Today on “The Argument,” what do swing voters want from Joe Biden?

I’m Jane Coaston. Earlier this month, New York Times Opinion held a focus group for 14 self-identified independents and moderates.

I’m so excited about this session, because I get a chance not only to talk to a roomful of independents, but you are, by definition, a room full of swing voters as well.

Frank Luntz, a veteran G.O.P. pollster, picked out the participants. And with some help from Deputy Editor of New Times Opinion, Patrick Healy, Frank also led the conversation.

So, my first question is, if I were to ask you—

Frank has done thousands of surveys and focus groups talking to people about their politics.

What would be that word or phrase?

But this group is unique. These are people who voted for Obama in 2012, then Trump in 2016. They don’t align with any one party, and yes, they’re real.

You are dead center of America. Most of you define yourselves as moderates, as well.

So that means, their votes are up for grabs, and both parties want to woo them.

You determine elections. You determine where our country is going to be going. You may not be heard enough, but you’re going to be heard tonight.

And the one thing a lot of people wanted to be heard on, Joe Biden, and how they think he steered the country after one year in the White House.

– Joe Biden is a nice enough guy, but I think there were better, more qualified people.

– I’ll be brutally honest, I think it’s Obama’s third term.

– I have questions about his mental health.

– I think Biden is trying his very best. You know, he’s a nice guy, and sometimes you don’t need a nice guy. You just need someone tough.

Full disclosure, you’ll hear that some of the people in the focus group expressed opinions not rooted in fact. But the moderators job isn’t to argue, or fact check the speakers. It’s to listen. And when I listened to the recording of the focus group, I wanted to know just how much we can learn about the state of the U.S. electorate from such a small sample size. So, I asked Frank Luntz to come on the show and talk me through it. And on a day when D.C. construction was in full swing, he very graciously obliged.

So, I think it’s louder actually in this room. Let me try one more place. How about this?

That actually sounds better.

OK, so I’m in a closet. So, we should start because I will not be able to stand for that long.

Yep, let’s just do it. Frank, thank you so much for being here. First, for an audience that may not know, who are you and what do you do?

Wow, that’ll actually be the hardest question you ask me. I call myself a word guy, and that’s because I listen to what people say. I listen to every single word they communicate. I’m fascinated with the human dynamic, and it’s why I love focus groups. It gives me a chance, not just to hear what people say, but to really understand what they think. And my focus groups are different than anyone else’s, because I’ll challenge people. I’ll get in their face. I’ll actually say to them, I don’t believe that’s the reason. I think there’s something deeper than that. I’ll push, and push, until people tell me unedited, uncensored, unscripted, how they really feel about something. And the challenge right now, is that people are so angry that they all want to speak, but nobody wants to listen.

How do you find and choose the participants?

We use a list of about 120,000 people, who over the last 10 years have volunteered to participate. We pay people to participate. We pay them for their time, and what makes it special, and I think accurate, is I will ask 20 or 25 questions to make sure I’ve got an accurately balanced group by gender, by age, by region of the country, by income, by education, by ethnicity, by ideology. We factor all of these in, to find the people who represent exactly what we’re trying to learn from.

I have a very, very tight definition of who’s an independent. Everyone else will say, if you call yourself an independent, that’s good enough. For me that’s not. They have to pass a screener to prove that they’re not a secret Democrat, or secret Republican. So they can say they’re independent, they can say they vote for an even number of Republicans and Democrats, but if they don’t, if we find that their actual voting history doesn’t back that up, then they don’t qualify.

Why do you think that you are more able to get the truth than a pollster would, or especially a pollster, if you’re polling 20,000 people, what do you think that you’re not getting from 20,000 people, but you might get from 14 people in a room?

You’ll get— you’ll absolutely get the facts, but you won’t get the explanation, you won’t get the justification, you won’t get behind the numbers. And this is the problem with polling right now, this is why so many people got it wrong in 2016 and 2020. They simply reported the numbers, without asking why.

