New polling data fro the campaign trail, with veteran Michigan pollster Richard Czuba, joining the conversation.

So sit in with us as we get the inside out.

Off the Record.

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And now this edition of Off the Record with Tim Skubick.. Thank you very much.

Welcome to another editio of Off the Record on this date of memory o what happened to nine over 11.

As we pause for just a second to remember those folks in the lives who were lost.

All right, let's talk about the polling data.

We've got some new stuff out this week.

Remington by the way, welcome to the off the record table.

Nice to have you on board.

What was your lead out of all those numbers?

There were a ton of them.

It was a buffet poll.

There you go.

Yeah.

Nicely done.

Something for everybody that you can read into.

Obviously, El-Sayed does not want to see in the Senate race that he's down, but, he is up from where he was in the last Glengariff poll.

I mean, Mike Rogers was doing ten, double digit points above El-Sayed, right before the primary.

But if you're Rogers, you like to see yourself up in at least one poll.

What, the thing that struck me is a lot of ties.

Okay.

Within the margin of error.

Right?

Yeah.

There were a lot of statistical ties, folks who were within four points of each other.

And that's the margin of error that was that was available in the poll.

So I think it was a sig that it's going to be a pretty brutal campaign season because nobody feels that they're out of the count just yet.

And, the numbers seem to indicate they aren't too.

And I also wonder if voters are paying too much attention just yet to the race.

Of course, the US Senate races taking up a lot of oxygen in the room.

And I think those down ballot statewide races are going to be really fighting for air over the next couple of months to to break through that complete monopoly on attention right now.

I guess what struck me is that the poll results, verified what we saw from Abu Camara a couple of weeks ago, that Donald Trump's approval rating is as low as it's ever been, ever.

First term.

This term.

He's never been this low.

And that just can't be good for Republicans.

And it can't be good for people who are serving and people who are in powe at the moment, because it just it feels like the public just doesn't trust the people who are in charge right now.

And that's not good for establishment.

It's not good for whoever's existing in government.

It's not good for the for the structure.

35% he had I think EPIC-MRA had him at 31%.

Just bad numbers.

But can you win a campaign by saying just Donald Trump is bad and therefore vote for us, for us because we're Democrats?

I don't think so.

I mean, Donald Trump is running at a dead a deficit polling wise, but I think voters are smarter than we give them credit for.

They do care about the issues.

I mean they are looking at the economy and they are separating that from Trump in many ways.

They think the economy is, to a whole host of things.

They are looking at issues when it comes to the war and all of these facets.

They are looking at these issues and they don't necessarily look through a Trump lens every time that they see these issues.

But I think that it doesn't help, any of the Republicans that this deficit exists.

Is there a chance that the Ds overplayed the trump card, if you'll pardon the pun?

Well, I think that' what happening in 2024, right?

That they were criticize pretty roundly, that they focus too much on Trump and didn' offer a vision for the future.

I think this time around, they say they've learned their lesson.

They're putting they're putting forward some messaging on the economy.

But I don't kno that it's landed in any kind of in any kind of visible way with people.

I mean, we were just talking before the program started about how there's really a lack of messagin from a lot of the candidates out there is just basically it's don't vote for the other guy.

If I ask you to put in one sentence what the Democratic message is you'd be struggling with that?

Yeah.

What is what is the major issue in this campaign?

I mean, if you look at 22, it was about abortion, 2018, it was fix the damn roads.

If you look at the candidates that we have right now, I can tell you Abdu El-Sayed is about getting money out of or getting money out of politics, money in your pocket and Medicare for all.

That's the only one I know.

I couldn't tell you what Mike Rogers is big, you know, card messages.

I don't know what.

Benson's messages.

I don't know what John James is message is.

What is their vision?

What are they going to do for the state?

I feel like we're kind of fumbling around right now on what that is because I don't know what it is.

Well, John James was in town, on campus, and we were there yesterday, and, he took on the socialism thing, tried to lump her in with El-Sayed.

