Note: Despite our saying on Friday that there would be no posting on Sunday, there was big news yesterday: Puppygate. So we wrote an item on it. It's here, in case you missed it.

Biden: I'm Happy to Debate Trump

In a surprising announcement on Friday, Joe Biden told radio host Howard Stern that he would be happy to debate Donald Trump in the fall. Previously, Biden had been noncommittal.

Trump responded by tweeting: "Everyone knows he doesn't really mean it." A bigger question is whether Trump would agree. He skipped all the primary debates and is out of practice. A danger for him is that he claims Biden is old and demented, and if Biden does well in one or more debates, that will effectively kill off that argument. It's a serious risk. Also, Trump has lied about so many things, the moderators could bring up his many lies and contradictions and expose them to a wider audience. They could also put him on the spot in terms of his position on abortion access. His current position is "leave it up to the states." What happens if a moderator says: "Suppose Republicans control Congress and pass a bill banning all abortions nationwide. Would you sign it or veto it?" He really doesn't want to be forced to answer that question on national television. For Biden it would be easy: "I would veto it."

There is also the question of who would organize the debates. In April 2022, the RNC pulled out of the Commission on Presidential Debates. Then there is the problem of Trump speaking over his opponents at debates and whether Biden would insist on giving the moderators switches to kill the candidates' mics if they spoke out of turn. In short, don't pencil a presidential debate into your calendar quite yet. (V)

Trump Is Now Attacking Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Donald Trump lit into Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on his boutique and overpriced ($41.54 Friday) social media site. This is clearly a sign that Trump's polling is telling him that Kennedy is hurting him more than Kennedy is hurting Joe Biden. Given that some of Kennedy's biggest funders are Republican billionaires, clearly the train has derailed. This was not the game plan. And once again, this is before the Democrats start ratf**king and running ads saying Kennedy is the only politician a God-fearing anti-vaxxer can trust.

In the posts, Trump called Kennedy a "Democratic plant" designed to help Biden. Speaking of plants, Kennedy is pro-weed. If word gets out, he could cost Biden some votes among people who are friends of Mary Jane. It makes no sense for Biden to support someone who could cost him votes.

Kennedy responded to Trump's tirade by saying: "When frightened men take to social media they risk descending into vitriol, which makes them sound unhinged. President Trump's rant against me is a barely coherent barrage of wild and inaccurate claims that should best be resolved in the American tradition of presidential debate." Smart move, Bobby Jr. By calling him "President Trump" rather than "Trump," "Donald," or "Mr. Trump," you score brownie points with Trump's supporters.

Historically, support for third-party candidates shrivels when we get to November. In the spring, voters can "send a message" by telling pollsters that they hate both major-party candidates, but when it is time to do the deed, most of the double haters hold their noses and pick the least-bad candidate. Kennedy used to be an environmental lawyer, but his former colleagues are running a newspaper ad in the swing states saying that he has now turned his back on the environment. There is little else that left-wing double haters might see in him. Also, if they really can't stomach Biden there is Jill Stein again.

One problem for Kennedy is that he is on the ballot in only three states so far. He's working on that, but even with his running mate's millions, it won't be easy to get on all the swing state ballots, let alone the others.

But the fact that Trump is now going after Kennedy shows that the public polls with Kennedy taking more votes from Trump than from Biden are probably right, at least for now.

As long as we are on the subject of third-party candidates, it is worth mentioning that the Constitution Party has just nominated outspoken anti-abortion activist Randall Terry. His entire platform can be summed up in three words: "Abortion is murder." He said: "We are running for President in the effort to make child killing by abortion the number one voter issue in America. We will show the horror of aborted children to the American people, and call on Christians to REPENT for having voted for Joe Biden." Unlike Kennedy, no ambiguity here at all. If you would like to do some personal ratf**king, you could make a donation to the Constitution Party. We are not sure if www.terry2024.com is Terry's actual campaign website or a parody of it run by some cybersquatter. If you make a donation to any campaign, be sure to first sign up for a spare e-mail address at gmail, Yahoo, Outlook, ProtonMail, etc. and use it to collect the 10 e-mails a day you will get from the campaign forever. (V)

