Gabe Lenz
@gabelenz.bsky.social
Professor of Political Science at UC Berkeley
The follow-the-leader tendency is largest for WHO membership. Among Trumpers who supported membership in Aug. 2020, and who never learned Trump’s stance on it, support remained near 100% after the election. By contrast, among those who learned Trump’s stance, support fell to 45%.
July 11, 2025 at 5:27 PM
The follow-the-leader tendency is largest for WHO membership. Among Trumpers who supported membership in Aug. 2020, and who never learned Trump’s stance on it, support remained near 100% after the election. By contrast, among those who learned Trump’s stance, support fell to 45%.
Did those voters defect when they learned? Since so few learned Trump’s stance, we lack the power to shed much light on this question, and it’s a hard causal one. Nevertheless, we don’t see much sign of defection among those who realized they were out of line with Trump.
July 11, 2025 at 5:25 PM
Did those voters defect when they learned? Since so few learned Trump’s stance, we lack the power to shed much light on this question, and it’s a hard causal one. Nevertheless, we don’t see much sign of defection among those who realized they were out of line with Trump.
Despite billions spent on the campaign, Trumpers mostly didn’t learn that Trump was out of line with them on COVID. On mandatory masks in public, for example, the % saying Biden supported this more than Trump increased from 19% to only 40%.
July 11, 2025 at 5:25 PM
Despite billions spent on the campaign, Trumpers mostly didn’t learn that Trump was out of line with them on COVID. On mandatory masks in public, for example, the % saying Biden supported this more than Trump increased from 19% to only 40%.
Not only were Trump voters out of line with Trump on COVID, they also mostly didn’t realize they were out of line. Among Trump voters who wanted mandatory masks in public, only 19% thought Biden was more supportive of this policy than Trump.
July 11, 2025 at 5:22 PM
Not only were Trump voters out of line with Trump on COVID, they also mostly didn’t realize they were out of line. Among Trump voters who wanted mandatory masks in public, only 19% thought Biden was more supportive of this policy than Trump.
Trump’s pollsters repeatedly warned him he was out of line with his own voters. The RNC chair and some of his advisors pleaded with him to change his stance. Trump ignored them.
July 11, 2025 at 5:21 PM
Trump’s pollsters repeatedly warned him he was out of line with his own voters. The RNC chair and some of his advisors pleaded with him to change his stance. Trump ignored them.
In the 2020 campaign, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, Trump took a stance out of line, not only with the public in general, but even with his own voters. It’s been forgotten, but even Trumpers were scared and wanted masks and aggressive gov’t action in 2020.
July 11, 2025 at 5:20 PM
In the 2020 campaign, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, Trump took a stance out of line, not only with the public in general, but even with his own voters. It’s been forgotten, but even Trumpers were scared and wanted masks and aggressive gov’t action in 2020.
New paper. What happens when a presidential candidate steps way out of line, not only with the public, but even with his own voters? And on a highly salient issue? Candidates typically don’t do that—they’re too strategic. But Trump isn’t. He’s good for social science. 🧵
July 11, 2025 at 5:19 PM
New paper. What happens when a presidential candidate steps way out of line, not only with the public, but even with his own voters? And on a highly salient issue? Candidates typically don’t do that—they’re too strategic. But Trump isn’t. He’s good for social science. 🧵
Here is the same period for the 1984 election, morning in America.
February 1, 2025 at 12:07 AM
Here is the same period for the 1984 election, morning in America.
An underappreciated reason why Harris lost was flat real disposable income growth in the election year. RDI was above trend, but voters care about growth in the election year itself. Between Jan. and Nov. 2024, nothing happened.
February 1, 2025 at 12:07 AM
An underappreciated reason why Harris lost was flat real disposable income growth in the election year. RDI was above trend, but voters care about growth in the election year itself. Between Jan. and Nov. 2024, nothing happened.
Been working on the unicorn problem for years only to read it’s been solved by GPT-4. AGI must be close.
December 26, 2023 at 9:24 PM
Been working on the unicorn problem for years only to read it’s been solved by GPT-4. AGI must be close.
An example of the ever present tendency of elites to extract from non-elites. Workers are being forced to pay thousands of dollars to quit. www.nytimes.com/2023/11/20/m...
November 20, 2023 at 3:44 PM
An example of the ever present tendency of elites to extract from non-elites. Workers are being forced to pay thousands of dollars to quit. www.nytimes.com/2023/11/20/m...
Political Science should beat other fields to this obvious next step in improving transparency and reproducibility. Pre-register or justify! From a nice Data Colada post: datacolada.org/115
November 16, 2023 at 9:39 PM
Political Science should beat other fields to this obvious next step in improving transparency and reproducibility. Pre-register or justify! From a nice Data Colada post: datacolada.org/115
GPT with vision is like having an 85+ percentile tour guide accompanying you. Check out how it makes sense of the cultural references in a Día de Muertos event poster.
October 14, 2023 at 7:26 PM
GPT with vision is like having an 85+ percentile tour guide accompanying you. Check out how it makes sense of the cultural references in a Día de Muertos event poster.