Whit Ayres, March 5

Whit Ayres’ comments to CNN regarding Donald Trump’s position as a quasi-incumbent:

Veteran GOP pollster Whit Ayres said the primaries have shown that Republican voters are viewing Trump, in effect, as an incumbent president to a greater extent than the other candidates expected. Trump is trying to become the first defeated incumbent to win a rematch four years later against the man who ousted him from the White House since Democrat Grover Cleveland beat Republican Benjamin Harrison in 1892. Trump “is running as a quasi-incumbent,” Ayres said. To understand his dominance, Ayres continued, “What we really need are entrance polls and exit polls from the 1892 Democratic coalition for Grover Cleveland. That’s the analogy: a former president running again to defeat the guy who beat him.”

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