Poll: Americans Are Very Unhappy

A new SSRS poll for CNN has a lot of bad news for Joe Biden and good news for Donald Trump. The top line is Trump is ahead nationally 49% to 43%, but that is not the worst of it for Biden. Now, 55% of Americans see Trump's term as a success and 44% see it as a failure. For Biden so far, only 39% see it as a success and 61% see it as a failure. Republicans are more united than Democrats, with 92% of Republicans approving of Trump's term vs. 73% of Democrats who see Biden's term as a success. In addition, 14% say both were failures and 8% say both were successes. Historically, presidents rise in the polls as people forget what it was actually like when they were in the White House.

Biden has two big problems: the economy and the Middle East. Biden's approval on the economy is 34%, despite unemployment being historically low, inflation being largely tamed, and everyone's 401(k) account doing great. It is true that prices are higher than 4 years ago, but for many people, wages have at least kept up, if not more. Still, higher prices stick out like a sore thumb (particularly, of course, for those whose wages have NOT kept up). For people who are employed, the unemployment rate is fairly irrelevant and for people without a 401(k), the stock market is irrelevant. But prices are relevant for everyone. That's the way it goes. The president can't really do much to affect the economy, but the voters don't know that.

Biden's other problem is the Middle East. Only 28% approve of his handling of it and 71% disapprove. Among voters under 35, his disapproval rate is 81%. Normally, foreign policy doesn't have much impact on elections unless Americans are being killed overseas in a war, but this year could be one of those rare exceptions. If Biden were to abandon Israel, then a different group of people would be very unhappy. One of the rules about the Middle East is that everyone loses all the time.

The poll also showed a huge divide among the voters. Among Trump voters, 66% cannot understand why anyone would ever vote for Biden. After all, they heard on Fox that he is the devil incarnate. Among Biden voters, 63% cannot understand why anyone would ever vote for Trump. They heard somewhere that he was impeached twice, indicted four times and is on trial in New York. (V)

What the Heck Was the Supreme Court Doing Last Thursday?

Last Thursday, the Supreme Court held an oral argument about Donald Trump's claim that presidents have absolute immunity from prosecution for anything they do in office. A question that came up was essentially: If Joe Biden ordered SEAL Team Six to assassinate Donald Trump, could he be prosecuted after he left office? Trump's lawyers said no, he couldn't. This got many legal analysts very antsy since it would de facto put the president above the law and make him a king.

The Court was also very concerned about distinguishing between crimes a president committed as part of his official duties (e.g., taking a bribe from someone who wanted to be appointed as an ambassador or judge) and crimes not related to his official duties (e.g., personally stabbing his annoying brother-in-law to death). The justices seemed to imply that crimes not related to an official act could be prosecuted later but crimes related to the president's official duties are a tougher call. Trump lawyers were asked if what Trump is charged with (e.g., arranging for fake electors, trying to block the peaceful transfer of power, etc.) were related to Trump's official duties, and one of Trump's lawyers, D. John Sauer, admitted that no, these actions were not part of the job description in Art. II of the Constitution. So if Trump is charged with "private" crimes and private crimes can be prosecuted, why isn't this a slam dunk with a ruling of "In this case with these facts there is no immunity" and leave it at that? Why all the questions about official criminal acts that are not at all relevant to the case actually in front of the Court? This has led many legal analysts to criticize the Court as going way beyond what it is supposed to do, namely, rule on this one case and not rule on vaguely analogous cases that might some day possibly come before the Court.

One lawyer who is taking a contrarian view is George Conway. In a podcast with Sarah Longwell on The Bulwark, Conway says that he believes the Court is actually thinking about what would happen if Trump was elected president and appointed an attorney general who promised to indict Joe Biden for... being a Democrat. That case would, of course, eventually get to the Supreme Court. Conway thinks the Court might be trying to head that case off at the pass by making a ruling now that would distinguish between "official" crimes and "private" crimes. Not enforcing immigration laws would then be an official crime and thus not be prosecutable whereas claiming his dog as a dependent on his tax return would be a private crime and thus prosecutable.