And you cannot just ask why once. You actually have to get at people two or three times to get the underlying factors that really matter in people’s point of view. And with focus groups, it allows me to challenge what people might say to a pollster, but they won’t say to their best friend. I try to become their best friend. I try to become their sibling. I try to become their colleague. Whatever it takes to get the truth out of them.

So, let’s talk a little bit about the specific focus group that you moderated for the New York Times Opinion section, a few weeks ago with a group of, as you said self-identified independents and moderates. What were you hoping to focus on in the conversation?

I wanted to understand why they are among the minority of Americans who haven’t chosen sides.

(SOUND CLIP) Let me ask you, and we’re going to do both political parties, for the Democrats and a word or phrase for the Republicans, we start with the Democrats. Scott, give me a word or phrase to describe the Democrats. – Cohesiveness, anti-hate, calmness.

– Revolutionary.

– Fair.

– Democratic, sometimes too liberal, but together.

– For the Democrats, they’re more like people oriented.

– Sneaky.

– He stole mine.

– Crazy.

– Sweet talkers.

– Chaotic.

– Radical.

– Going toward socialism.

– Smooth talkers.

– Currently intolerant.

OK, now we’re going to go backwards. Give me a word or phrase to describe the Republicans. Jules, you’ll start.

– Very loud.

– They don’t represent everybody.

– I’ll have to regroup.

– Wrong direction? I can’t think of one word.

– Weak.

– Ruthless.

– Inconsistent.

– Uncivil.

– Dishonest and cowardly.

– More business-oriented.

– Arrogant.

– Capitalistic.

– Unnecessarily divisive.

– Chaotic.

These are people who voted for both Barack Obama and Donald Trump. And I know that a lot of your listeners can’t imagine that there’s anyone like that who exists in America. And the good news, is that they’re not as angry at each other. The bad news is that they are very, very hostile to the way things are in America today.

One of the points that becomes immediately clear, is that people do not think the US is in a particularly good place at the moment. And many of the people who participated, think that things are bad, and are getting worse.

– We’ve been promised a lot by past politicians, and it just seems that nothing ever changes.

– It changes, it gets worse. Everyone I know is so despondent, and tired, and confused about the messaging. It’s scary, very scary, and I’m 66. So I feel this is the lowest point in my lifetime.

– The inflation is out of control. The gas prices, out of control. Pandemic is out of control. I mean, everything is bad, and getting worse.

– I hate the fact that kids can’t just be kids anymore. I feel like the P.P.D. is definitely preventing that.

– I mean, this is the first time in my lifetime, that the difference is, there’s just no compromise right now. It’s either you believe this, or you believe that, and there’s really nothing in the middle right now, and that’s what’s causing a lot of the fight and the hatred in this country.

You talked about the economy, you talked about foreign policy, you talked about Covid. And there’s just a lot of pieces of the puzzle, that all add up to people feeling pretty negative. Were you surprised at all by how negative their responses were, or did this mirror what you were thinking people might say coming into it?

Everyone feels negative right now. If you’re on the left, you think that Donald Trump is still an influence, a bad one on American society. If you’re on the right, you think that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are doing a bad job in Washington.

If you’re on the left, you’re thinking about social justice and equality. If you’re on the right you’re thinking about democracy and freedom. We all have something that makes us agitated and angry, and I was hoping that because they were independents, because they voted for both sides of the political equation, they would be much more hopeful, because they would see advantages on both sides.

What I realized, and the most important finding of this group, is that in fact, independents are simple rejectors. They reject both the left and the right. They reject the past president and the current president, and in some ways, they’re actually even more negative, because they don’t see a way out. They don’t see either side as being the answer to the challenges facing the country. And that means that they’re pretty down on the future.

There are a couple of issues that I want to talk about that came up a handful of times in the conversation. And one prevalent theme was the fragility of two important aspects of how our country works. Our democracy, such as people see it here, and the economy.