I mean, if you look at Jocelyn Benson's record, it's it's not necessarily a socialistic record.

She's a pretty standard Democrat in many ways towards the progressive end of the party, but I don't know if that sticks for voters calling her a socialist, especially when you have someone on the ballot like Abdul El-Sayed who is closer to a socialist than, in least in voter's eyes, than Jocelyn Benson is.

Well, he said, that was one of the things where she is a socialist is on taxation.

And last time I checked, she' not calling for a tax increase.

Or did I miss something?

Has she?

She's called for tax cuts.

Which is sort of the opposite of socialism, isn't it?

If you're if you're saying the government is taking all your money?

It's the best thing the Republicans got right now is trying to go after, or connecting Democrats to Hasan Piker.

But you really can't do that with Jocelyn Benson.

She's never appeared with him.

She's never endorsed him.

She doesn't even like to appear on stage with Abdul El-Sayed for crying out loud.

I mean, but the best they go is to try and connect it to that brand, and I don't.

I think that may be a bridg too far.

Maybe it's not.

Maybe.

Maybe voters make will make that connection but it's a harder one to sell.

And it actually, the fac that, the Republicans went there at least ignited some fire in what I think has been an otherwis sleepy gubernatorial campaign.

I also think there's a bit of a disconnect on the socialist message.

Like, I think people of a certain generation understand what it means, understands historically what it means.

And I think a younger generation sees it as something completely different or sees it as is, like a change element and not necessarily something that has a long history.

And even with this poll, we called some of the poll participants in the ones who I spoke with who were saying, yeah, lik I lean socialist, that's the way I lean, and it's not an evil word to them.

It's not something where there is.

I feel like Republicans are trying to make it that, and I don't know that it's connecting with voters right now.

Then you got to use the word communist, okay?

Does that does that raise your you know, you're brain?

Oh no, communist.

Goodness gracious.

But but again, that may just be a bridge too far because what is what is that Abdul El-Sayed or any Democrat saying that is communist?

I mean, what we think of in Communist is this failed experiment in Russia where the government took over everything.

Is that really what anybody's talking about?

I mean, can you really make that claim?

Well, I, I do think we should point out, I mean, the, the Democratic candidate for the seventh Congressional District, I mean, he's probably the closest to a socialist we've seen.

He let his DSA membership lapse just in July, right before the primary.

So I do think there are some with with some pretty left leaning policies right now.

But yeah, I mean, whether or not people connect it to those historical failures, I don't know that they do.

But we do know for sure that one thing is connecting is data centers.

Let's take a look.

The so-called Nimby syndrome has overtaken this issue of data centers in Michigan.

And as citizens turned voters are shouting, not in my backyard!

However, many office seekers hoping to win those voters who are against it are coming out against the projects to, for obvious reasons, veteran Michigan pollster Bernie Porn has discovered that no matter where you look in the voting population, not one single group supports data centers.

Mr.

Porn tested over 40 voting subcategories, and he found substantial opposition everywhere, regardless of education status, regardless of political affiliation.

70% of Democrats oppose it, 56% of Republicans oppose, regardless of gender or age or education level, regardless of anything.

There's no support.

Even regardless of where you live, there is not 50% support in any of these categories.

There isn't anybod who is supporting data centers?

No.

And in fact, I read an article a couple days ago where Democrats look at thi as Kryptonite for Republicans.

That's because President Trum strongly supports data centers.

Meanwhile, Democratic candidate for the U.S.

Senate, Abdul El-Sayed, knows that thousands of union jobs are being created with these projects.

So while he opposes the Selen project, he does want to impose restrictions on future project that could lead to construction of more data centers down the road.

However, Republican U.S.

Senate candidate Mike Rogers favors a one yea moratorium on new construction.

Given that rank and file union members oppose data centers despite the creation of jobs, the pollster thinks doctor El-Sayed and union leaders, well, maybe they ought to rethink their support.

He might want to rethink his position on, and, data centers, union members themselves.