Conway also thinks that there are two ways the Supreme Court might rule on the immunity case. One is to rule that in this specific case, Trump is not immune and for future cases the rule is... whatever. If that happens, according to the rules, Judge Tanya Chutkan could start the trial 81 days after the ruling comes down. If the ruling is made on June 28, the trial could start on Sept. 17. Nothing would prohibit that. There are no "election season" exceptions. Another possible ruling is to send the case back to Chutkan to determine if trying to block the peaceful transfer of power is an Official Act of the president. In that case, she could start the fact finding hearing on July 1 if she wants to. If this happened, the actual trial might not start before the election, but the fact finding, with the government presenting its case, could be quite damaging to Trump. Conway seemed to exclude the possibility of the Court simply ruling: "Trump is immune and can't be prosecuted." That would basically put every future president above the law and Conway doesn't think there are five votes for that. (V)

Not All Republicans Are in the Tank for Trump

The Washington Post's Aaron Blake has put together a list of the percentages of votes that did not go to Donald Trump in closed Republican primaries, both before and after Nikki Haley dropped out. A closed Republican primary means only registered Republicans could vote, so no ratf**king (except among Democrats who took time to re-register as Republicans). Here is the list:

Date	State	Non-Trump vote
March 2	Idaho	15%
March 5	Oklahoma	18%
March 5	Tennessee	20%
March 5	Utah	44%
March 6	Haley drops out
March 19	Florida	19%
March 19	Kansas	25%
April 2	Connecticut	22%
April 3	New York	18%
April 23	Pennsylvania	17%
	Average	22%

The $64,000 question is how many of the non-Trump Republicans were just sending a message and how many find Trump unacceptable? The votes for the former governor when she was still a candidate could be votes for her to be the nominee. But after she dropped out, who were the voters sending a message to? Trump? As in: We don't like you? Maybe after blowing off some steam, these non-Trump voters will all come home on Election Day, but if even 10% of them change horses and vote for Biden in the end (or don't vote), however grudgingly, that could be enough to flip some of the swing states. (V)

Who Are Trump's Megadonors?

Donald Trump's small donors are being squeezed dry. Many will give their last dollar to him if need be, but some of them have apparently already done this so the well is running dry. Consequently, Trump is depending more and more on huge megadonors to take up the slack. Who are these folks, anyway? Here are some of the whales:

• Timothy Mellon: The 81-year-old reclusive heir to the Pittsburgh Mellon banking family has given MAGA Inc. at least $16.5 million since 2022. He also gave $20 million to a pro-Trump super PAC called America First Action during the 2020 cycle. The Mellon family is worth $14 billion. Mellon has also given a super PAC supporting Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at least $20 million. Clearly he is expecting Kennedy to hurt Biden more than he hurts Trump. In addition, Mellon has donated to many anti-immigrant measures, including a private effort to build a wall on the Mexican border.
  
  
• Isaac and Laura Perlmutter: Isaac, 81, is the former chairman of Marvel Entertainment. He has already given $10 million to a pro-Trump super PAC Right for America. He is a regular at Mar-a-Lago. In 2020, he gave $21 million to America First Action. Like Mellon, he is extremely low profile and rarely photographed or interviewed. When Reuters reached Perlmutter's lawyer to ask some questions, the lawyer hung up.
  
  
• Linda McMahon: Along with her husband, accused sex trafficker Vince, McMahon ran World Wrestling Entertainment until 2009. She has given $10 million to MAGA Inc. this cycle and gave $15 million to America First Action in 2019 and 2020. She lives in Connecticut and ran for the Senate in 2010 and again in 2012. She lost both times. As a consolation prize, Trump appointed her administrator of the Small Business Administration. She is 75 and the McMahons have a net worth of $2.7 billion.
  