– My husband was laid off twice since this all started, and we missed house payments, and now constantly inside, I’m stressed out waiting for it to happen again. Getting laid off, and the economy being all over, then he talked about supply chain stuff, and I think that, I could use a little more assurance with, and plans, instead of just a lot of shrugging, and saying that things are better than they are, is really frustrating.

Who’s saying that they’re better than they are?

– Jen Psaki, for one. Media, and also people on Twitter, so, if you ever look at Twitter that’s just crazy. – And the democracy is more concerning. I mean, you see you have the Democrats in power. They seem to be wanting to change the rules. Got too many conservatives on the Supreme Court. Oh, let’s pack the Supreme Court. So those kind of things are concerning. There’s just this effort to perpetuate those that are in power.

– I don’t want to be the one to be in a shelter because I work for one on the weekend. A women’s shelter. I don’t want to become that client.

Do you live paycheck to paycheck?

– Yes.

Are people in your focus groups usually focused on the economy as much? And when I say economy, what does that term mean to the people who participate in your focus groups?

This is why the issue of inflation, as much as you talk about it on the pages of the New York Times and in our conversations with others, why it’s still underreported and underdiscussed because inflation affects everyone. And it’s not inflation. It’s rising prices, rising costs. And that’s why I emphasize not economic concerns, quality of life concerns. Inflation means you don’t get to eat out as much as you want to. You don’t get to drive as much as you want to. Inflation to them is about paying more and getting less. And not just goods and services, but getting less out of life.

– It’s the cost of everyday products my grocery bill is through the roof.

– My own personal security feels threatened by the inflation.

– I’ve had Covid multiple times. And I’m concerned with that, but inflation is hitting us every day in our pockets and everything that we do.

And you combine the impact of inflation with the polarization of the country and a feeling that things are just getting worse. They look at their day to day lives, and they just think that the future is going to be as bad, if not worse, than the present.

So the group that you spoke with was a group of centrists, which is the exact group that I think that when Joe Biden won the Democratic nomination, he was the exact person picked to most appeal to centrists. But they described him using a pretty broad spectrum of terms.

– Just calmness.

– Pathetic.

– Out of touch.

– Incoherent.

– Reasonable.

– Pathetic.

– Clueless.

– Detached.

– I’m going to go with calmness.

– Complete disaster.

– Spaced out.

– A puppet.

I’ve heard the puppet claims before, and a lot of what people said about Joe Biden, how they thought about him, I feel like I was pretty familiar with. But what do you think these answers tell you?

It tells me that there’s a hope that he will do better. And what I heard in the conversation about him was real disappointment, that he wasn’t the same man as president as he was as a candidate for president, that he’s disappointed them, that he’s let them down. And I want to emphasize with the previous president, it was about anger or love. You either love Trump or hated him. That’s not the same with Joe Biden.

The people who were disappointed in him don’t hate him. He still has an opportunity to win people over. He still has an opportunity to transcend ideology, to transcend politics. But they look at their day-to-day lives and they don’t think that he’s helping them at all. And I’m listening every moment of the 90 minutes we had with them to hear something they embrace. Here’s something that they endorse, something that they support.

And I’d say if you did a content analysis, 75 minutes of the 90 were spent complaining and only 15 minutes were spent in support of anything. These people sounded tired. And it wasn’t the time that we did it at night. They’re just physically, intellectually, emotionally tired from the last two years. Covid never seems to end. Prices seem to get out of control. Shortages, a lot of them mentioned issues of crime. In fact, crime is more commonly mentioned than any other issue.

– You’re not even safe to walk around and go to the train station because somebody might throw you off the train. OK? Somebody’s going to try to take what you have in your pocket.

– Because I’ve had my bike stolen here in Austin, Texas in a very gentrified neighborhood four different times in the last seven, eight months. I mean, it’s just like people are chaotic.

How many of you think that the level of crime is up in America today versus a year ago? Raise your hands if you think it’s up.

