Have voters, politicos, analysts, and the media focused before with such intensity on a presidential race in the US more than a year before the actual vote? Perhaps. But I’m willing to say: Probably not. The reasons why this race is so magnetic are overt. Trump and Trumpism are in the air. Democracy is on the table. Pivotal policy issues are in play: reproductive rights, immigration, jobs and the economy, health care, public health and public safety, education, national security, the rule of law, and the funding and future shape of the federal government. Social media chews on all of this 24-7. Information – and disinformation – is ubiquitous. Partisanship is at a boiling point and Democrats and Republicans are maneuvering for position. Peggy Collins is the Washington bureau chief of Bloomberg News and a veteran national and local news reporter. 

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