The leaders probably need to look at their own, membership, because in Michigan, you have, union members that, are against them.

Tom Leonard of the group Climate Power commissioned this poll in his fight to block data centers from multiplying.

Right now, there are over 4 with 26 in the planning stages.

So, if you're a politician out there running for a House seat, you're against data centers, right?

Yes.

On on the most part, I mean, for for people running for office right now it is an incredibly toxic issue.

I mean, if you go to any town meeting where there is even the hint of a data center.

I used to work up in the Bi Rapids area, there was no plan, for data center up there, but there are these moratoriums that they're just putting in place ahead of tim before one could even come in.

So they and everybody's so animated.

And like that said you know, it's across the aisle, no matter who you talk to, it's age, it's party, and it's location from cities to counties to anywhere in between.

But then you have the governor saying, well, the data centers are jobs?

Yeah, yeah.

She's saying that, you know.

Yeah I get it.

This is another, this is another one of those issues, though, where we're not seeing any separation, really.

I mean, Jocelyn Benson, John James, they're almost in the exact same spot on these.

I mean, really, the only question is, do we repeal the use and sales tax exemption that the legislatur gave them a couple of years ago?

Maybe that's the only bit of daylight, but the, the folks who are run for office have found a way, even if they support dat centers, to message it in a way that we are protecting communities, they've embraced that there are environmental concerns, there's noise concerns, there's placement concerns.

Where are we going to place these things?

So even if you want the thing even if you're okay with them, you found a way to to listen t what people are concerned about and tailor a position.

So it makes it sound like you're at least listening to people.

But is it a moratorium, unilateral disarmamen for a year while everybody else around us, sucks all these jobs in?

Yeah, I mean that that is what they say.

The threat is, is that if Michigan doesn't hop on board, that they'll miss the train.

But I think what people are ignoring is that this is this is a train that's been going off the tracks for a while.

Right.

You've had people upse about large business incentives and large businesses being forced upon their community for a long time, data centers aside, they've been uncomfortable with tha in Michigan for several years.

And then you have discomfort with the with the level and the speed at which AI is advancing.

And then you also have a, distrus with Big Tech and its presence in, in everyone's lives for, for so long.

So I think you have all of those kind of jammed together and, and it's difficult for politicians to address all of those concerns with a single policy except to say, let's do a moratorium.

Let's just pause it.

Let's figure this out.

To Beth's point.

I mean, if we talk about, you know, the candidates not being too far off on data centers, let's go to economic development.

I mean, they're not too far off on that either.

I mean, the MEDC nobody wants to keep it the way it is at the moment.

I spoke about Big Rapids earlier.

Goshen, that still looms large and how that went down.

And this is you see this in other parts of the state with whether it's a data center whether it's a battery storage place or whether it's, you know, a wind farm or a solar farm.

These big developments and the ta incentives are very unpopular.

All issues are local.

And this one is.

Yeah.

But if you take a look at data centers, just in general, how many data centers do we have in Michigan?

We are about 40.

40, 40.

44.

And then how many are in the pipeline like 10?

15?

About 20.

I mean, so we've already we'v already developed data centers.

As much as, you know, we're well beyond, the bump on this.

And we're only talking really about a few projects at this point.

If you wanted data centers moved to Texas, half of the state are our data centers.

Good stuff.

Let's call in our gues today, pollster Richard Czuba.

Richard, welcome to Off the Record.

Nice to see you again.

So I always love to ask pollsters this question.

You guys sifting numbers all the time.

So as you sifted through all of these numbers, what gave you pause and said, oh my goodness, I didn't know this was going on?

I think one of the thing that shocking me is the degree to which young Democrat are motivated to vote right now.

Republicans face this huge red flag heading into the election of a ten point difference in motivation.

We have strong Democrats at 94% saying they're definitely voting, strong Democrat, or strong Republicans at only 84%.

So I wanted to take a bigger look into that.

And if you are a Democrat under the age of 30, 83 say they are definitely voting.

But you are a Republican under the age of 30.

