Mayor Pete’s Shape-Shifting, Pot-Puffing Centrist Pivot.
Plus a Generic White Man leaves the race!
Biden or Bust, a Prison Town Hall, and a marijuana legalization plan released at 4:20 PM. This is the Centrist Slide edition.
I’m Chris Erik Thomas. Welcome to Issue 26 of Rubber Chicken Circuit, the weekly election newsletter from Study Hall. PS: If you like this newsletter, hit the HEART button above. It helps us reach more readers.
The Headline
Is Mayor Pete’s Big Pivot Enough to Make Him 2020’s Centrist Wet Dream?
It seems like just yesterday moms across America were finding the gay son they could be proud of in the cookie-cutter cleanliness of PETE BUTTIGIEG. He was woke! Liberal! Spoke 493 languages! Had an equally boring husband! Small-town Mayor Pete was the hot new thing and quickly established his liberal street cred with praise for the Green New Deal, support for the decriminalization of illegal border crossings, and, as the New York Times hilariously said, “speeches that could have been ripped from an Aaron Sorkin script.”
Like Old Taylor Swift, however, Old Pete Buttigieg can’t come to the phone right now. Why? Because he’s dead and in his place, centrist Pete has risen from the ashes like a shape-shifting Terminator. Whether this new Pete intends to kill Sarah Conner and start a robot revolution remains to be seen, but his pivot to moderate centrism does intend to destroy Biden’s base of support.
In a way, he’s the 2019 wet dream for centrist liberalism: big-money donors love him, he’s extremely safe with policy plans, he loves the military, and he’s gay but not *limpens wrist* too gay. He even smoked pot “a handful of times a long time ago.” The best part of this whole pivot? When his financial bundlers told him they weren’t into his ideas for expanding the Supreme Court or abolishing the Electoral College, he put his money where his morals should be and dropped these far-left ideas from his stump speech (but “still backs” these ideas when called out on the pivot). Liberalism might be good for getting yourself out there in a crowded field but at the end of the day, nothing tastes as good as a centrist, Mark Zuckerberg-approved pivot feels.
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Notable Numbers
21.9%
The percent of voters who are exclusively considering JOE BIDEN as their presidential nominee, according to a new FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos poll. That’s the highest percentage for any candidate (only Bernie comes close with 14.6% die-hard supporters). This doesn’t seem like a repeat of the “Bernie or Bust” fanaticism of 2016, though. As much as it seems like the 2020 election has been going on since the day America was founded, the reality is that it’s still very early.
A die-hard supporter for Biden or Bernie or anyone could change their mind if that candidate starts to show signs of weakness. What matters isn’t who has the biggest base, but who the most common second-choice is and, surprise surprise, a lot of people have one particularly wonky woman on the backburner.
3
The number of candidates who are scheduled to appear at the Prison Town Hall at Eastern State Penitentiary. Only CORY BOOKER, KAMALA HARRIS, and TOM STEYER have made time in their campaign schedules to debate criminal justice reform at the event, which was organized by formerly incarcerated individuals. Not a good look for almost every non-African American candidate to skip out on this considering the criminal justice system disproportionately impacts communities of color but hey, go off. If Harris is willing to show up considering how problematic her record as California’s “top cop” was, everyone else should add it to their schedule too.
4:20 PM
The exact time that BERNIE SANDERS unveiled his plan to legalize marijuana on a federal level, which should delight my fellow stoners. Beyond its impeccable timing, the plan is wildly ambitious but would rely on executive action rather than congressional gridlock to ensure that Americans across the country can light up. Beyond making late-night sales of Taco Bell skyrocket, the plan would also ensure that communities of color benefit rather than big tobacco corporations — including a push for state and federal authorities to erase old marijuana convictions.
$800,000
That’s the amount that JULIÁN CASTRO needs to raise by the end of the month or he’ll drop out of the race. It’s not too shocking to imagine a race without Castro since he has about a 0% chance of hitting the November debate stage (the Texan hasn’t received a single qualifying poll needed for the debate) and he’s been warning people he’d drop since the end of September.
Still, it would be sad to see him go considering how vocal he’s been for minority groups. It was only a few weeks ago that he went into Mexico to help a caravan of LGBTQ migrants try to cross the border, but that isn’t enough in such a crowded race. It’s best to say our goodbyes now and relive that moment when he called out Uncle Joe’s failing memory on the debate stage (and then got an avalanche of hate from the media for it). Maybe if he’d been white and in his 70s, voters would have supported him.
9
The number of candidates who’ve qualified for the November debate now that Little Miss Minnesota Moderate 2020, AMY KLOBUCHAR, has made it to the stage. After a strong performance at this month’s debate establishing her liberal moderate street cred and putting Elizabeth Warren on the defensive, she hit 3% in a national poll on Thursday morning. If you thought that the moderate cage match to be the New Biden was over between Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg, prepare for Round #2.
The Leftovers
Don’t You (Forget About Tim)
You know it’s doomsday for your campaign when NBC News accidentally publishes and then deletes a post about TIM RYAN dropping out. But yes, it’s true, he actually did drop out, which isn’t difficult when nobody remembers you’re running.
ELIZABETH WARREN: After the last debate’s non-answer on tax increases, Warren has a team of economists working to “solve [the] Medicare-for-all tax puzzle.” BETO O’ROURKE: If you thought Beto the Skateboarding, Swearing Bad Boy would walk back his comparison of the Trump administration and Nazi Germany, think again, baby. ANDREW YANG: His claim that “10% or more of Donald Trump voters say they would support” him in the election is as honest as me saying I’m Elizabeth Warren’s new submissive sex slave. TULSI GABBARD: If you want to pull your hair out at the dumbest fight of the 2020 campaign yet, here’s a guide to what happened after Hillary Clinton called Gabbard “a favorite of the Russians.” MARIANNE WILLIAMSON: “i licked my himalayan salt lamp and it told me to vote for marianne williamson” is the best campaign slogan she’ll never use. MICHAEL BENNET: This tweet sums up the entire Michael Bennet campaign. STEVE BULLOCK: One Iowa poll showing him with 4% support is almost enough to make you forget he’s polling at 0% in every other poll in the state. JOHN DELANEY: He’ll go to the World Series with you if you donate “ANY amount” to his campaign, which is a pretty great deterrent to guarantee nobody donates to him. JOE SESTAK: The “candidate who refuses to give up” is still walking aimlessly around New Hampshire looking like a lost grandpa trying to remember where he parked his pickup truck.
Already forgot the name of the guy who just dropped out? Me too. See you next week for another serving of Rubber Chicken Circuit. If you like this update, please hit the heart button below! It helps us reach more readers.
