On this Tuesday’s Morning Joe, exactly two weeks before election night, host Joe Scarborough initiated the discussion stating that “the Trump campaign has been saying for a week now that this is going to be America's Brexit.”
In response, The Washington Post’s Robert Costa explained:
“The Brexit theme is an important undercurrent right now within the Trump inner circle, and you have Steve Bannon the former head of Breitbart news working closely with Trump and in almost every local interview that Trump is giving when he’s on the stump, he's talking about Brexit because that's how he sees the race, that’s how Bannon sees the race… it's more of a nationalist populist wave that they hope to ride, they think the polls are wrong, they think the media is against them and it's really an ‘us against them’ mentality against globalization – and not really a partisan argument, that's how they see it inside of the campaign, especially Bannon and Trump himself.”
When suggesting that the Trump campaign thinks that the media is against them, Kay of BBC’s World News America burst out laughing. Scarborough then engaged her by asking about the polls right before Brexit to which she answered: “What was interesting was that the polls were close right after Brexit, and in retrospect I think people were wrong to think we would stay in the European Union.”
Scarborough then interrupted saying “You said everybody did.” She continued: “The polls in the final days gave the Leave campaign a slight margin and they were right.”
The MSNBC host complained: “But Katty, how could that be when you told me that everybody you knew and the Leave campaign people -- are we not re-writing history here because this is a theme I am hearing – oh there was never a Brexit surprise. Really?!”
Scarborough went further on discussing the most recent polls indicating a closer margin in the polls between Clinton and Trump, indicating that the margin may narrow from 5 percent to 2 to 3 percent right before Election Day. Also, mentioned in the conversation with MSNBC contributor Chris Cilliza was the possibility of a small hidden vote by voters who do never disclose their preference for Trump in public due to concern of social stigmatization. Scarborough referenced the “the latest CNN and the new NBC news Survey Monkey showing a 5-point lead, you keep going in that direction and it ends up being 1 or 2 points - anything is possible.”
“Brexit is a generic idea as opposed to a candidate. I think that comparison is not the same. When you go to polls for Brexit, you are voting on the broad historical sweep, what does it mean for the UK's place in Europe, and Trump, you are voting for a candidate,” stated Cilliza seeking to conclude the conversation on comparisons between the UK referendum and the US election. However he did not consider at all that the Trump phenomenon has created a populist movement in the US which certainly can also be considered a broad historic moment, given the fact that both Trump and Clinton have stated something along the lines that this election is a defining moment for this country.
Here are the excerpts from the October 25th discussion on Morning Joe:
MSNBC’s Morning Joe
10/25/2016
7:07:40 – 7:15:34 AM
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: This presidential election, two weeks left, can you believe it?
Two polls show Donald Trump closer to Hillary Clinton than other recent polls, and the survey monkey online tracking poll shows Clinton with a 5-point lead, 46% to Trump's 41%, and Gary Johnson at 7% and Trump gained 1 point since last Sunday. In a 2-way race, it's 50 to 44. The new CNN/ORC shows Clinton at 49% and in a 4-way race, Trump 5 points behind at 44%. Both candidates gained 2 points since this poll was last conducted which was back on October 2nd, notably before the Access Hollywood tape and the last two debates. Gary Johnson dropped 4 points, and Jill Stein 2 points and in a 2-way race, Clinton has a 6 point advantage in a CNN poll, 51-45.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: The Trump campaign has been saying for a week now that this is going to be America's Brexit. If you got a 13-point lead and you are Hillary Clinton, this is not going to be America's Brexit, even 5 points a little too much, probably, if it’s 2 or 3, then there's that possibility…are the Trump people feeling better about these last two polls tightening up a bit?
ROBERT COSTA: The Brexit theme is an important undercurrent right now within the Trump inner circle, and you have Steve Banon the former head of Breitbart news working closely with Trump and in almost every local interview that Trump is giving when he’s on the stump, he's talking about Brexit because that's how he sees the race, that’s how Bannon sees the race… it's more of a nationalist populist wave that they hope to ride, they think the polls are wrong, they think the media is against them and it's really an ‘us against them’ mentality against globalization --
KATTY KAY: Laughter
COSTA: -- and not really a partisan argument, that's how they see it inside of the campaign, especially Bannon and Trump himself.