OK. Almost all of you.

– Absolutely. – Well, at least we’re hearing about it more. So, I don’t know. That’s the question. Is it perception or is it reality?

– Reality.

– Reality.

– Reality.

– The numbers speak for themselves. I live downtown Chicago. I’m sure you’ve heard on the news what’s been happening here, last couple of years. And it’s still going on. The crime in Chicago is completely out of control.

– I think that it’s common sense when you’re trying to defund the police, that you take away from their budgets, and the numbers go down. And logically, the crime is going to go up. – It’s going to go up. Yeah.

The focus early on about crime, they brought it up. It was not in the moderator’s guide. It was not part of the expected conversation I was going to have with them. And their personal fear— not about somebody else but about themselves— their level of insecurity right now, I haven’t heard that since I was polling in New York in the 1990s, early 1990s. And that tells me that the whole issue of public safety is not going away.

One of the questions that you asked them was politicians didn’t understand about their lives. And that turned into, what would you tell your politicians right now?

– I don’t care about Covid anymore. I want my kids to have a regular life. I don’t want them masked. I don’t want them social distancing. I do not worry about them getting sick.

– Term limits have got to be established.

– Career politicians have to go. Sorry.

– What I would tell the politicians is that you need to come in, just provide a lot more opportunities for people who are suffering in the economy. I definitely think that’s a major thing down here especially. And it would definitely help them out a lot.

– We need stimulus checks. This economy is absolutely terrible. Help the people that you say that are in need and stop BS-ing us.

– I need one of yous to saddle me with at least two weeks, two to three weeks, from paycheck to paycheck. Part of your job is going to Congress and then talking to those politicians about your focus groups. What are you telling them?

I’m telling them that they’re really, really unpopular. I’m telling them everything that their staffs are not. And, by the way, it’s making them angry. Everyone is looking for support and nobody is looking for an explanation why voters feel that the way that they do. So I’ve left a number of presentations explaining how Americans feel to a very unhappy audience who simply care about elections rather than voter satisfaction.

Right. Because? I wonder and I’d be curious to your thoughts—

Can you hold on one second? I got to plug in because this is—

Oh, absolutely.

You stay, I’m going to take off my headphones. Sorry.

It’s OK.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Earlier this month in our episode about the future of the G.O.P., I asked Republican voters to call in about how they’re feeling about their party right now.

– My issue is, as a Republican, that the Republican Party will not accept what happened in the 2020 election. It makes the party look bad, like a bunch of losers who cannot accept defeat.

And this week, I want to hear from Democrats. Where would you like to see the party go in the coming years? What issues are most important to you? Do you want to see Joe Biden on the Democratic ticket in 2024? And either way, who do you see as the future of the Democratic Party? Leave me a message at 347-915-4324 and we’ll share some of your responses in a future episode.

Today, I’m talking with focus group expert Frank Luntz whose computer started dying halfway through our interview. He grabbed a computer charger.

Got it.

And we got back into it.

We were talking a little bit about, you were talking to politicians and how they just get mad at you. I’m curious because I think that there are voter priorities, and there are political priorities. And I’m interested in when you talk to people about the politicians who represent them, whether at the local, state or federal level, do they feel as if they’re being heard at all?

We surveyed this, and the independents in the focus group confirmed it. Their voters feel ignored, disrespected, in some cases, betrayed. Hell hath no fury like a voter scorned.

– I’m so tired of them. They’re not civil. They don’t listen. They just get in Washington and then they’re, you know, doing what everybody else wants them to do, not the people who voted for them.

But I think the greatest challenge is the disconnect in priorities. And the best example of this— there was simply no interest in January 6.

– I also did not think that January 6 was remotely the disaster that it’s being made out to be.

How many of you would say that January 6 is your least important issue? Three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13 of you. OK. I get it. Patrick?

