I find it exceedingly hard to believe that a conservative will not vote for Trump when it really comes down to the day. I think there are plenty that will say they won't all the way up to that point though.
There are plenty of Conservatives who aren't voting for Trump, they just get drowned out by the extremely loud cultists. Just look up Republicans against Trump.
Because they find voting Democrat to be more distasteful, for whatever reason. I have to imagine the people who swing the swing states have to be a really interesting mix of uninformed and having close relationships with people from both major parties. Like they only know the ideas at super high levels, basically just the slogans and spokespeople. It's all vibes.
Or I could be way off, I dunno. World's a wacky place
In my state, you can be independent and vote for either.
But yeah, I voted in the Republican primary this time, to vote against Trump, even though I would have wanted Nikki to lose, but would rather risk that than Trump.
Perhaps my point didn't come across. I'm not trying to explain why a swing voter would stay in one party. I was trying to understand what might cause someone in the US in today's world to be the kind of person who could feasibly vote for either party when they are wildly different on the major topics in the zeitgeist.
I think a substantial number of voters are going to hold their noses and vote for the shitty candidate their party presented.
It'll be interesting to see how many people stay home compared to prior elections. People are super political and angry for a variety of reasons, but the choices are awful.
There's definitely going to be a shift back in his direction amongst the faithful as conservative media does its work, but the thing to look for is whether than holds for low-information "undecideds" who make up about a third of the electorate. Depending on how much his case stays in the media, how much it affects his own ability to reach voters (i.e., does he get sentenced to prison pending appeals? Does he end up under house arrest with a parole officer looking over his shoulder?), and if people like the Minutemen or Proud Boys engage in violence over it, people in the middle who might have otherwise voted for him on the basis of "economy feel bad, maybe different big man make economy feel better?" might continue to peel away from him, and that's a greater risk to his chances than what the diehards will or won't do.