Clinton Has Huge Lead over Trump Among Latinos

As we noted very briefly yesterday, a new Latino Decisions poll gives Hillary Clinton a 70% to 19% lead over Donald Trump. Mitt Romney won 27% of the Latino vote in 2012 and that wasn't enough to win the election. If Trump indeed gets 19%, he is going to have to do much better among whites than Romney did to make up this loss. Also scary for Trump is that 83% of the respondents say they are absolutely certain they will vote and another 9% "will probably vote."

The net favorability numbers for various politicians include Barack Obama +52%, Hillary Clinton +39%, Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) +34%, Gov. Mike Pence (R-IN) -14% and Donald Trump -53%. Clearly, Latinos don't like Republicans.

For Latinos, the most important issue is immigration, with 38% naming it. Second was the economy, with 32% picking it. In third place with Latinos is health care, the #1 choice of 14% of the Latinos surveyed.

Despite polls like this—and this one was not an outlier—the Washington Post ran a story yesterday with the headline: "Clinton isn't doing better than previous Democrats with Latinos—even against Trump." The story quoted the poll cited above, which shows Clinton doing better with Latinos than Obama did. Hmmmmmm. Sometimes you have to take your news with a fair amount of salt. (V)

Clinton Foundation Gets Best Possible Rating from Watchdog Group

Republicans have been criticizing the Clinton Foundation for months. However, Charity Navigator, a nonprofit watchdog group whose mission is to investigate charities for accountability and financial strength in order to let potential donors know about them before they give money, has given the Clinton Foundation four stars out of a possible four stars. The watchdog group considers a number of factors—for example, whether the charity has at least five independent members on its board, which the Clinton Foundation now has (it didn't always have this number). According to Michael Thatcher, the president of Charity Navigator, the Clinton Foundation scored 94.74 out of 100 points to get its four star rating. The only items in which it was not perfect were minor issues with the donor privacy policy and its process for determining the chief executive's salary. (V)

Trump Speaks at a Black Church

When Bishop Wayne Jackson, of the Great Faith Ministries church in Detroit, invited Donald Trump to speak at the church, Trump's campaign said he didn't want to speak there, but he would agree to an interview by Jackson—provided that the questions were given to him in advance. Jackson agreed and sent the questions. Trump's staff wrote out detailed answers and told Trump to memorize them. The idea was to prevent Trump from speaking at the church himself, lest he should say something damaging to the all-black congregation.

Surprise, Trump spoke to the congregation anyway yesterday. However, he read prepared remarks rather than speaking off the cuff. He praised black churches as the conscience of America. He also said that the country is too divided, we talk past each other, and we need a new civil rights agenda. His speech went over well (presumably because someone else wrote it), but it is unlikely to change many votes. (V)

Is Clinton Repeating LBJ's Mistake?

To a large extent, Hillary Clinton's campaign is a clone of Lyndon Johnson's 1964 campaign. Johnson ran multiple ads, including the famous "Daisy" ad, basically saying that Barry Goldwater was a crazy man who couldn't be trusted with nuclear weapons. Clinton's campaign is based on the idea that Trump is a crazy man who can't be trusted with nuclear weapons. It's the Johnson campaign all over again.

Johnson won in a landslide, but ultimately paid a high price. He got a lot of Republicans to vote for him but he didn't really have a mandate. People weren't voting for Johnson but against Goldwater. Johnson managed to get a number of laws passed, but that was more a reaction to John Kennedy's assassination and also to Johnson's legendary ability to twist arms (and other body parts). In 1966, Democrats lost scores of seats in the Senate and House, and in 1968 Richard Nixon beat Johnson's vice president, Hubert Humphrey.

The lesson for Clinton is clear. She has to build a mandate for her ideas and get people to want her as president, not just want to avoid Trump. If she fails to do that, then even if she wins, a new and less scary Trump will arise before long, selling the same ideas, but in a less overtly racist way. (V)

40 Down, 10 to Go

Pop quiz: What do Alabama, Arkansas, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, West Virginia, Wyoming and Mississippi have uniquely in common, when it comes to American politics? Time's up. The answer, as The Guardian observes, is that these are the 10 states where every single statewide election since Reconstruction has been won by a white person.