  
• Robert Bigelow: He was a big supporter of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) this cycle until he stopped being a supporter and cut off DeSantis. Since then, he has given $9 million to MAGA Inc. this cycle. He has also helped pay Trump's legal bills. He is fascinated by UFOs and has dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago. His background is in the hotel industry. He is worth about $700 million.
  
  
• Patricia Duggan: She got her money from her ex-husband, Robert Duggan, who sold his pharmaceutical company to AbbVie in 2015 for $21 billion. His net worth is about $3.3 billion. Patricia and Robert have eight children. Both Patricia and Robert gave America First Action at least $4 million in 2020. She is also a major donor to the Church of Scientology.
  

These are just a few of the big donors known so far. Trump is actively working on recruiting more of them, something he didn't do in 2020. (V)

As Maine Goes, So Goes... Nebraska

Actually, it is the other way around, but it sounds better this way. Two states, Maine and Nebraska, allocate their electoral votes with one per congressional district and two statewide. Joe Biden won one electoral vote in Nebraska in 2020, the Omaha-based NE-02. Nebraska Republicans thought they could pull a fast one on Democrats by changing the law to allocate all their electoral votes to the statewide winner, thus (potentially) costing Joe Biden one electoral vote. In some scenarios, that could be crucial. Take that, Biden! What are you going to do about it?

Not so fast, Nebraska. The Democrats hold the trifecta in Maine, the other state with the split EVs. Maine House Majority Leader Maureen Terry (D) has now said that if Nebraska switches to winner-take-all, Maine will too, thus depriving Trump of the one EV he could get in rural ME-02, which covers 80% of the state. That would cancel out Nebraska's move. Now that Maine has an answer to "What are you going to do about it?," Nebraska is much less likely to change the law.

Actually, allocating electoral votes in all states as Maine and Nebraska do would be better than the current scheme, although not as good as eliminating the Electoral College altogether (which would require a constitutional amendment). Dozens of blue states have one or more red districts and dozens of red states have one or more blue districts. If every state switched to the Maine/Nebraska plan, dozens of states would suddenly be competitive. Here is a list of the number of competitive blue and red districts per state, based on the PVI of the district. Any district between D+5 and R+5 inclusive is considered to be competitive here. States with no competitive districts are not listed:

State	# D+1 to D+5 districts	# R+1 to R+5 districts	# EVEN districts
Arizona	1	2	0
California	7	3	0
Colorado	1	0	1
Connecticut	2	0	0
Florida	1	3	1
Georgia	1	0	0
Illinois	5	0	0
Indiana	1	0	0
Iowa	0	3	0
Kansas	0	1	0
Maryland	1	0	0
Michigan	1	4	0
Minnesota	1	0	0
Nebraska	0	0	1
Nevada	3	0	0
New Hampshire	1	0	1
New Jersey	2	2	0
New Mexico	3	0	0
New York	5	2	1
North Carolina	2	1	0
Ohio	1	3	0
Oregon	3	0	0
Pennsylvania	1	3	2
Rhode Island	1	0	0
Texas	1	2	0
Virginia	1	1	0
Washington	1	1	0
Wisconsin	0	2	0
Total	47	33	7

We'll save you the job of counting, but in this model, 28 states are suddenly at least somewhat competitive because there are one or more districts that are worth fighting over. So instead of about 7 states that anyone cares about, 28 states would become battlegrounds because there were electoral votes to be had there. Of course, any switch to the Maine/Nebraska plan would have to be nationwide. It would be foolish for California to switch unless Texas and Florida did too, and vice-versa. Getting from here to there would be tough since Congress probably has no authority to tell the states how to divvy up their electoral votes. What might work is an interstate compact that says the state will switch to the new plan as soon as all 50 states have ratified it. That way, Texas could not say to California "you go first" and then renege after California does so. The Interstate Popular Vote Compact works this way. (V)

Peter Meijer Ends His Senate Bid in Michigan

Normally, candidates who aren't polling well just keep running until the money is gone. Republican Senate candidate Peter Meijer did not face this problem, as his family owns a superstore chain with locations all over the Midwest and he is a multimillionaire. Nevertheless, he dropped out on Friday.

