喜悦与愤怒交织：哈里斯和特朗普争夺未决选民
【中美创新时报2024 年 9 月 22 日编译讯】（记者温友平编译）在七个关键战场州中的四个州（内华达州、乔治亚州、威斯康星州和北卡罗来纳州）采访了 20 多名选民，结果表明，特朗普对这一群体的挑战仍然是他分裂的个性，而哈里斯必须向选民保证，她有计划让他们的生活再次变得更加负担得起。《纽约时报》记者乔纳森·斯旺、詹妮弗·梅迪纳、露丝·伊吉尔尼克和玛吉·哈伯曼（Jonathan Swan, Jennifer Medina, Ruth Igielnik and Maggie Haberman）对此作了下述报道。
德文·霍华德并没有感受到喜悦。
25 岁的机场技术员霍华德对副总统卡马拉·哈里斯的乐观表现毫无用处。他怀疑这两位候选人是否能挽救他所看到的走上错误方向的国家。和拉斯维加斯的其他选民一样，霍华德厌倦了汽油和房租的成本，因为他的薪水似乎越来越不能支付他的常规开支。
“我只是不喜欢他们的做法，他们告诉我们，当事情看起来不太好的时候，我们都应该更加乐观，”霍华德在东拉斯维加斯为垒球比赛热身时说。“他们只顾自己，不帮助我们这样的人。我们只是得到同样的承诺，没有什么改变。”
霍华德还没有决定要投票给谁——或者他是否会投票。他对前总统唐纳德·特朗普分裂国家感到沮丧——尽管他在 2020 年投票支持特朗普——但他对哈里斯也没有什么印象。大多数时候，他和他的朋友们都试图忽略每天的政治新闻轰炸。
他对经济、国家方向和个人财务状况的不满反映了数百万美国人的感受。他们是七个战场州所谓的未决定或可说服的选民，他们将决定 2024 年大选的结果。
虽然经济已经稳定下来，但许多选民表示，他们的生活并没有稳定下来，而且他们面临的物价比以前高得多。
虽然哈里斯在宣布参选后民调支持率迅速上升——吸引了对拜登总统不满的民主党人——但许多摇摆不定的选民仍然对她持怀疑态度。民调显示，这些选民最关心的是经济问题。他们的收入低于选民整体，对国家的未来持悲观态度。他们非常注重交易。他们最想从候选人那里知道的是：你会为我做什么？
这群选民——七个州约 300 万选民——的忠诚度在民调中发生了变化。在《纽约时报》和锡耶纳学院 8 月底进行的战场州民调中，他们略微倾向于哈里斯，但在最近的《纽约时报》/锡耶纳全国民调中，他们更倾向于特朗普。
这些选民是可以争夺的，两大竞选团队都在围绕吸引他们制定媒体策略。
在七个关键战场州中的四个州（内华达州、乔治亚州、威斯康星州和北卡罗来纳州）采访了 20 多名选民，结果表明，特朗普对这一群体的挑战仍然是他分裂的个性，而哈里斯必须向选民保证，她有计划让他们的生活再次变得更加负担得起。
虽然堕胎和移民是民主党和共和党基地强有力的战斗口号，但可说服的选民将这两个问题作为投票驱动因素的可能性只有一半。而民主党对特朗普刑事审判和攻击性言论的传统攻击路线对他们来说并不重要。
霍华德居住的拉斯维加斯受到疫情的打击尤其严重，赌场关闭了近三个月，摧毁了这个依赖旅游业的地区。疫情的影响波及了其他行业，导致经济在拜登政府执政期间陷入困境。
哈里斯已经开始回应像霍华德这样的选民的经济担忧。她已经发布了一些政策，称这些政策将降低成本。但她的口号——“新的前进道路”——与她在问题上的立场几乎没有关系。到目前为止，她几乎没有采取什么实质性的行动来与拜登划清界限。选民们表示，她承诺的改变似乎更多的是氛围而不是具体的政策。
特朗普和他的盟友正试图改变民主党人认为的对她的欢乐竞选的基调。他们试图利用哈里斯的笑声，在广告和在线视频中，把她描绘成一个不严肃的人。在他们看来，哈里斯的信息可能与她需要的选民情绪不一致。
特朗普在最近的拉斯维加斯集会上嘲笑哈里斯对欢乐的呼吁，并将其与自己的做法进行了对比。
“每个家庭都会兴旺发达，我们每天都会充满喜悦——你知道，他们用什么词吗？”特朗普说。“所以，如果你不介意的话，我不会用这个词，而是机会和希望。我们将充满雄心壮志。”