Only 41 say they are definitely voting.

But you've watched the conduct of younger voters before, and it gets a little squishy as it goes to Election Day, you know, okay, I know I got to do this, but then something else comes up, you know, like I got a hot date or whatever.

And, you know, can this number change?

Sure, it can change.

But I'll tell you, the Democrats have put together a ticket that I think covers the broad spectrum of their big tent.

Abdul El-Sayed is very motivating to those young voters those young Democratic voters.

We saw it in the primary.

I think we're going to see it again.

Republicans, everything they're doing right now, this convention in Texas is about motivating their base, and they should be motivating their base.

But the problem is they're motivating MAGA, which is already motivated.

They need to be motivating more regular Republicans.

Richard, I had a question on as far as where Republicans ar right now, how would you compare their enthusiasm to 2024, 2022, 2020?

I think they are below all three of those elections right now, to be honest.

When we look at that, are you definitely voting or probably voting.

We've never seen a ten point difference in the last four elections going back to 2018 even.

In Republicans and Democrats.

And it's, again, those Republicans, frankly, under the age of 50 who are bearing the brunt of costs right now, who are particularly disinterested in voting.

They're just kind of like, meh, this was all supposed to change.

Nothing changed.

And they're not very excited about voting right now.

And that's where Republican have to focus their attention.

What do you think changed from the poll that you conducted before the primary to now in the US Senate race?

I mean, Roger's up double digits, no It's within the margin of error.

Abdul El-Sayed won the primary.

That's what changed.

And what we're seeing in these numbers is he does not have any significant problems in galvanizing Democratic voters, where his problem continues to be, as far as we're seeing, it continues to be with independent voters.

Mike Rogers is leadin with those independent voters.

They make the decisions in Michigan.

But I will say if, in fact, more Democrats turnout than Republicans if there's greater motivation, Abdul El-Sayed can absolutely overcome, his problems with independents by turning out more Democrats, specifically, more young Democrats who are unreliable voters.

Richard, what do you think callin some of these poll participants?

It was difficult to find many who knew who was running for secretary of state, who is running for attorney general, even some of the the their answers on the gubernatorial race were sort of like, well, I guess this person I'm leaning towards that.

Those candidates what do they have to do to break past the Senate race, or is it possible for them just to ride the coattails all the way to Election Day?

Well, the reality is none of them have the resources to break through the clutter and the din of this U.S.

Senate race.

I mean, I apologize to Michigan voters, but my God, you're just beginning to see the spending in this race.

It is going to continue clear through Election Day.

I don't know who has the money to compete against that.

And the reality is, we have to be very clear.

Donald Trum is the center of this election.

He wants to be the center of this election.

I don't think other Republicans want him to be the center of this election, because his numbers in Michigan are atrocious, and his job approval at 35 is actually his highest number.

His economic number falls to 33.

His number on Canadian tariffs falls to 29.

His numbers on Iran war fall to 26.

They just get worse.

And so if Trump is the center of this campaign, Republicans are in trouble.

I think Mike Rogers is trying to make Abdul El-Sayed at the center of this campaign by othering him right now.

And I don't know that that's going to be enough because you asked earlier what is this campaign about?

It is about costs, and it is about the powerlessness of voters.

They feel they don't have power in this conversation anymore and they want to retake that power.

Did you get a sense of tha lack of power is the reason why you got what you got in regard to proposal one and the Constitutional Convention?

Well, boy, there are some big red flags on con con here.. We have this at 47% support to 32%.

Oppose the rest.

Undecided.

When I pulled the numbers from 2010 that we did for the Detroit News, WDIV, it was at 35% support, 39% opposed.

We hit that yes vote very close in Decembe or in September in the polling.

If that continues, that indicates this could be a very close race on con con.

And it's Democrats and centrists who are most likel to vote for it, not Republicans.

And I think there was a concern that it would be Republicans who would want to cause the disruption.

I think Democrats need to step up the messaging, to their own voters to tell them how dangerous con con would be to what they value.

