Tuesday, April 19, 2067: And Then There Were Two

It's now official: Congresswoman Harper Henry is running against Vice President Vickers for the Republican nomination.

It seemed very unlikely that Vickers would face a primary challenge; the 35th Amendment was largely supported by Republicans because they hoped he would run for president someday.  But it's been a long time since 2058, and Vickers is now so far right, especially on robot and AI issues, that the party's liberal and moderate wings have been openly clamoring for someone to challenge him.

Harper Henry would be an odd choice for them; her ADW-NOMINATE score is actually further to the right than Vickers was when he was last in Congress.  Indeed, they agree on almost everything: supporting the Gomez-Lausen Act and denying robots civil rights, expanded global warming mitigation efforts, and foreign intervention and an expanded role of the US in the Democratic Alliance.  There is, however, one issue where they differ significantly: polygamy.

Vickers' support for a constitutional amendment to ban group marriage is a hallmark of his campaign.  Henry, on the other hand, is polyamorous herself: she has lived with her two boyfriends and their children for almost twenty years.

It's hard to know what damage Henry can do to Vickers based on this position.  As I have mentioned in my paper on JULYSSA, the model includes Polling USA's monthly American Values Survey, and in last month's survey, Republican voters were opposed to polygamy 61% to 29%, with 10% undecided.

Then again, I have also mentioned that JULYSSA does not use a Rational Actors Model, because we (Alice and I) have shown that voters are not rational actors, and their preferences can be, frankly, weird.  In other words, voters may choose Henry if they feel Vickers has an electability problem, even if she doesn't match their values on marriage and is otherwise politically similar to him.

Right now, JULYSSA has Henry's chance of winning the primary at 12.5%, but this estimate must be regarded with extreme caution: she has not, as of yet, been included in any polls, and JULYSSA assigns it's greatest model weights to polling results.  More time will be needed to see what Henry's chances really are.