哈里斯将这场竞选描述为一场她的对手是一个老套的、黑暗的力量，而她则恰恰相反的竞选。她的竞选活动带来的许多喜悦来自她的民主党支持者，在她的集会上可见一斑。哈里斯公开表达了对拜登失去信心的民主党人真实的宽慰和喜悦。
拜登退出竞选两个月后，哈里斯赢回了许多传统上支持民主党的选民。她已经赢得了非裔美国人、年轻选民和受过大学教育的白人选民的支持，这些人对拜登心存担忧。但这是选民中更加谨慎的一部分。
当被问及共和党对她乐观竞选的批评时，哈里斯在周二的一次活动上表示，她不会让对手把她的“优势变成弱点”。
“我为美国人民感到高兴，”哈里斯说。“我为乐观感到高兴，为我所看到的我们的未来和我们投资于它的能力感到高兴。我为人民的雄心壮志感到高兴。我为人民的梦想感到高兴。”
“我已经准备好结束这一切了”
尽管特朗普经常做出不切实际的承诺——他曾发誓要以某种方式将汽车保险费用减半——但许多可说服的选民仍对他不予理睬。两党的战略家都表示，这是这些选民对特朗普行为的担忧的结果。
根据最近的《时代》/《问询报》/锡耶纳民意调查，在全国范围内，选民认为哈里斯比特朗普更聪明，性格也更适合担任总统。选民更有可能将特朗普描述为极端人士，比例为 74% 比 46%。在未决选民中，差距更大。
然而，对于许多选民来说，将特朗普视为极端主义者可能并不是一件坏事。他以超过 50 个百分点的优势赢得了那些认为极端主义对他“相当贴切”的选民。他们认为最能带来变革的候选人是特朗普。
“我觉得卡玛拉不应该关注快乐，而应该关注舒适和安全，比如食物、医疗等对人们来说很重要的东西，”34 岁的威斯康星州哈蒙德的斯蒂芬妮·索姆森 (Stephanie Somsen) 说。
索姆森倾向于投票给特朗普，因为她说特朗普最有能力解决她的经济问题。但她仍然对哈里斯持开放态度，并谈到女性竞选总统的艰难。她说她希望看到哈里斯在希拉里·克林顿没有成功的地方取得成功。
“我认为快乐的信息很好，”她补充道，“但我想听听她详细说明她计划如何实现这一目标。”
特朗普竞选团队首席民意调查员托尼·法布里齐奥在一份声明中称，哈里斯向可说服选民传达的信息“不合时宜”。他补充说：“当这些选民面临选择时，是卡玛拉的经济困境、通货膨胀和失败，还是特朗普总统的成功和对未来的强大愿景——我们相信他们会把选票投给特朗普总统。”
哈里斯竞选官员表示，人们把民主党人对竞选竞争加剧的欣慰情绪——以及她集会的基调——与她向选民传达的核心信息混为一谈。他们说，这种喜悦与特朗普经常摆出的末日姿态形成了鲜明对比，特朗普的姿态让选民想起了他在白宫时期的混乱。
“经济是其中很重要的一部分，”哈里斯竞选团队的民意调查员莫莉·墨菲说。“但它忽略了人们权衡和考虑的其他因素，即什么让他们的生活更舒适。”她补充说，人们感觉自己已经经历了许多年，“感觉事情一直不稳定。”
两个竞选团队面临的一个挑战是，未决选民的悲观情绪往往会演变成愤世嫉俗。
“我对选举感到厌倦。我已经准备好结束选举了，”62 岁的迈克尔·博阿兹 (Michael Boaz) 说，他来自佐治亚州玛丽埃塔。
“我很高兴卡玛拉没有特朗普那么愤怒，”他说。“但归根结底，我们的政府是世界上唯一一个可以靠这种债务运作的实体。所以我想，如果她能开心地假装一切都会好起来，那就太好了。无知是福。”
博阿兹是一名电子工程师，曾在 2016 年和 2020 年投票支持特朗普，在 1 月 6 日之后，他自称“除了特朗普以外的任何人”，尽管他仍在权衡是否要投票给哈里斯。
特朗普的民意调查员法布里齐奥 (Fabrizio) 已经锁定了大约 11% 的战场州选民，他称这些州为“目标可说服者”。他们更有可能是男性，年龄在 50 岁以下，种族多样性高于总体人口。在选民情绪总体不佳的情况下，这些选民尤其如此，尤其是对高价格的不满。
为了接触这些选民，特朗普在非传统、非政治的渠道上进行了一系列采访，其中包括播客。许多这样的网络名人，如喜剧演员西奥·冯，接触了大量年轻男性观众。
