And Trump Will Be An Albatross Around The Necks Of GOP Candidates Again
Both the CBS and Fox polls that were released over the weekend, showed Trump virtually unbeatable in the GOP primary contest. Fox also shows Trump leading Biden in a 2024 rematch, although I’m not all that worried about that. Call me crazy but I see a blue wave forming up that will lead to a Biden victory, as well as Democrats capturing the House and possibly even holding onto the Senate.
None of my friends are as optimistic and I am. Most of them think I’m delirious. But last week I found someone who agrees with me, author and DC-based Lebanese-American journalist Hussein Ibish. His essay in The Atlantic, Why Trump Won’t Win, is a lot more clear-eyed and perceptive than any of the prognosticators warning about a Trump win/fascist takeover. Sure, MAGAts may want just that. No one else does though. “Amid all of the worrying,” wrote Ibish, “we might be losing sight of the most important fact: Trump’s chances of winning are slim... It’s hard to imagine any Republican candidate galvanizing Democrats, independents, and even some Republicans to vote for the current president in the way that Trump will.”
Trump’s media supporters, above all at Fox News, will offer support, propagating a set of myths about his record in office, particularly the supposedly great economy over which he presided. Trump will be able to run as both an incumbent, because he’s a former president, and an “outsider,” as in 2016, because he is out of office. That will make his attacks on the “deep state” and his own persecution narrative more convincing. Trump intends to use his various criminal and civil trials as proof that “they”— the Biden administration— are going after him because he represents “us”— his voters. A certain segment of the public will buy into these messages.
Trump might also enjoy a relative advantage in the Electoral College because of the counter-majoritarian aspects of the U.S. political system. He soundly lost the popular vote in both 2016 and 2020, and almost no one expects him to win a majority of votes in 2024 either. But if the race is close enough in the right places, the undue power of rural voters in smaller or less populated states could tilt the outcome in his favor.
Finally, Biden is not the candidate Trump ran against four years ago. He is older, his approval rating is suffering, and, during his four years in office, he has given certain segments of the public reasons to be dissatisfied with him. That’s reflected in the current polling, where he appears to be losing support among key groups, including Black and Latino voters.
All of that notwithstanding, when the general election gets under way, and presuming that Americans are faced with a binary choice between Trump and Biden, Trump’s chances will start to look much worse. Even if most Republicans unite behind him, a significant portion of both Republicans and independents will have a hard time pulling the lever for him. Some Republican voters might well stay home.
…Trump hopes that his legal troubles will prove a boon to his campaign, allowing him to paint both law enforcement and the judicial system as part of a massive conspiracy against him. He has even requested that his federal trial regarding efforts to overturn the 2020-election results be televised. That’s unlikely, but the more airtime these prosecutions get, the better. Among Republicans, Trump’s polling has improved since his indictments, but many other Americans simply won’t be impressed, inspired, or persuaded by someone who faces 91 felony counts, in addition to civil cases. Trump already has been found liable for fraud and sexual abuse in New York. To that may well be added a criminal conviction at the federal level. Even if none of the trials has concluded by next fall, much of the evidence that prosecutors have accumulated is already in the public record and will be powerful fodder for anti-Trump attack ads. And Democrats will benefit from the attention Trump draws to the election-subversion cases. Even many of Trump’s most ardent supporters are tired of re-litigating 2020; voters would prefer to focus on the future, not the past.
On top of all this, Trump has a strong record of electoral losses, with his 2016 upset, which apparently surprised even him, as the lone exception. His party suffered the standard midterm defeat in 2018. Then he lost the 2020 election. Then Republicans lost control of the Senate after Georgia’s runoff in early 2021. Then his party was denied the standard midterm victory in 2022, barely eking out a four-vote House majority thanks in large part to his own handpicked, election-denying candidates, almost all of whom lost in competitive races. There is no obvious reason that 2024 should constitute a sudden break from this pattern of MAGA defeat.
