Earlier today, I was talking to a friend who’s a political junkie. He doesn’t like Trump but he’s against impeachment. (Aside: my friend’s argument was: (1) if you impeach Trump and fail, you strengthen him in the election, and (2) if you impeach Trump and succeed, you get President Pence.)
I was telling my friend that I was fresh off watching Mitt Romney’s very moving 8-minute speech in which he stated why he would vote for the first article of impeachment.
As I talked about it, though, I remembered how much Mitt Romney has shown his disdain for Trump and I said that out loud. Then I pointed out that Mitt is not up for reelection until 4.5 years from now and a lot of things can happen in between that blunt the negative effect of his vote on his reelection chances. Then I pointed out that of all the red states to be from, Utah was probably the safest state from which to vote for impeachment because a lot of Republicans there are not crazy about Trump.
So within 5 minutes, my point completely changed from “Isn’t Mitt a principled guy?” to “Basic political science (public choice) predicts his vote. He doesn’t like Trump, his seat is safe for 4.5 years, and a lot of the Republican voters he needs don’t like Trump either.”
By the way, Romney could well be principled and that might explain his vote. My point is that basic incentives predict his vote even without principle.
My friend agreed with my reasoning and then said, “I think political science doesn’t predict the votes as well as it would have 20 or 30 years ago. I might, for example, have expected Susan Collins to vote for impeachment.”
I answered, “I don’t think so. She’s up for reelection this year, she took a lot of heat from the left for voting for Kavanaugh, and she badly needs the Trump base.”
He agreed.
READER COMMENTS
Daniel Kuehn
Feb 5 2020 at 6:30pm
There are several Republicans (and Democrats!) in his sam electoral position (4.5 years out and/or a Trump-skeptical state). I suspect these would be weak predictors of a Senator’s vote on this particular vote even if they are decisive factors in other cases, right? Put another way, if I were to construct a prediction model those would be weak factors. Certainly being from a Trump-skeptical state would be weak if we’re also accounting for party. The only real decisive factor for Romney, it seems to me, is what we knew about what he thought about the evidence against Trump and what he thought of the appropriateness of the behavior.
Not liking Trump doesn’t seem super predictive. Apparently lots of Republicans don’t like him and there’s a public record on that for many of them.
David Henderson
Feb 5 2020 at 6:54pm
You wrote:
No. All the Dems, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, voted for impeachment, so that fits the partisan model.
Re the Reps, which ones have a personal grudge against him, are 4.5 years out, and are in a Trump-skeptical state?
Daniel Kuehn
Feb 5 2020 at 7:22pm
Yes, I noted that accounting for party is important: “Certainly being from a Trump-skeptical state would be weak if we’re also accounting for party.”
What I said was that 4.5 years out and a Trump-skeptical state is not a strong predictor. “Trump-skeptical” can be operationalized many ways but outside Utah we can think of that as swing states, and swing state status has zero predictive value on vote outcome: Gardner (R-CO), Bennett (D-CO), Casey (D-PA), Toomey (R-PA), Rubio (R-FL), Scott (R-FL), Warner (D-VA), Kaine (D-VA), Brown (D-OH), Portman (R-OH). As for the 4.5 years, a third of the Senate is in the same electoral boat as Romney. More of them voted for conviction, but once you control for party it disappears so that doesn’t seem to have “predictive value”.
These factors might have an impact on the margin in other votes, for sure. But the best predictor here is party. It only fails to explain a single Senator. And a much stronger explanation of his vote seems to be his assessment of the evidence.
Daniel Kuehn
Feb 5 2020 at 7:23pm
You framed the post as a matter of predicting votes. If we’re talking about predicting votes these factors have to arbitrate and explain variation.
Tom DeMeo
Feb 5 2020 at 8:16pm
“which ones have a personal grudge against him”
I understand that Trump always attempts to frame things this way, and is surprisingly adept at selling the idea, but do you really buy into that?
Does he ever accept a disagreement as offered in good faith?
David Henderson
Feb 6 2020 at 12:08am
I’m not sure whom you’re asking.
Tom DeMeo
Feb 6 2020 at 9:18am
David, I’m asking you.
The language in this post about opposition to Trump is being framed as personal, and your phrase, “personal grudge” is the most severe of the bunch.
