Trump’s primary vote totals trounce previous incumbents’ numbers

By Mary Kay Linge

President Trump, Barack Obama and George Bush.EPA

2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

Trump blasts Joe Biden, praises Tulsa 'warriors' for braving coronavirus fears at rally

Trump campaign blames protests, media for modest rally crowd in Tulsa

Democrats fear they can't compete with expected GOP convention blowout

Trump mocks 'zero enthusiasm' Joe Biden rally in Philadelphia

President Trump is betting big on the primaries.

With no serious challengers for the Republican Party nomination and high approval numbers among the GOP’s rank and file, Trump could have cruised through the spring campaign season like most incumbent presidents do.

Instead, he traveled to 18 states for campaign rallies and spent more than $155 million to rack up high primary-vote totals for a nomination he had no chance of losing.

“I don’t remember any uncontested primary campaign for a sitting president like this,” Stony Brook University professor Helmut Norpoth told The Post. “People don’t normally turn out in large numbers for a race without a challenger.”

But in 23 of the 27 states that held primaries both this year and in 2012, when President Obama ran for re-election, Trump has racked up higher raw vote totals than Obama did — often doubling or tripling his predecessor’s numbers. His primary vote totals also beat President George W. Bush’s in 2004.

The high Trump turnout showed up not only in reliably Republican states like Montana and Arkansas, but even in deep-blue strongholds and in purple states that Joe Biden hopes to flip come November.

In Michigan’s March primary, Trump’s 639,144 votes dwarfed the 174,054 that Obama notched in 2012. A few weeks later, Trump scored 713,546 votes in Ohio — more than twice Obama’s 2012 total of 285,990.

Credit “the sophisticated political machine that the Republican National Committee and Trump campaign has built,” RNC press secretary Mandi Merritt told The Post.

The campaign has made a heavy get-out-the-vote effort in each primary state as a dry run for its general election turnout operation, Merritt said. That included nearly 45 million voter contacts — more than the GOP made in the entire 2016 cycle.

And it’s using Trump’s rallies to vaccum up supporters’ data and register new voters, fueling its November plans.

The primary push has a sound psychological basis, Norpoth, an expert in voter behavior, said.

“If you can get people to come out for a primary that isn’t even a contest, you have them hooked,” he explained.

Primarily Trump

Unlike past incumbent presidents, Donald Trump’s campaign has been pushing supporters to the primaries – even though his nomination is in the bag. He’s running up big numbers compared to both Presidents Obama and Bush: