What Went Down In The Indiana Primary

Now that I’ve finished deleting all my old posts and tweets where I vehemently declare that Trump won’t be the nominee, I can sit down to think about what this means for the general election. Conventional wisdom suggests that the nominees will move to the center after the primaries. But it’s not clear that this is exactly how things play out anymore. The two parties are clearly sorted by ideology, with liberals supporting Democrats and conservatives supporting Republicans. As people become more politically engaged, they tend to join one side or another. One result of this has been what Richard Skinner, my fellow blogger over at Mischiefs of Faction, has called the “partisan presidency.” Similarly, some other research by me and a bunch of other presidency scholars illustrates how presidents and presidential candidates have, since around 1980, really embraced their roles as party leaders. The Electoral College contributes to this. How many states can we expect to be competitive in the fall? In a normal year, that list is probably limited to New Hampshire, Ohio, Colorado, Wisconsin, and Florida. Maybe Virginia, Iowa and North Carolina. In a bad year for Republicans, Missouri and Indiana. Some of the variation in those states will come down to turnout; in a presidential year, the Democrats have a bit of an advantage while Republicans do better in a midterm year. In others, especially Iowa and Wisconsin, there’s some evidence to suggest that they’re not so much moderate as balanced between fairly committed liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans. It’s not clear what the incentives to pivot to the center will be. And the challenge for Trump goes beyond a standard ideological pivot.