Meijer is an Army veteran who served in Iraq and is a former congressman. Normally, that would be a good springboard for the Senate. However, he was one of the few Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump. Trump noticed... and opposed him. After Meijer's announcement, Trump posted this message to his boutique social media site: "Once he raised his very little and delicate hand to Impeach President Trump, his Political Career was OVER!" Maybe Meijer thought that with Trump actively opposed to him, he had no chance, even if he could toss tens of millions of his own dollars into his campaign. Score another political corpse for Trump.

The Michigan seat is open due to the retirement of Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI). The Democrats are almost certain to nominate Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI). With Meijer out, there are still 10 Republicans running for the nomination. Trump has endorsed former U.S. representative Mike Rogers. However, wealthy investor Sandy Pensler is also in the race and can try to carpetbomb Rogers into oblivion. Polling shows that Slotkin beats all the Republicans, but her lead over Rogers is just 2 points and he is by far the strongest candidate. If Democrats want to try a bit of ratf**king, they could try to help Pensler, although he doesn't need any help. The primary is August 6. (V)

Democrat Is Favored in Special Election in New York Tomorrow

Donald Payne's death last week cost the Democrats a crucial House seat. Tomorrow's special election in Buffalo could return it. This is the seat vacated by Democrat Brian Higgins, who resigned from Congress in February.

In New York State, there are no primaries for special elections. Each party picks its own candidate. Democrats chose state Sen. Tim Kennedy, who represents Buffalo. Republicans picked Gary Dickson, a town supervisor from West Seneca.

Since Higgins resigned, the state legislature redrew the district map. However, the special election will use the 2022 map, the one that gave Higgins his win, not the new map. Whoever wins will serve until Jan. 3, 2025. However, both candidates are expected to run in the regular election as well. The district, NY-26, is D+9, which favors Kennedy.

If Kennedy wins, the House would be 213D, 218R. However, in June there are special elections for three vacant seats previously held by Republicans. That could change the House to 213D, 221R, which would give Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) more breathing space. If he's still speaker by then, that is. (V)

Another Republican Calls It Quits

In a sneaky move, Rep Bill Posey (R-FL) announced Friday that he will not run for reelection. Why is this sneaky? After all, 20 other Republicans are also retiring. Well, Posey's chosen successor, former state Senate President Mike Haridopolos (R), just filed to run a few days ago. That in itself is unusual since eight-term Republican representatives in red districts don't normally draw opponents unless there are some ideological issues at play, which is not true here.

What is sneaky here is that the filing deadline has just passed. Normally, when a Republican retires in an R+11 district, every Republican state senator and representative within 20 miles of the district perks up his or her ears and gets ready to run. But because Posey said he would run for reelection and then announced "nope" just after the filing deadline had passed, none of the other local legislators or mayors got a chance to enter. Could it be that Haridopolos has one of those new AI-powered crystal balls with a USB-C cable he could plug into his computer to get predictions daily, and one of them said: "Congress is in your future"? Who knows? In any event, Posey has already endorsed Haridopolos. What a turn of good luck for him! Two other Republicans also filed, just in case the 76-year-old Posey decided to call it quits, but Haridopolos is clearly the favorite now that Posey has endorsed him. Open and transparent politics at its finest. (V)

Today's Presidential Polls

Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin are still statistical ties. We believe that more than some other recent polls showing Trump with substantial leads in some of these states. The differences could be due to methodology, shy voters, or just bad luck.

State	Joe Biden	Donald Trump	Start	End	Pollster
Michigan	51%	49%	Apr 19	Apr 25	YouGov
Pennsylvania	49%	50%	Apr 19	Apr 25	YouGov
Wisconsin	49%	50%	Apr 19	Apr 25	YouGov

Click on a state name for a graph of its polling history.

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