It is not a coincidence that these states could fairly well be said to form the backbone of the GOP's "red wall." It's also not a coincidence that nearly all of the states on the list (Wyoming and West Virginia are the exceptions) have adopted Voter ID laws. But the dwindling size of the list, and the relatively meager 61 EVs they control, should give Reince Priebus & Co. pause. It's just another illustration that a foundation made up nearly exclusively of white voters (and white officeholders) is a loser, long-term. (Z)

Clinton Backs Regulation of Drug Prices

No, not the kind that Bill doesn't inhale. The legal kind. Undoubtedly prompted by the recent controversy over the price spike in EpiPens, Hillary Clinton has proposed that the federal government regulate the prices of pharmaceuticals, only allowing for price increases if a company can show a reasonable basis for the new price.

If she tries to get this put into law, she will need the approval of a Congress controlled by the GOP. Many will undoubtedly scream about socialism, and about how government regulation of prices will stifle innovation. There may be some truth to this, although it's not like a pharmaceutical company can just go into the fast food business if they decide the profits are no longer high enough. It's also worth noting that Europeans already regulate drug prices, and that the United States does the same thing with other commodities, like electricity and postage. Probably, Clinton's idea is a non-starter, although if enough people get angry about the EpiPens and Martin Shkreli's Daraprim shenanigans, who knows? (Z)

Johnson and Stein Getting on the Ballot in More States

Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson is now on the ballot in 47 states—New Hampshire was the most recent addition—and is on track to make it on all 50 states. Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein is on the ballot in 42 states and is working on the others. For Johnson, the real question is whether he passes the 15% mark in five specific polls so that he will be allowed to debate Clinton and Trump on Sept 26. He is currently polling around 10%. Stein is polling below 5% nationally and it would take a miracle for her to make it. (V)

Trump Visit a Disaster for Mexican President

It's not yet clear whether or not Donald Trump benefited from his visit to Mexico. We may never know, since it would be hard to separate the impact of that from the impact of his speech on immigration later in the day. What we do know, however, is that the meeting has proven disastrous for Enrique Peña Nieto, who is being savaged across the political spectrum in Mexico. Almost universally, the Mexican media thinks that he embarrassed himself and his country, and weakened the nation's hand in its dealings with the United States, regardless of who becomes president.

In theory, this development is only tangentially related to the U.S. presidential election. However, it's possible that the backlash could find its way across the border, one way or another (say, an increase in Trump dislike among Latino voters). Also, it seems fair to conclude that Trump won't be getting any other meet-and-greet photo ops with any other world leaders, who would surely be wary of getting burned in the same way. Indeed, it's not impossible that this could spill over into a Trump presidency, if he were to be elected. If the perception that a Trump visit means "How can I use you for my own purposes?" as opposed to "How can we both benefit?" that could be very bad for foreign relations. (Z)

Don't Forget to Register

Time Magazine reminds us that, well, time is running out to register to vote. Here are the deadlines in each state and territory:

September 9: Northern Mariana Islands
September 19: Puerto Rico

October 8: Mississippi, South Carolina, U.S. Virgin Islands
October 9: Alaska, Rhode Island
October 10: American Samoa, Arizona, Arkansas, Hawaii
October 11: Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas
October 12: Missouri
October 14: New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma
October 15: Delaware
October 17: Virginia
October 18: Kansas, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon, West Virginia
October 19: Massachusetts
October 24: Alabama, California, South Dakota
October 28: Guam, Nebraska
October 31: Washington

November 1: Utah
November 1: Vermont
November 1: Maryland
November 8 (Election Day): Colorado, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Minnesota, Montana, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, Wyoming

No registration required: North Dakota

If you are one of the 6 million Americans living abroad, your deadline is generally dictated by your last state of residence. Click here or on the banner at the top of the page for more information. (Z)

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---The Votemaster and Zenger