哈里斯接受的采访次数远少于特朗普，但她早期的政策发布表明，她的团队了解他们在摇摆选民中面临的障碍。她的政策包括一项模糊但受欢迎的民意调查计划，旨在打击“企业哄抬价格”。哈里斯没有像拜登那样将特朗普描绘成对民主的生存威胁，而是将他描绘成一个只关心自己和富有朋友的富人。
矛盾，不热情
最近一个晚上，钱包担忧在东拉斯维加斯拉丁裔社区的大联盟梦想棒球场回荡。在对十几名男性的采访中，大多数人表示他们没有投票计划。即使是那些表示可能会投票的人，也更多的是矛盾而不是热情。
“我年纪越大，就越不相信这些政客会为我谋福利，”42 岁的销售代表霍华德·邦德 (Howard Bond) 说，如果他要投票，他会投给哈里斯。“我们所有人的问题是，当我们想知道支持什么时，他们却一直在谈论他们反对什么。”
不过，他说，他确实抱有一些乐观的态度。
“我不知道什么是快乐，但摆脱那些老头子确实让人耳目一新，”邦德补充道。“但我们应该怎么做，为通货膨胀而高兴？为租金上涨而高兴？我应该为什么而高兴？”
本文最初发表于《纽约时报》。
题图：霍华德·邦德正在考虑投票给副总统卡马拉·哈里斯，他和他的儿子巴迪在拉斯维加斯。邦德仍不确定他是否会投票。亚当·佩雷斯/纽约时报
附原英文报道：
Where joy meets anger: Harris and Trump battle for undecided voters
By Jonathan Swan, Jennifer Medina, Ruth Igielnik and Maggie Haberman New York Times,Updated September 21, 2024
Howard Bond, who is considering voting for Vice President Kamala Harris, with his son, Buddy, in Las Vegas. Bond remained unsure if he would cast a ballot.ADAM PEREZ/NYT
Devon Howard is not feeling the joy.
Howard, a 25-year-old airport technician, has no use for Vice President Kamala Harris’ displays of optimism. And he doubts whether either candidate can fix what he sees as a country headed in the wrong direction. Like other voters in Las Vegas, Howard is fed up with the costs of gas and rent, as his paycheck seems to cover less and less of his regular expenses.
“I just don’t like the way they’re playing it, telling us we should all be more optimistic when things just are not looking good right now,” Howard said while warming up for a softball game in East Las Vegas. “They’re all out for themselves, not helping people like us over here. We just get the same promises, and not much is changing.”
