Now we head out to California to Stanford University, the Hoover Institution, where Lonnie Chen is standing by. He's a former advisor to the Marco Rubio and Romney campaigns. In fact, he's worked on several high profile political campaigns. He's a research fellow at Hoover Director of Domestic Policy Studies, and a lecture in the Public Policy program at Stanford University. So Lonnie Chan, welcome back to the show. Thanks Kathleen. Your poll, a new poll shows there's an aged divide
among California Democrats and some goop unity issues. Let's start on the Democratic side. What is the poll? Who who did you talk to? And what's the results for the Democrats. Well, we at the Hoover Institution partnered with some of the other research institutions at Stanford and the polling firm you Gov to conduct a poll of seventeen hundred Californians and we found exactly as you indicated, a significant split amongst
Democrats in terms of who they support. So eighteen to twenty nine year olds overwhelmingly uh ported Bernie Sanders, and other age demographics overwhelmingly supported Hillary Clinton, which resulted in our poll in a thirteen point lead for Hillary Clinton going into next week's California primaries, So that's good news for her. Obviously, though there remains a significant division based on age, but we didn't find as many differences based
on other factors like ethnicity and race. But certainly the age issue have to be concerning for Hillary in the long run, because kids tend to go more for Bernie Sanders and in many in many voting outcomes, and also in this poll, that's right, they tend to like Bernie Sanders progressive positions, particularly when he talks about free college tuition for example. That's one that's very popular with my
students here at Stanford UM. But the reality is, you know, Hillary Clinton has been trying in this primary to adjust some of her views on issues to be more uh interesting, let's say, to the younger demographic. But unfortunately, at least in our poll, that does not appear to have paid off. Uh, Lonnie, the California primaries what less than a week away now? Correct threat Seventh, what do you see for the from this Golden State poll that's most significant for Republicans? Well,
I think there are a couple of issues. First of all, obviously, Donald Trump is doing well in poll because he's the only Republican presidential candidate remaining and he is now the nominee presumptive. The level of support he's garnering, though in our poll, is still substantially lower than the level of support that Mitt Romney won in two thousand and twelve by the time he got to the California primary, and
the two gentlemen were in very similar positions. Romney was the nominee presumptive when we came to California in two thousand and twelve, as is Donald Trump today. But Trump is polling with the support of over sixty percent of California Republicans. But that's compared to the almost ninety percent support that Mitt Romney enjoyed in exit polling after the
two thousand and twelve elections. So Donald Trump does not appear as though he has unified the Republican Party in California in the same way that Romney did ahead of the two thousand twelve primary, So that maybe one warning sign. Another interesting issue is that you've got basically one in three California Republicans who are still trying to make up their minds about whether they want to support another candidate,
rite someone in or stay home come election day. Now, you were a senior official uh in the Bush administration at the US Department of Health and Human Services. As I mentioned, you were helped run the Romney Ryan twelve presidential campaign. You helped advise Marco Rubio, so you were obviously an insider in Republican Party circles. What are you hearing and in fact, what do you think of Donald
Trump as the candidate on the for the Republicans. Well, you know, I personally am am greatly troubled by by Trump as the presumptive nominee. I think particularly the lack of detail he's put out on certain policy areas, in facting a lot of policy or been concerning. But I think, you know, the fundamental issue with Donald Trump is that it does not appear to hold the same conservative points of views on issues as past nominees have of the
Republican Party. And you know that's been overlooked, I think by and large by many of the electorate because with his personality and a lot of people find his brashness and his sort of tell it like it is to be an attractive feature of his candidacy. Um for me, personally, though, I think he's quite a wild card, and I think, you know, it's a dangerous situation when you nominate someone and you're not entirely sure what they're going to do, aside from apparently build a wall and get tough on
China when it comes to trade. So, uh, you know, I find the Trump candidacy to be troubling. You know, I was obviously for Rubio. I think he would have been the best nominee for the party this year and beyond. But the voters chose chose Trump, and that's who the
guy will be going into the fall, Lonnie. Is it possible that's conservative conservativism of many other leading Republicans has not appealed sufficiently to more moderate Republicans and that for some reason that's who Donald Trump is attracting, someone who has kind of put off by the more conservative policies of others. Yeah, I mean that could be part of it. You know that there's an anti establishment ism to the
Trump support. There's also a moderate a nature to his support as well that that that comes with a more moderate positioning that Trump is taken on certain issues. Um, But at the end of the day, Kathleen, I tend to attribute a lot of his support to the fact that, you know, people have seen him on TV. He's somebody who's familiar, and he is in some ways an ideal
candidate for the era of television. He knows how to use and in some cases manipulate media to his favor, and he's and he manages to get out there quite a bit, and people see him and they like him. So, you know, I think that it has much more to do with personality than stances on issues. Bonnie Chin, thank you so very much for joining me today on taking Stock from the Couver Institution at Stanford University. He's worked
on Republican campaigns in Republican administration. He views Donald Trump as a wild card and says that maybe his skills on television has are what is attracting so many Republicans. This is taking Stock on Blueboard Radio.