Matt Grossmann

@mattgrossmann.bsky.social

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Michigan State political scientist & @ippsr Director; @hookedlansing Co-owner; Also: @niskanencenter @fivethirtyeight; New book: How Social Science Got Better

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the incumbency advantage largely disappeared as an important factor in election outcomes for US House & Senate as partisanship grew in importance. But candidate quality differentials still can matter, particularly in the Senate, as they did in 2022 www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Do Quality Candidates and Incumbents Still Matter in the Partisan World? Comparing Trends and Relationship Between Candidate Differentials and Congressional Election Outcomes, 1900–2022www.tandfonline.com The increase in elite-level polarization and the changing partisan nature of elections to the U.S. House led scholars to posit that candidate characteristics are minor considerations in determining...

policy changes are more likely to reflect preferences of the educated as well as the rich, across 43 countries. Educational inequalities are larger & concentrated in cultural issues, producing a bias toward cosmopolitan socio-cultural policy academic.oup.com/ser/advance-...

The economic and cultural dimensions of unequal policy representationacademic.oup.com . Many scholars have argued that policymaking in Western democracies is biased toward high-income citizens, thereby violating fundamental ideals of politic

Emphasizing American national identity, including during July 4th & the Olympics, can reduce partisan animosity goodauthority.org/news/july4th...

How July 4th reduces partisan animosity – at least for a momentgoodauthority.org July 4th celebrations make us think about shared American traditions – and that thinking can help bridge the partisan divide.

Even if Dems do well in 2024, they are unlikely to have a trifecta with a committed majority willing to play reform hardball for many years. The constraints established by the Supreme Court are likely to stand, limiting liberal policymaking & empowering Republican presidents.

Even if Trump was on pace to win pre-debate (& even if another Dem would have done ~same), the accepted narrative of a Trump win is likely to be that Dems blew it by renominating Biden. Voters might not remember the debate, but it will stick out as an off ramp Dems didn't take.

The debate & after-debate coverage are also likely to further diminish interest in a campaign that was already depressing & uninteresting to many Americans, possibly further reducing viewership for the conventions & any 2nd debate.

Anti-corporate rhetorical moves of Republicans under Trump are real, enabled by changes in business & among voters. They have sometimes been backed up with real bills/policy. But traditional tax & regulatory party agendas, often with more $ implications, are ~intact & polarizing.

The conservative legal movement was part of the Republican establishment brought in earliest to Trump. It made peace near completely & has been rewarded with quick generational advances, not just for social activists but also for economic conservatives & their own long-term power

The scholarly backlash against "White Rural Rage" has stimulated a conscious popularization of rural studies in political science & a recognition that scholars from rural areas bring distinct perspectives: www.nytimes.com/2024/06/29/b...

How ‘Rural Studies’ Is Thinking About the Heartlandwww.nytimes.com What’s the matter with America’s rural voters? Many scholars believe that the question itself is the problem.

With conservative control of Supreme Court projected for decades & no reason to expect Dem Senate dominance soon, will be substantial constraints on liberal policymaking even under Dem presidents. Constrained Biden agenda & Trump COVID agenda may be liberal high points for years

Although strong presidential performance typically helps for downballot races, the personal specificity of voters' Biden concerns may enable some Dems to separate their personal images. And independent of actual performance, voter expectations that Trump would win would help Dems

Despite everything, Twitter is still where narratives congeal across media, activists, & politicos, quickly & with the ability to influence other media. Last night, it was within minutes of the debate start. Bluesky & threads are not close to real-time alternatives to its role.

Weakening of administrative deference & the major questions doctrine will likely combine to severely limit unilateral policy actions of (especially Democratic) presidents, setting the threat & expectation that any significant liberal admin policy change will be overturned

Debates can matter, usually by stimulating clear media narrative that even those who did not watch it hear clearly. Liberal media & commentariat are not at all mirror images of conservative side, including having more ties to neutrality & self-criticism Candidate traits matter

Public opinion moved thermostatically in favor of immigration under Trump & against it under Biden. But opinions on race moved leftward under Trump but held steady under Biden, in part because salience of race has declined dramatically since 2020 democracyfund.org/idea/pushed-...

Pushed and Pulled: How Attitudes About Race and Immigration are Settling and Shifting After Trumpdemocracyfund.org In this report, we investigate how Americans’ attitudes about race and immigration evolved over Trump’s presidency and in the first three years of Biden’s term.

Public debate expectations are higher for Trump, which may make the bar easier to reach for Biden (though they could also make commentators or voters more attentive to Biden mistakes or slowness): www.nytimes.com/2024/06/27/u...