Howard hasn’t decided whom he’ll vote for — or whether he’ll vote at all. He has grown frustrated by how much former President Donald Trump has divided the country — though he voted for Trump in 2020 — but he has also been unimpressed by Harris. Mostly, he and his friends try to tune out the daily bombardment of political news.
His sourness about the economy, the direction of the country and his own personal finances reflects the feelings of millions of Americans. They’re the so-called undecided or persuadable voters in the seven battleground states who will decide the outcome of the 2024 election.
While the economy has stabilized, many voters have said they don’t feel it in their lives and are facing far higher prices than they once did.
While Harris quickly gained in the polls after she announced her candidacy — drawing back Democrats who were unhappy with President Joe Biden — she is still viewed skeptically by many undecided voters. Polling shows these voters care more about the economy than any other issue. They have lower incomes than the electorate overall, and they’re pessimistic about the country’s future. They are highly transactional. What they want to know from the candidates, above all else, is: What will you do for me?
The allegiances of this group of voters — roughly 3 million voters in the seven states — have shifted from poll to poll. They leaned slightly toward Harris in late August in battleground-state polls by The New York Times and Siena College but have swung more toward Trump in more recent Times/Siena national polls.
These voters are up for grabs, and both campaigns are building their media strategies around appealing to them.
Interviews with more than two dozen voters in four of the seven key battleground states — Nevada, Georgia, Wisconsin and North Carolina — show that Trump’s challenge with this group remains his divisive personality, while Harris must reassure voters that she has a plan to make their lives more affordable again.
While abortion and immigration are powerful rallying cries for the Democratic and Republican bases, persuadable voters are half as likely to cite either issue as a driver of their votes. And traditional Democratic lines of attack on Trump’s criminal trials and his offensive rhetoric are of little concern to them.
Las Vegas, where Howard lives, was hit especially hard by the pandemic, as casinos shut down for nearly three months, devastating a region that relies on tourism. The consequences rippled to other industries and left the economy struggling well into the Biden administration.
Harris has begun to respond to the economic concerns of voters like Howard. She has released a handful of policies that she says would lower costs. But her slogan — “a new way forward” — has little to do with her stand on issues. She has done very little, so far, to separate herself substantively from Biden. The change she is promising, voters said, seems more about vibes than specific policy.
Trump and his allies are trying to turn the tone of what Democrats have cast as a joyful campaign against her. They have tried to weaponize Harris’ laugh, in ads and online videos, to portray her as unserious. The way they see it, Harris’ message could prove discordant with the mood of voters she needs.
Trump mocked Harris’ appeal to joy at his recent rally in Las Vegas, contrasting it with his own approach.
“Every family will thrive, and every day we will be filled — you know, the word they use — with joy?” Trump said. “So, I’m not going to use that word, if you don’t mind, but opportunity and hope. We’re going to be filled with ambition.”
Harris frames the race as one in which her opponent is a tired old act, a force of darkness, and she is the opposite. Much of the joy associated with her campaign comes from her Democratic supporters and is visible at her rallies. Harris has publicly channeled an authentic expression of relief and delight from Democrats who had lost faith in Biden.
Two months after Biden quit the race, Harris has won back many voters who were traditionally with the Democrats in the first place. She has made inroads with African Americans, younger voters and college-educated white people who had concerns about Biden. But this is a much warier portion of the electorate.
When asked about Republican criticism of her upbeat campaign, Harris said at an event Tuesday that she wouldn’t let her adversaries turn her “strength into a weakness.”
“I find joy in the American people,” Harris said. “I find joy in optimism, in what I see to be our future and our ability to invest in it. I find joy in the ambition of the people. I find joy in the dreams of the people.”
‘I’m ready for it to be over’
Despite Trump’s often unrealistic promises — he has vowed to somehow halve automobile insurance costs — many persuadable voters are holding out on him. It’s a result, strategists in both parties say, of concerns these voters have about Trump’s behavior.