How concerned are you that, in the next presidential election, there will be some kind of attempt to undermine the election attempt to change the outcome of the election, violence? Or are you not concerned about that? – No, I’m not worried. I think that rioting has become just commonplace now, apparently.

– I’m not concerned the United States know how to lock things down.

The interest was economic. The interest was quality of life. The interest was personal safety. And I tend to listen to what voters tell me. Whether or not I agree with it doesn’t matter. If I’m to do my job as an oracle of the voice of the public, I have to report it honestly, faithfully, and I have to be prepared for politicians to get angry with me.

I do a lot of shows with people who have thought a lot about particular issues. And they believe that if things were more like the way that they want them to be, things would be better. How do you think that people in my position or people in these positions of cultural, political, social power can do more to listen to what voters say? I think that there’s been a lot recently of people like, oh, voters want populism. And I’m like, Do they? Voters want x. Do they? There’s a lack of listening because I think that there’s a sense that voters don’t really know what they want.

My friends, about 70 percent of them, maybe 75 percent— I’ll tell you, my 20 closest friends, 75 percent of them voted for Joe Biden. What percentage of your 20 closest friends voted for Donald Trump?

20 closest friends? I would say, honestly, zero. And I include that among people I’m good friends with who are Republicans because they are the type of Republicans who were turned off by Donald Trump. I know several people who didn’t vote.

And that’s the challenge.

Right.

That we tend to surround ourselves— that the Donald Trump voters weren’t in New York or Washington DC or Los Angeles. The Trump voters were in places that so many of the elite don’t go to, in states that so many of the elites have never visited before. And so I’m not surprised that there’s this disconnect. That’s why pollsters and focus group moderators and people who share public opinion of such an amazing responsibility— and we better do it correctly.

So many people told me, “I don’t know a single person who voted for Donald Trump.” And my response is always, “And that’s the problem.” The whole idea that, I’m going to write you off out of my life because I disagree with you, that is also one of the frightening trends that’s happening in America today.

What would constitute disagreement? Because I’ll say personally, like um, I had a friend— or I thought was a friend— a couple of years ago who seemed to not really recognize that I was not white, and they made an extremely racist comment in front of me. And I was like, you know what? That’s it, we’re done. Goodbye. When we come to this subject, there’s often the idea of canceling people for their viewpoints. But we all have the right to not associate with someone whose viewpoints we find abhorrent.

How do you think that we can bridge the gap between just disregarding people whose views we don’t like, and then also having the right to say, I don’t have to be friends with you or talk to you if what you want to say to me is derogatory to me or my family or who I am?

So my first— I’ve been through the same situation you’ve— I’m Jewish, and I’ve had people say anti-Semitic stuff to me. And I’m shocked. But instead of saying, go away from me, I want to understand what’s the genesis of that comment. I want them to learn from me the reaction to that. Try to understand what in their life brought them to that point of view. Try to understand why they would say it to me, looking at me, knowing what my religion is. Try to understand that there’s a better approach to this. I actually look at that as a teaching moment rather than a dismissal moment. And that’s why these focus groups, for me, are so rewarding.

You asked the group that you spoke with how they plan to vote in the November midterm elections.

Who are you going to vote for Congress in November? How many of you say the Democrats? Raise your hands. Three, four, five. Who’s going to vote Republican in November? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight.

– It only makes sense. We already have Democratic president. We got to have Republican have Congress at least, please, to balance it out now.

– Yup.

– Absolutely. Explain why. – I disagree about the balance. I just want to send a message. I think the Democratic party is nuts at the moment. And the only way I can send that message is with my vote.

– I believe in balance of power.

– Yeah. The progressives have taken over the Democratic party.

Anyone else want to explain your vote for the House?

– It’s gotten too extreme. I mean, that’s what it is. It’s just way too far left, and less moderates is I think, damaging as a whole. So, got to balance it out.

– Well, if Republicans take over the House, you’re going to have more gridlock, which is what we’ve had in this country for the last 50 years anyway.