SCARBOROUGH: So, Katty Kay, we are going to skip past the video of Donald Trump hugging an American flag.
KAY: Awkward.
SCARBOROUGH: So, what were the polls the last day before Brexit?
KAY: What was interesting was that the polls were close right after Brexit, and in retrospect I think people were wrong to think we would stay in the European Union –
SCARBOROUGH: You said everybody did—
KAY: The polls in the final days gave the Leave campaign a slight margin and they were right.
SCARBOROUGH: But Katty - How could that be when you told me that everybody you knew and the Leave campaign people -- are we not re-writing history here because this is a theme I am hearing – oh there was never a Brexit surprise. Really?
BREZINSKI: O -- ohh
KAY: Ok. So, here's how there was a Brexit surprise, the leave campaign and I spoke to them on the day of the vote - told me we think we are going to lose. Two things happened: Sterling rallied in the days before the vote and the markets rallied in the days before the vote, that gave people - I am not sure why we trust financial markets but in London everybody looks at the markets and they thought the markets had rallied because they thought we were going to stay in the European Union. Clearly – and remember – we had catastrophic polling in the year before that in the general election.
SCARBOROUGH: Oh horrible! You all don’t know how to poll -- you have Shakespeare and the Beatles on your side, but polling not so much.
KAY: You don't have a history of polls being that wrong, so we went into the vote with markets and Sterling rallying and skepticism about the polls because we came out of a general election --
SCARBOROUGH: So Katy, you are telling me all the polls were showing it close.
KAY: No, I think there were some polls -- All the polls were showing it close, yes, all the way through right up until the end – the polls were showing it close and then in the days beforehand --
SCARBOROUGH: What is close?
KAY: One or two points.
BRZEZINSKI: Okay. That's close.
KAY: That was close.
SCARBOROUGH: Which is, by the way, five points, and I don't want anybody to misconstrue what is being said here, five points is a landslide, and four points is a landslide, and especially if you look at a difference between last week there being an eleven, thirteen point gap and this week the latest CNN and the new NBC news survey monkey showing a five-point lead, you keep going in that direction and it ends up being one or two points - anything is possible.
CHRIS CILLIZZA: That's exactly right. I think that if you look at it, what is happening is natural partisanship, adhering on to the electorate. It’s really hard at a presidential level – the most polarized race you have in the country, the most money spent and the most educated electorate about the two candidates and it's hard to win in this environment 52-40. I mean, it's virtually impossible. I think what you are seeing is some basically Republicans getting back in line with Trump to some extent, and the hard thing for him is he has a hard ceiling, in a four-way race and in a two-way race, 43-44 it's not enough. Can I make one Brexit point?
BRZEZINSKI: Please.
CILLIZZA: Brexit is a generic idea as opposed to a candidate. I think that comparison is not the same. When you go to polls for Brexit, you are voting on the broad historical sweep, what does it mean for the UK's place in Europe, and Trump, you are voting for a candidate - it's like would you vote for a third party candidate? Lots and lots of people say yes if that third party candidate is Gary Johnson, that number is lower.
SCARBOROUGH: So, Chris?
CILLIZZA: Yea
SCARBOROUGH: There are some that even helped run Barack Obama's campaign that believe there could be a two to three-point hidden jump for Donald Trump, do you believe? and I am not saying there is, I am not saying there isn’t. Mika, in my experiences over the past year, nobody admits it publicly and then whispers in your ear as you leave the room that yes in fact, they are voting for Trump and it's still happening. Do you think there's possibly one or two point hidden vote for Donald Trump out there, the people that are embarrassed to tell pollsters that the guy that has been on TV for the past week sexually harassing women or insulting them is the guy they will be voting for?
