Is the Phrase "Defund the Police" Hurting the Democrats?

Former President Obama recently had an interview where had this to say about "Defund the Police":

"You lost a big audience the minute you say it [Defund the Police], which makes it a lot less likely that you're actually going to get the changes you want done..."

Obama also called "Defund the Police" a 'snappy slogan'. Now there are a lot of things that you can rightfully quibble with, from the reference of "Defund the Police" as a slogan (kind of belittling), bickering about audience (when actual people have died at the hands of the police), and complaining about losing power (where Obama was fairly derelict in maintaining the legislative branch as President). But if you want criticism, many people have already dragged Obama (including Rep.-elect Cori Bush who ran on a Defund the Police platform). But let's break down the idea a bit further. It boils down to one question: "How can you enact a progressive agenda without alienating the populace?"

The Statistics

Let's get it straight right away. Just because an idea is unpopular does not mean that the idea is inherently wrong. With that said, "Defund the Police" is an unpopular idea right now. According to Pew Research, only 25% of people polled supported reducing the budget for the police department while 31% of people polled supported increasing the budget. 42% supported no change. But let's go to Black Lives Matter, which is the organization tied closest to "Defund the Police". According to Civiqs data, in April 2017, only 38% of registered voters supported Black Lives Matter, a number that wavered throughout 2017 despite the Charlottesville Rally. However, in 2018, more registered voters supported Black Lives Matter than opposed (40% to 39%), but it stayed below a majority until this past summer. In the wake of protests over George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor's deaths, Black Lives Matter hit a peak of 53% supporting, which fell to 48% supporting by end of November.

Another corollary you could look at is healthcare. Let's start with Obamacare. In 2013, only 24% of those polled thought it had a net benefit to the country as a whole compared to 38% who said it didn't. In 2017 (7 years after Obamacare was initially passed), that opinion flipped where now 44% of those polled thinks it has a net benefit compared to 35% who said it didn't. That's a 23 point swing in opinion over 4 years!

What did we learn

Yes - Defund the Police is an unpopular phrase right now, and it arguably had some impact on Democrats, who lost very real seats in the House and lost key Senate races (most notably the Maine Senate race). Losing power does make it more difficult to enact these changes, but it also does not mean we should abandon these sentiments. Ideas that are unpopular today can only become more popular in the future if we continue to raise awareness and challenge leaders to do the same. We must also support towns and cities who are willing to try this approach and elevate their stories because people will believe it can be done if they see it for themselves. So sure, Obama may have been right about this election, but for change we can believe in, we cannot stop using these snappy slogans.

Irrelevant Questions: Are Professional Teams More Likely to Win a Championship if Their Home State Voted for the President?

In an exercise of correlation not causation, I wanted to see if there were any presidents who acted as lucky charms or as jinxes for the states that voted for them. To narrow the analysis, I focused solely on champions in the National Football League (NFL), National Basketball Association (NBA), National Hockey League (NHL), and Major League Baseball (MLB). I also started with the first Super Bowl and based on it on the winner in a given year rather than for the season. For example, the first Super Bowl was in 1967 as part of the 1966-1967 season, so I assumed that the year in question is 1967. The following were the Presidents during that time:

• Lyndon B. Johnson
• Richard Nixon
• Gerald Ford - Editor's note: Since Nixon resigned in 1974, I decided to say Ford was the active president for the 1975 and 1976 years, but used Nixon's electoral win in 1972 as the baseline. This is despite Ford not being on the Nixon ticket in 1972.
• Jimmy Carter
• Ronald Reagan
• George H.W. Bush
• Bill Clinton
• George W. Bush
• Barack Obama
• Donald Trump

Here were the results:

# of Champs in States that voted for the President of the given year

Before we highlight some clear gaps in this analysis, let's look at what we can find:

• Barack Obama seemed to be a lucky charm for states that voted for him, as teams in those states won 27 out of the 32 possible titles (or 84.38% success rate). He was followed by Ford, Johnson (both 75%), and Reagan (71.88%). Obama is also the only president where teams across all sports wont more than 50% of the time.
• Donald Trump seemed to be a jinx for states that voted for him, as teams in those states won 6 out of the possible 16 titles (or 37.25% success rate). He was followed by GW Bush (38.54%) and Nixon (41.67%)
• Baseball teams seemed to benefit most from the boost, winning 35 out of the 53 possible titles (66.04%). Hockey seemed to benefit the least, winning only 28 out of the 53 possible titles (52.83%)
• The Democrat vs. Republican spread is most pronounced in baseball (spread of 32.59%), where baseball teams in states that voted for the Democrat president won 18 out of 21 years (85.71%) vs. baseball teams in states that voted for the Republican president won 17 out of 32 years (53.13%). It is followed by hockey (27.56%), football (15.06%), and basketball (1.14%).

There are some obvious gaps:

1. The number of teams, the team locations, and the state's voting results change, so there's no clear normalization in this analysis.
2. Especially in more recent years (after 2000), there has become a clear urban vs. rural divide when it comes to voting. This means more states with major league teams would tend to vote for Democrats.
3. There are a significant number of Canadian teams in the NHL as well as smattering of Canadian teams in the NBA and MLB. Provinces in Canada obviously do not vote for Presidents.

I tried to normalize the results further by looking at the number of teams in any given year that are in a state that voted for the President vs. the total number of teams, giving everyone an equal chance of winning the championship. I also looked at the average number of votes received from the electoral college. Using these, I was tried to normalize the "luck" vs. the "charm".

% of champions vs. % of teams that voted for the President

This margin analysis provides some interesting insight.

• Obama is the only president where the % of champions was higher than the % of teams (with a fairly significant margin of ~16%).
• All other presidents saw underperformances, but GW Bush actually had the best underperformance (margin of -3%) as there were fewer teams in states that voted for him compared to other presidents. This likely coincides with the fact that GW Bush had the lowest average electoral college totals (excluding Ford) for the Presidents listed.
• Nixon saw the greatest underperformance (margin of -17%).

Percentage points per Electoral College vote

Looking at the percentage points / electoral college votes, we see a similar trend. Obama had the highest performance for each Electoral College vote (24.2 points per electoral college vote) while Nixon had the worst (10.2 points per electoral college vote). Interestingly, Republicans had fewer electoral college points compared to the Democrats. 

What does this mean under a Biden presidency?

Using the average margin vs. % of teams (and no changes in teams in the leagues) as well as the average percentage points per Electoral College vote for Democratic presidents, we would expect 9 of the eventual 16 champions to come from states that voted for Biden. Using Obama's margin (which seems fitting as Biden was Obama's VP) and his percentage points per Electoral College vote for Democratic presidents, that goes up to 12 out of 16 teams. Since baseball seems to be the Democrats strong suit, I'd expect a Democratic state to win the World Series next year (bad news Braves and Rays fans, good news Dodgers, Yankees, Padres, and White Sox fans!). Generally, the first year for Democrat presidents is the worst (both Carter and Clinton went 1-4 in their first year as President), but I'll give Biden a bit of an Obama boost and say that the NBA champ will also be from a Democratic state. I think the Super Bowl champ and the Stanley Cup champ in 2021 will be from a Republican state. Does this mean anything and should you gamble using this information? No! But if it works out...who knows.