Now with the note that midterm elections generally are lower turnout— except in 2018, because everyone was mad then in a different kind of way— what do you think are going to be the big issues for voters when it comes to electing new members of Congress or deciding whether or not to send their same member of Congress back to D.C.?

Based on these focus groups, I think it’s going to be an economic decision rather than a political decision. And it’s not going to be an embrace of the Republican Party. It’s going to be to send a message about the Democratic Party. To be clear, I heard nothing that would make Republicans feel good about what they’ve said or what they’ve done over the last year. But if I’m a Democrat, I’d be scared to death about what they had to say because they’re really unhappy with the condition of the country. And even if they don’t blame Joe Biden, they believe that he doesn’t have the answers to fix it. And now they’re questioning whether he can do it.

So what would you tell someone who’s seeking your advice right now— a politician, for example— who wants to appeal to voters who ask them to fix the thing, but they also look at what they can actually do and they’re saying like, I want to fix the things, but I can’t fix the things, what do I do? How do I talk to voters about this in a way that really makes sense to them?

I would— and I’m going to do this for Joe Biden— if I were advising Joe Biden right now, I would tell him to engage in the conversation with the American people. We appreciate honesty. As a population, we appreciate candor. And I would have him come forward and say, look, one year ago today, this is what I expected, this is what I wanted, this is what we achieved, and this is where we failed. And the problem is political advisors are always telling their candidates, never acknowledge failure because it’s going to be turned against you. Because Joe Biden is personally popular, personally respected, to have this conversation of candor and honesty— don’t tell people that inflation is transitory when they can’t afford to buy meat. Don’t tell people that the economy is strong when they literally cannot put enough gas in their car. Because that’s what makes them angry, and that’s what causes them to vote against you.

– I’m really— I really respect Joe Manchin in the Democratic Party because he has seemed to hold tight to some sort of beliefs that aren’t on the party line. OK. I’m going to ask you a question that’s not been on our script. I’m going completely rogue here. If there is an election for president tomorrow and the candidates were Joe Biden the Democrat, Donald Trump the Republican, and Joe Manchin the independent, who would you choose? Who would choose? Trump? Raise your hands. One, two. Only two of you. Three of you. Four of you. Who would choose Biden? One, two, three, four of you. Who would choose Joe Manchin? One, two, three, four, five of you. – God, we’re so divided.

Ask me if I’m hopeful for the country.

Are you hopeful for the country, Frank?

I am not. I am not, and the more that I listen, the more that I hear, the more that I understand, the more frightened I get. I will tell you that we are on a razor’s edge right now. That it’s not that it’s a powder keg. It’s not that we’re about to erupt with violence on the streets. But we are reaching the point where we simply turn off the T.V., stop reading the newspaper, stop collecting any information, and shut it all off. And once we do that, the future of our democracy will truly be in peril.

Frank, thank you so much. This has been really helpful. It’s been sobering. And I really appreciate your work and your time spent in a closet for us.

Well, it was a privilege to have this opportunity. I am grateful.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Frank Luntz is a veteran Republican pollster and a political and communications consultant. New York Times Opinion has published an edited transcript and audio of Frank’s focus group online. You can find the link to it in our episode notes. We’ll also link to the other focus groups published in Opinion with Democratic and Republican voters reflecting on January 6 one year later. It’s all part of the Times Opinion series, “America In Focus,” exploring what voters think about the country, especially people who often feel voiceless in the national conversation.

“The Argument” is the production of New York Times Opinion. It’s produced by Phoebe Lett, Elisa Gutierrez, and Vishakha Darbha, edited by Alison Bruzek and Anabel Bacon, with original sound and music designed by Isaac Jones, engineering by Carole Sabouraud, fact checking by Kate Sinclair and Mary Marge Locker, audience strategy by Shannon Busta. Our executive producer is Irene Noguchi. Special thanks this week to Kristin Lin and Kristina Samulewski.

[MUSIC PLAYING]