Do you do you feel like people are supporting it because they they just want change and they want, or do you think they don't fully understand what it is at this point?

Well, you know look at the wording of con con.

And that last sentence essentially says it would go before the voters for final approval.

Voters want final approval of everything.

Right now, we're seeing thi in the data center conversation that you talked about earlier.

Voters feel like it' being rammed down their throat.

So anything that says we get control, we get to run the show gets their support.

Voters, the conversation with voters needs to be it's not what's going to happen if you have a constitutional convention.

The $5,000 thing.

What do you think?

Well I think everybody, Republicans, Democrats, independents, understand that it's pretty much an empty promise.

I don't think, you know, I don't think anybody's seen tariff dividends.

I don't think anybody has seen Doge dividends, in checks.

So this is just one more thing.

I think that as we look at this campaign, it is costs we have to pay attention to.

And we don't see, Democrats yet with a clear plan to address costs.

And when we talk about frustratio and powerlessness of the voters, we are having the same conversation.

Two years ago.

Voters penalize Democrat because of costs and inflation.

Here we are two years later, having the same conversation.

And voters appear to be penalizing Republicans.

You know, we talk about these polls a second, really big red flag for the Republicans is when you look at undecideds in this race, and there's about 9.5% undecided in both races.

80% of them disapprove of Donald Trump.

That' a huge red flag for Republicans.

And I'm not sure how you overcome that, because if voters go the way they're going, you know, Benson and Sayed are winning El-Sayed are winnin 71% of the disapprovers, James and Rogers are winning, what, 83 to 90% of the approvers.

If that pattern continues, Republicans are in trouble.

They've got to find a way to break that pattern.

Do you think that, the Democrats attempt to tie these Republicans at all levels of the ballot to Donald Trump is working?

I think it is.

I don't think it's it.

We haven't seen the final result yet because we have those undecideds out there.

But I think one issue that plays particularly uniquely in Michigan is the Canadian trade issue.

I think that is one that sticks out, because it so impacts Michigan.

It impacts everybody talk about manufacturing and autos.

But it's devastating to the farmers in Michigan.

The Canadian trade war is devastating to tourism in Michigan.

And those are our top three industries.

And I just want to step back a second here and provide a little context on this issue in particular, as Tim, yo said at the start of the show, at this very hou that we're taping 25 years ago, the first plane flew into the World Trade Center, and we all saw that it was Canadians who came to our assistance.

And Michigan knows Canadians and Michigan relies on our Canadian neighbors.

And so, 25 years later we're in this inexplicable trade war with Canada amidst threat from Russia and China and Iran.

And it makes no sense to voters in Michigan because these are our allies and our friends.

You bring up one of the oh, pardon me, just I was going to sa one of the one of the key things we hear right now in focus groups with voters is 25 years ago, they asked the question, what's happening to us?

They're asking that same question, but it's what's happening to us, what's happening to us as Americans.

And this Canadian trade issue goes to the very core of that conversation.

And you bring up the September 11th terror attacks.

This has become an issue in both, the US Senate race and now the governor's race.

I don't know if this is anything you heard there through your polling or, is that attack line working?

You know, Jame is trying to capitalize on it, tying Benson to it, but is it working in the Senate race?

I, I think this is part of an overall effort by the Republicans to, as I said, other Abdul El-Sayed.

He is Muslim.

He has a middle eastern background.

So they are just goin to make him different from that, try to make him different from everybody else.

I think it is having limited impact because in the end, voters are going to make this decision on the economy and they are going to mak this decision on whether or not they have power in the conversation.

I think it's going to I think it plays to Republicans, bu Republicans are already there.

And if we see an increased surge in youth vote, particularly of Democrats, that's absolutel to Abdul El-Sayeds advantage.

Mr.

Czuba, always great to have you on.

And Off the Record.

Send me the bill.

Okay.

Great to be here.

Good to see you.

Also.

Our thanks to everybody.

And have a nice weekend for see you for more Off the Record next week.

Okay.

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