It has been the Trump’s lifelong strategy to dismiss all opposition as personal and to furiously demand that they are just petty and should be dismissed as illegitimate. He seems to have convinced you and many of the other posters that this is the dominant explanation for opposition to Trump, not rational disagreement.
Meanwhile, you seem to be implying that otherwise, more rational calculations of political risk are in play.
David Henderson
Feb 6 2020 at 9:35am
Tom,
The reason I asked whom you were asking is that I didn’t use the term “personal grudge.”
And while I agree with you that Trump is as you depict him, no, I’m not saying that’s how I regard these things. I have a LOT of friends who despise Trump and it isn’t because it’s personal. They worry a lot about our republic.
But when it comes to politicians who haven’t shown much regard for principle in the past, I bring more skepticism.
Having said that, notice that I didn’t say that Romney isn’t principled on this. I’m prepared to believe that he is. What I found striking, and the reason I reported my conversation with my friend, is that thinking through his incentives got me to pretty much the same place as starting from the idea that he’s principled.
Tom DeMeo
Feb 6 2020 at 5:41pm
David,
Re-read your first response to Daniel Kuehn (Feb 5 2020 at 6:54pm). So far as I can see, you did ask-
“Re the Reps, which ones have a personal grudge against him, are 4.5 years out, and are in a Trump-skeptical state?”
I get your point about being skeptical about high minded political principles here. I just suggest there are other explanations other than personal animosity to Trump.
David Henderson
Feb 6 2020 at 5:47pm
Tom,
As you note, I was quoting Daniel. Those are not the words I would have used.
You write:
I agree. I even gave one: principle.
David D Boaz
Feb 5 2020 at 7:19pm
Seems like this only works if you add in a presumed personal grudge. Otherwise, Lamar Alexander surely has a great deal of disdain for Trump and recognizes his manifest inadequacies, and he’s not running again, and yet he went along with the tribe. Pat Roberts and Mike Enzi are also not running again, so have little to fear, and I assume also see Trump’s unfitness. But I haven’t heard them say it, so I leave them out of the calculus. But it seems to me that “sees the problem, has little or nothing to lose” applies to both Romney and Alexander, but only one acted on those incentives.
David Henderson
Feb 5 2020 at 7:51pm
Good point.
Adam
Feb 5 2020 at 10:54pm
I grew up in Utah and have lived here for most of my life. Utah is decisively not a Trump skeptical state. It was during the election but once Trump became president, most Republicans (mainly Mormons) fell right in line.
My personal experience is anecdotal, but I know that the Republican held congress is planning some trial balloons to issue a recall of Romney and replace him with someone more loyal.
Alan Goldhammer
Feb 6 2020 at 8:10am
I grew up in Utah and have lived here for most of my life. Utah is decisively not a Trump skeptical state. It was during the election but once Trump became president, most Republicans (mainly Mormons) fell right in line.
This is a difficult statement to defend. In the 2016 Presidential election, Trump did not even get 50% of the vote. Evan McMullin was a 3rd party candidate and polled almost 22%; his vote total plus Hillary Clinton’s out numbered the Trump voters. In 2018, Republican Mia Love lost her bid for a 2nd term. While Utah will likely vote to reelect President Trump, I suspect the margin will not be as high as in other states supporting the President.
Adam
Feb 6 2020 at 8:38pm
You need to understand Mormon beliefs and culture. First, Mormons (of the Utah variety anyway) see the Republican Party as their political arm. If you’re not Republican, you are shunned. But more importantly, a big belief is that once a decision is made everyone is expected to fall in line.
Utah Mormons didn’t like Trump during the election because of what he said about Romney, but they fell in line as soon as he got elected. God appointed him to held back the tide of socialism. Many of my friends related stories of thanksgiving prayers made to thank god for sending Trump to save America.
The belief about falling in line after a decision is made is codified in the official church leadership handbook.
A Guim
Feb 5 2020 at 11:42pm
I would say that it is much less costly to Romney to vote for conviction if he knows ahead of time that Trump will not be convicted. It is no secret that most of the Republican Senators who have to work with Trump don’t love him, but it would be a disaster for the party if he was removed from office. Romney can play a game of chicken with the rest of the Republicans, letting it be known that he will vote for conviction, thereby restricting the flexibility of the other Senators to vote for conviction and still achieve the necessary result. Perhaps he was voting his conscience, but with complete confidence that Trump would not be convicted anyway, minimizing the likely fallout of the vote.