More Voters Expect a Strong Debate for Trump Than for Biden, Poll Showswww.nytimes.com A New York Times/Siena College poll shows Republicans with greater enthusiasm for their candidate.

Wikipedia discusses Democratic officials more positively than Republican officials, in sentiment & with emotional language: manhattan.institute/article/is-w...

Is Wikipedia Politically Biased?manhattan.institute Wikipedia.org is the seventh-most visited domain on the World Wide Web, amassing more than 4 billion visits per month across its extensive collection of more than 60 million articles in 329 languages....

Less attractive people do not live as long as those rated in the middle, but there is no survival advantage to being the most attractive (based on high school yearbook photos): www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Looks and Longevity: Do Prettier People Live Longer?www.sciencedirect.com Social scientists have given relatively scant attention to the association between attractiveness and longevity. But attractiveness may convey underly…

post-debate commentary can change voter views as much as the debate itself, as narratives about who won congeal: www.niskanencenter.org/how-presiden...

How Presidential Debates Influence Voters - Niskanen Centerwww.niskanencenter.org When and why do presidential debates change voter views? How, if at all, did they help Donald Trump last time? Ethan Porter finds that the post-debate commentary changes voter views as much as the deb...

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Matt Grossmann

Keep an eye out for Jenn's book later this summer!

White Racial Sympathy The left side of Americans' racial attitudes drives support for racially-targeted policies. New #ScienceOfPolitics podcast/transcript with Jennifer Chudy: www.niskanencenter.org/white-racial...

White racial sympathy - Niskanen Centerwww.niskanencenter.org The impact of racial attitudes in American politics isn’t just about the presence or absence of anti-Black prejudice.

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Matt Grossmann

The newest episode of The Odd Years Podcast with Amy Walter (of the Cook Political Report & PBS) features a fun conversation with @mattgrossmann.bsky.social and me about our forthcoming book Polarized by Degrees. It's available via podcast apps or this link: www.cookpolitical.com/CPR-access/o...

The Odd Years Podcastwww.cookpolitical.com Listen and follow:

White racial sympathy - Niskanen Centerwww.niskanencenter.org The impact of racial attitudes in American politics isn’t just about the presence or absence of anti-Black prejudice.

higher levels of US aid especially for military financing and education are associated with a higher likelihood of anti-American terrorism in aid-receiving countries academic.oup.com/ej/advance-a...

academic.oup.com

I talked to Amy Walter with Dave Hopkins about our forthcoming book, Polarized by Degrees: How the Diploma Divide & the Culture War Transformed American Politics: t.co/YsOQf1TDzf We got to talk about global trends, racial politics, social media, Trump, & The Simpsons:

‎The Odd Years: Season 2, Episode 4: How The Diploma Divide Is Reshaping American Politics on Apple Podcastst.co ‎Show The Odd Years, Ep Season 2, Episode 4: How The Diploma Divide Is Reshaping American Politics - Jun 25, 2024

I would like to come up with a survey experiment to test "solution aversion" on climate change views but compare it against a "coalition aversion" alternative, where Americans change views due to the political side & affiliated groups associated with belief in a large problem.

With close Presidential, Senate, & House races & key rising politicians--plus a productive Democratic trifecta under pressure--the Lansing, Michigan area is central to national politics: slate.com/news-and-pol...

The Future of Michigan Politics Depends on a City You Probably Never Think Aboutslate.com There’s a new locus of power in the state.

English-speaking countries' publics are more troubled by high interest rates because they rely on debt much more for housing, cars, education, & health care; countries with larger welfare states are less affected www.vox.com/future-perfe...

Why Americans hate inflation — and its curewww.vox.com Other countries have social safety nets. The US has debt.

Biden refugee restrictions are part of broader efforts by center-left parties to respond to immigration concern, but they often don't satisfy either side goodauthority.org/news/immigra...

Politicians on all sides campaign on restricting immigrationgoodauthority.org Will Biden’s latest executive orders on immigration help him in November?

Michigan now sells more legal weed than any state, even California www.freep.com/story/news/m...

Michigan surpasses California as the top cannabis market in the U.S. by sales volumewww.freep.com Since December 2022, Michigan has sold more total grams of flower and units of other cannabis products than California, reports a firm that tracks data.

Prior price increases still have negative influences on consumer sentiment; multiple years of high inflation likely have a large cumulative negative effect www.briefingbook.info/p/digesting-...

Digesting inflationwww.briefingbook.info The impact of inflation on consumer sentiment decays at a rate of about 50 percent per year