Transcript: Harris' harsh take on Trump's Hitler stunner sums it up

Sargent: Ben, it's very convincing. What exactly needs to happen between now and Election Day, in the most granular demographic terms possible, for you to win? And one of the three biggest things that can go wrong that you worry about the most and that keeps you up at night?

Wikler: I'll start with what could go wrong: The Trump campaign has claimed everywhere that it knows of hundreds of thousands of people who are basically MAGA, but they don't vote. Their goal with their field programs, such as they are, is to get these people to participate. Republicans engage in voter suppression and mobilization for their side. We participate in mobilizing our side and persuading the other side. Ddifferent strategies. And I would try to convince those voters that they should actually vote for Harris this time and they definitely shouldn't vote for Trump.

What we saw in 2016 and 2020 was that a lot of people who were voters who supported Republicans, who hadn't voted before or hadn't voted much, registered or voted for Trump on the same day. People who weren't in surveys, not in the models. And Trump exceeded his projected vote share and total vote by a wide margin, larger in Wisconsin than anywhere else. The RealClearPolitics poll average was seven points lower in Wisconsin in those two years. And if that happens again, this won't be a close election unless the Democrats are able to also overperform and find plenty of people to get out of trouble and vote. So the question, Is there a polling error? Is there a large group of people who are closet Trump and/or Harris voters? is in a sense unknowable. We're doing everything we can to look for them, but we don't have a window to do so. All we can do is try to overshoot the mark. Let's take a 48-48 race – we need to make a big breakthrough and try to attract many more voters to be prepared for a situation where there is an overwhelming wave of Trump voters coming out of necessity and cast their vote at the last second.

Well, meIf the polls are indeed like 2012 and are underestimating Harris' support, then I think we would also be glad we went for the fences, because in that scenario we can win a majority in the state legislature with a few open seats. We can win a whole bunch of Senate seats. We can win several U.S. House seats in Wisconsin and Tammy Baldwin returns to the U.S. Senate. And if that happens across the country, then we may be back with a Democratic trifecta. So try to take advantage of the advantages while preparing for the disadvantages.