Peter
Feb 5 2020 at 11:59pm
TBH #2 is why Trump got my primary vote but not the general and why he won’t get it again this year. Pence is an extremely polarizing VP, would love to see the numbers on for every Pence supporter he gains how many Trump supporters he loses.
Thomas Firey
Feb 6 2020 at 5:49am
The Washington Post notes that Trump has higher favorability numbers in Utah than Romney does.
Rebes
Feb 6 2020 at 8:19am
David, I am surprised that you would consider Romney as principled in the first place.
Romney hates Trump because Trump perfected what Romney started but did not succeed with. Romney’s 2012 campaign was based on polls, not principles. Romney was the first to blame illegal immigrants and China for all economic woes. Trump picked up the same populist themes, but unlike Romney, he also made them sound populist. Romney’s disdain of Trump is driven by envy, not public choice and certainly not principles.
TMC
Feb 7 2020 at 2:03pm
I’d add that Romney came across as very weak. In 2012 Obama attacked him, often unfairly, and Romney did little to fight back. Trump stood up to Clinton and professional politicians in general in a way that many people really enjoyed.
Hi vote was petty retribution.
Chris
Feb 6 2020 at 11:33am
I think your rational explanation is largely right. I would also add that Romney is one of the few senators to have run for president and garnered himself a name outside of his senate activities. He’s feeding an established narrative of who he is, expecting that narrative to outlast people’s angst that he voted, inconsequentially, for removal from office.
Collin’s never had any intention of voting for removal, regardless of when her . She has an established track record of doing exactly what she did here: blathering non-specifically about how she’s on the fence and weighing evidence, until at the last minute she steps in line. That way the moderates feel like she’s really considering things, the base can point to the one Republican that really deliberated and made the right decision, and she gets far more press than most other senators. I literally only know her name because of how she plays the press with this tactic. In all honesty, the way she does this is so transparent I can’t really fathom how anyone doesn’t view her with disgust; left, moderate or right.
Douglas Eckberg
Feb 6 2020 at 3:29pm
“She has an established track record of doing exactly what she did here: blathering non-specifically about how she’s on the fence and weighing evidence, until at the last minute she steps in line.”
It makes no difference to you that she was one of only two to actually buck her party and vote in favor of witnesses? It was always possible that a couple of other moderates might join them, but they didn’t, and bringing the spotlight on herself cost her in the Party. With the final vote, there was no particular reason to continue to poke Trump and McConnell in the eyes, as the outcome was a foregone conclusion and voting to convict would only further undermine her position in the Party.
But there’s a more. She was one of only three Republicans — the others being Lisa Murkowski and the dying John McCain — to actually vote against the “skinny” repeal of the ACA back in 2017. And that vote actually counted, because they were successful.
So, no, I don’t accept your characterization.
chris
Feb 7 2020 at 3:00pm
I disagree that the vote for witnesses cost her anything with the party. She knew that her vote didn’t mean anything and she was using it to continue the narrative that she is a deliberator. Furthermore, her fellow senators know that as well; they are fine with her appearing to deliberate and act moderate because it helps her keep her seat without actually impacting anything.
nobody.really
Feb 6 2020 at 3:49pm
Borowitz Report: Susan Collins Takes Hours to Decide On Lunch Before Ordering Exactly What Mitch McConnell is Having
Michael Byrnes
Feb 7 2020 at 6:24am
Romney voted to convict, while his fellow Senator from Utah, Mike Lee, voted the party line.
Differences between Lee and Romney?
Romney is 72 (I think), while Lee is 48, so Romney may not be looking at future in Republican politics while Lee is.
Romney is up in 2024, Lee in 2022.
Romney is extremely wealthy, Lee I don’t know but would assume less so.
Lee has split his career between Utah and DC and entered politics in 2010, in the version of the Republican Party we have seen recently. Romney has ties, through age, family, and places he has lived, to an older version of the party. He spent some of his formative time in politics as the Republican governor of Massachusetts.
Both incentives and personal history probably had some impact on what each of them saw as their relatics options in this decision, but it was still on them to decide.
I don’t think it was obvious to anyone which way Romeny would vote, though he was always seen as one of the Republicans who might vote to convict.
David Henderson
Feb 7 2020 at 11:30am
Nice analysis.
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