Nationally, voters see Harris as more intelligent and more temperamentally fit for the presidency than Trump, according to recent Times/Inquirer/Siena polling. Voters are much more likely to describe Trump as extreme, 74% to 46%. The gap is even wider among undecided voters.
And yet for many voters, viewing Trump as extreme may not be a negative. He wins the group who said extreme describes him “somewhat well” by more than 50 percentage points. And the candidate they associate most with change is Trump.
“I feel like instead of focusing on joy, Kamala should focus on comfort and security when it comes to things like food, medical care — things that matter to people,” said Stephanie Somsen, 34, of Hammond, Wisconsin.
Somsen is leaning toward voting for Trump because she said he is best positioned to address her economic concerns. Yet she remains open to Harris and spoke of how hard it is for women who run for president. She said she wanted to see Harris succeed where Hillary Clinton did not.
“I think the message of joy is fine,” she added, “but I want to hear her elaborate on how she plans to get there.”
In a statement, Tony Fabrizio, the Trump campaign’s lead pollster, described Harris’ message to persuadable voters as “tone-deaf.” He added, “When these voters are faced with the choice of Kamala’s record of economic misery, inflation and failure versus President Trump’s record of success and strong vision for the future — we are confident they will cast their ballots for President Trump.”
Harris campaign officials say people are conflating Democrats’ wave of relief that the race has become more competitive — and the tone of her rallies — with her central message to voters. And they said the joy contrasts with an often apocalyptic posture from Trump that reminds voters of the chaos of his time in the White House.
“The economics are an enormous part of it,” said Molly Murphy, a pollster for the Harris campaign. “But it ignores the other pieces that people weigh and factor in terms of what makes life comfortable for them.” She added that people feel as if they’ve been through many years “of feeling like things have been unstable underneath them.”
One challenge both campaigns face is that undecided voters’ pessimism often bleeds into cynicism.
“I have burnout over the election. I’m ready for it to be over,” said Michael Boaz, 62, of Marietta, Georgia.
“I’m glad Kamala is not as angry as Trump,” he said. “But at the end of the day, our government is the only entity in the world that can operate on that kind of debt. So I guess if she can be happy and pretend it’s going to be OK, then that’s good. Ignorance is bliss.”
Boaz, an electronics engineer who voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020, now describes himself as “anybody but Trump” after Jan. 6, though he is still weighing whether to vote for Harris.
Trump’s pollster, Fabrizio, has homed in on roughly 11% of voters in the battleground states that he refers to as “target persuadables.” They are more likely to be male and under the age of 50 and are more racially diverse than the population overall. In an electorate that is in a sour mood overall, these voters are disproportionately so, especially about high prices.
To reach these voters, Trump has done a spree of interviews on nontraditional, nonpolitical channels, including some with podcasters. Many of these internet personalities, such as comedian Theo Von, reach large audiences of young men.
Harris has done far fewer interviews than Trump, but her early policy rollouts show that her team understands the hurdles they are facing with undecided voters. Her policies have included a vague but popular poll-tested plan to combat “corporate price gouging.” Instead of framing Trump as an existential threat to democracy, as Biden did, Harris has instead portrayed him as a rich guy who only cares about himself and his wealthy friends.
Ambivalent, not enthusiastic
Pocketbook concerns resounded at the Big League Dreams ballpark in the Latino neighborhood of East Las Vegas one recent evening. In interviews with more than a dozen men, most said they had no plans to vote. Even those who said they might vote were more ambivalent than enthusiastic.
“The older I get, the less convinced I am that any of these politicians are working for my best interest,” said Howard Bond, 42, a sales representative who said that if he cast a ballot, it would be for Harris. “The problem for all of us is that they keep talking about what they’re against when we want to know some stuff to be for.”
Still, he said, he does harbor some optimism.
“I don’t know about joy, but it is a breath of fresh air to move on from the same old men,” Bond added. “But what are we supposed to do, have joy for inflation? For rising rent? What am I supposed to be joyful about?”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
