Welcome to The Lid, your afternoon dose of the 2016 ethos…Donald Trump on Wednesday said he doesn’t even need commercials given how much earned media he garners. Though we have no polling on it, we have to assume this idea has broader support among swing-state television viewers than anything proposed to date this campaign.
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‘16 from 30,000
Donald Trump’s problems with minority voters have been well documented. But our colleague Dante Chinni notes that white voters may prove to be a significant problem of their own. Specifically, college-educated white people in Midwestern states critical to win the White House. According to our latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, Trump holds a 23-point edge (54-31%) over Hillary Clinton among white, non-Hispanic voters without a college degree. But among white voters with a college degree? He trails Clinton 44 to 43 percent. For comparison, our October 2012 poll found Romney leading Obama 57-36% among whites with a bachelor’s degree and 53-41% among those with a bachelor’s or more. Chinni notes that the white-vote split can have serious implications in November. Populated metro areas near Philadelphia, Columbus, Milwaukee and Detroit have a significant number of college-educated white voters. And those areas have plenty of votes, meaning closer margins would force Trump to find other places to make up for it. It also means Trump’s problems with minority voters won’t matter much if he can’t make up ground with college-educated whites.
POPPING ON NBC POLITICS
- Trump talks about Jeff Sessions as a possible VP pick, but in 2002 he supported the Alabama senator’s opponent, CNBC’s Eamon Javers reports.
- Trump is finally getting some help on the air in battleground states from the National Rifle Association.
- This key group of white voters could doom Donald Trump, Dante Chinni writes.
- Super PACs supporting Trump are struggling to meet their fundraising goals, Leigh Ann Caldwell reports. `
- Hillary Clinton may be more likely to choose a Tim Kaine-ish VP pick but Elizabeth Warren may be the potential pick that would raise the most cash, Alex Seitz-Wald reports.
- A new Pew Research Center study shows an eye-popping difference in how Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are viewed in 15 countries around the world.
- McCain is hitting back at Donald Trump's renewed calls for torture in the aftermath of the deadly terror attack at the Istanbul airport in Turkey.
- Ivanka Trump promised a “convention unlike any we've ever seen.”
- And from First Read: Trump clashes with big business.
FOR THE RECORD…
“I don’t even need commercials, if you want to know the truth.”
-- Donald Trump during a rally in Maine on Wednesday.
