McLaughlin to Benny Johnson: Trump Voters Still Have the Power to Shock the Media
On Benny Johnson’s show, longtime Trump pollster John McLaughlin rejected the late-cycle gloom and laid out a clear path for Republicans to hold the Senate, keep the House closer than expected, and pull off real upsets—if the voters who backed Trump simply show up tomorrow.
“There’s more Trump voters in America than there are anti-Trump Harris voters,” McLaughlin told Johnson. Democrats believe they have an early-vote advantage “and they don’t want you to vote.” His direct warning: if those Trump voters who have not yet cast a ballot come out, “we might even be able to knock off that socialist Ferguson in Minnesota with Michele Tafoya. That could happen.”
McLaughlin walked Johnson through the numbers that explain why public polls look different from the reality he sees. In July the generic ballot had Democrats ahead by two points. When the same voters were asked if they preferred “a big government socialist Democrat or a free market capitalist Republican,” Republicans surged to a 13-point lead, 49-36. “You had a 15 point flip,” he said. The margin later narrowed as Democrats avoided the contrast, but the underlying preference for free-market Republicans never disappeared.
He pressed the case that Republicans should have defined Democrats earlier on open borders, higher taxes, a weaker military, releasing criminal illegal immigrants, and cashless bail. Candidates such as Abdul El-Sayed, McLaughlin noted, carry “ties to Muslim Brotherhood terrorists.” In Michigan he pointed to African-American voters in Detroit rejecting El-Sayed over support for “transgender men in girls’ sports.” Mike Rogers, he added, “seems to have had a really good week” as those issues finally surfaced.
New York remains in play according to McLaughlin. He cited a Republican poll showing Kathy Hochul at 50 and Bruce Blakeman at 46. “All her ads have been all negative all week long, for the last two months, just attacking Blakeman. She has no record to defend.” Hochul’s embrace by New York City’s radical mayor only sharpens the choice for voters outside the city
When Johnson asked for his crystal ball, McLaughlin was direct. “I think we should hold the Senate, like 52, 53 seats.” He expects to lose North Carolina after resources were pulled, believes the party should be closer to Jon Ossoff in Georgia than most forecasts show, and sees Alaska and Maine as holds. The House will be closer than the media expects, though underfunding left some opportunities behind.
Everything still depends on turnout. “If our voters stay home tomorrow, it’s a bad day. If our voters come out and vote as they should, then the Republicans will be fine.” Returning power to “the guys that shut us down during pandemic… who basically kicked off inflation, who raised energy prices, who cut off oil and gas drilling” would be “a national catastrophe.” His closing line to Johnson’s audience was blunt: “Shame on any Trump voter who stays home. We got to get out.”