exchange that turned into a joke, and "CP time" (in the long run, not a big deal, she isn't even the one who said it, but it's getting her a bunch of unfavorable publicity in NY the moment). OTOH, Bernie is going to speak at the Vatican.

I don't think it's enough for Bernie to pull out a win, but... maybe. Thursday's debate could be a defining moment.

[geek tragedy]

1. he should have been doing big rallies here back during voter registration period

if not for the party switchers, at least for new voters. I was surprised that he launched his big rally in the Bronx when it was too late for anyone there to register to vote.

The two races to compare this to:

1) Teachout/Cuomo 2014

2) Clinton/Obama 2008

Sanders is obviously better known and financed than Teachout, but Democrats were really, really pissed at Cuomo over his public desire to have Republicans control the State Senate.

I struggle to see how Sanders will outperform Obama's 2008 showing--I know there will be a lot of Obama voters in the city who will vote Clinton, but how many 2008 Clinton supporters will vote Sanders?

So, in my mind anyways, I knock a couple points off Obama's performance and that's a good predictor for Sanders. (that was also pretty much how I predicted Wisconsin).

[FourScore]

4. I thought he should've campaigned much earlier here - especially before the October cut-off. n/t

[thesquanderer]

10. Yeah, but who knew in October that he'd even still be in the race in April?

A lot of people figured he'd be lucky to get past March 1 (Super Tuesday). In October, I'm not sure even Bernie thought he'd still be in it in April!

[thesquanderer]

7. Yeah, it would have been good if he had started the NY campaign earlier.

Every candidate does this, focusses on the near-term states, and waiting until they're over (or close to it) to move on to the next. Obviously, the strategy basically makes sense, because if you lose the states coming up first, often the later states can become moot, so you throw virtually all your resources at the imminent contests. In a sense you're in that mode of always "putting out fires." And it's not just a matter of money... the candidate simply can't be in many places at once.

Still, New York has tons of delegates, but rules that really work against late surges, so more effort earlier could have paid off nicely. I can understand why he didn't do a party registration push back in October... that was months before even Iowa, there was no way to predict that that would have ended up having been a wise choice of resources. But a big voter registration push in March could have been beneficial. Though I do know there have been events in New York going back months already, so maybe they were doing that to some extent. New voters are primarily young voters, and traditional advertising is not always the best way to reach them. So it's hard to know exactly what he has or hasn't done in that regard (not being in that demographic myself).

Could he have benefitted from some big New York rallies in March? Yeah, I agree, he probably could have. Might that have cost him resources and therefore possibly votes in some of the 7 states he's won in the interim? Well, yeah, that's the tough choice. A Bronx rally in March sounds great now, but after his drubbing on March 15, may not have seemed a logical choice then. By the time of the Wisconsin primary, NY registration was already over.

You make an interesting point about how Obama did in 2008. One benefit that Hillary had then, that she doesn't have now, is that she was a sitting New York Senator. Sure, she's still got the same name recognition today, but back then, she was more a part of New Yorkers' every day life, and had been for years. Also, the contrast between Obama and Clinton was not as striking as the one between Clinton and Sanders, in that Clinton and Obama were both relative moderates. And if anything, I think the general pendulum of New York has swung a bit further left since then.

[geek tragedy]

8. My sense from NY was that the more leftwing people were on Obama's side

in that campaign. Clinton was the establishment back then, and she had voted for the Iraq war (which was 8 years fresher in everyone's mind).

Clinton will flip the numbers in a lot of pro-Obama precincts in the city, I would expect.

The one place I might expect to see her lose ground compared to where she was against Obama is Latino voters. They went for her strong in 2008 and she may have trouble duplicating that (based purely on ideology--socialism is actually pretty popular in Latin America).

This is a low turnout state, so the real question is who comes out and votes.

[thesquanderer]

9. Yeah, Obama was probably seen as slightly left of Clinton...

but the difference wasn't terribly dramatic. Edwards was the major candidate trying to carve out the left flank, but he was gone by New York.

[FourScore]

3. Excellent wrap up!! BTW, Zephyr Teachout is running now for Congress!!! n/t

[thesquanderer]

16. Yup. It would be great to see her there.

some more info...

Teachout did better than anyone expected; a Cuomo effort to kick her off the ballot, equal parts vicious and hamfisted, did not hurt. The Vermont-born insurgent, a veteran of Howard Dean's 2004 presidential campaign, won 34.3 percent of the vote and dominated Cuomo in the Hudson Valley. If you are a Hillary Clinton supporter suddenly shocked by the progressive energy around the campaign of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), you obviously did not pay enough attention to Teachout.
...
In December she endorsed Sanders for president, writing in the Huffington Post that he was right on the Iraq War, right on trade and "has spent his career fighting private prisons and overcriminalization." Tellingly — considering that she was not yet in the race — she noted that Sanders has "always been practical, with a long career of working across all party lines with respect."
...
"I’ll always choose the innovator over the evolver," Fetterman wrote to supporters after making his endorsement. Neither he nor Teachout had a problem with backing the front-runner if Sanders fell short. "I'm very excited about both Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton," she said.

She agreed with Cuomo on at least one issue: Letting Syrian refugees come to New York: "We have an incredible tradition of openness and generosity in this country." But she did not expect the governor who once snubbed her at a parade, with cameras rolling, to help put her in Congress.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/01/26/zephyr-teachout-runs-for-congress/

[KoKo]

5. Recommend....!

[xynthee]

6. Good summary!

I wish I could disagree with you on the bad stuff, though. I predict riots on April 19 because so many would-be Bernie voters are completely unaware of these stupid, stupid registration laws. I think it's unrealistic to expect (normal) people to be paying attention to the primary more than a year before the general election so they can make sure to have the correct party affiliation by Oct. 9.

Other than us, how many people gave a rat's ass about this stuff back in October or even knew Bernie was running? Most people I know were complaining about having to hear anything about the election so far in advance.

The deck is totally stacked against him, but there's still SO MUCH TIME for Hillary or one of her many, many surrogates to say something horrible/stupid, so I'm clinging to that hope plus the hope that the voter registrations aren't too screwed up.

[leftynyc]

11. New voters had until mid-March

(that would be last month) to register party. It's only those who were changing parties or went from unaffiliated to Democratic that had to have it done in October. Thems the rules for Democrats in NY. Want to change them, whining about them isn't the way - joining the party and working within the party is how you change Democratic party rules in NY.

[thesquanderer]

17. Yeah, I was surprised at how people hadn't even *heard* of Sanders, months after he announced.

We here can forget how not plugged into politics so many people are.

[JackRiddler]

12. I beg to differ somewhat...

And invite you to consider this:

How many registered Democrats in New York state? Five million?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511711436

[thesquanderer]

15. Well, I give both sides, so no matter which side you like, you can differ, and you can agree! (n/t)

[IamMab]

13. Vatican-adjacent, I think you mean. Take that nothingburger off the grill already, it's overcooked.

[thesquanderer]

14. I was talking about it from a press/PR viewpoint

Whether you think the Vatican thing is a big deal or not, it doesn't matter, it's still been good press for Bernie, that's the point.

Just like you can think the Daily News interview was fine or not, it doesn't matter, it still yielded bad press for Bernie.

The point of that paragraph wasn't about whether this or that was legitimate, it was simply a statement of what yielded positive vs. negative press for the candidate.