Presidential elections are usually decided by a relatively small group of swing voters in six or seven swing states. The most important are independent voters and suburban voters, two groups that appear to have turned away from Trump since 2016. He hasn’t done anything to win them back since 2020, instead running in recent months on a platform that’s more radical, extreme, and openly authoritarian than ever (except on the issue of abortion, where he is less extreme than his Republican-primary competitors). With Trump promising vengeance, retribution, and dictatorship, at least on “day one,” as he recently told Sean Hannity, will these swing voters be wooed back into his camp? Are Americans so fed up that they will want to elect someone who has advocated for the “termination” of the Constitution in order to keep himself in power?
Recent polling suggests that Biden is in real trouble, including with a number of core Democratic constituencies, which is leading many Democrats to yearn for a different candidate or to despair that Trump will be reelected. In fact, Biden has a strong record to run on. In his first two years, with a tiny House majority and only a tiebreaker in the Senate, he managed to pass more progressive, consequential economic legislation than, arguably, any president since Lyndon Johnson. Unemployment is low, and inflation is cooling. Perhaps the public has not fully felt these positive developments yet, but they will almost certainly have registered by next November.
Americans have reported to pollsters that although they believe that the economy is bad for others, they themselves feel economically secure. Biden should ask voters Ronald Reagan’s classic question: Are you better off today than you were four years ago? The answer can only be yes, given the dire situation the nation found itself in during the early months of the coronavirus pandemic (to say nothing of the general sense of chaos throughout Trump’s presidency). But Biden and Democrats need to make this case. Without prompting, voters might not readily remember how challenging a time 2020 was.
The abortion issue, opened up by the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, has consistently played in Democrats’ favor, and that’s unlikely to change next November. If the Republican nominee were former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, women might not rally so powerfully to the Democratic side. But Trump claims responsibility for the decision overturning Roe by virtue of his Supreme Court appointees. That, plus Trump’s treatment of women, gives Biden a huge opportunity with female voters.
Biden’s pro-Israel policies during the ongoing war in Gaza might cost him support from Arab and Muslim Americans, but probably not enough for him to lose Michigan, for example, to Trump. Voters in those groups seem unlikely to support the author of the “Muslim ban,” who is threatening to reimpose similar restrictions, and the “Peace to Prosperity” Israeli-Palestinian proposal that invited Israel to annex 30 percent of the occupied West Bank. Some will stay home— a potential danger for Biden— but many will, perhaps reluctantly, turn out for him despite what they say now.
The 2024 election will be a referendum on democracy, with both candidates claiming to stand for freedom and American values. On this matter, Biden’s claims are obviously stronger: He has been governing as a traditional president, whereas Trump promises authoritarianism and openly says he wants to be dictator for a day to accomplish certain policies, namely restricting immigration. But what if his plans take more than a day? What if his one-day dictatorship extends to a year and then never ends? Americans know that strongmen don’t keep their promises.
Biden is old, but so is Trump. Biden has grown unpopular, but so has Trump. Biden has liabilities, but Trump’s are considerably worse. Biden has lost the backing of plenty of voters, but the results of the past few elections suggest that Trump has lost more. Meanwhile, Trump’s record as president and since— January 6, the devastating testimony from his former senior officials, the ongoing trials, and whatever additional self-inflicted wounds he delivers— will contrast very poorly with Biden’s track record and steady leadership. By November, enough Americans will surely understand that they aren’t voting for Biden over Trump so much as voting for the Constitution over a would-be authoritarian.
The case against Trump’s reelection is obvious and damning. As long as his opponents prosecute that case— and they will— Trump isn’t going to win.
Ibish brought up the abortion issue, but he didn’t mention that abortion referenda will be on the ballot in as many as 11 states. Some, like Arkansas, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska and South Dakota to matter for Biden and some are in deep blue states that Biden will win anyway, like Maryland, New York and Colorado. It’s worth mentioning that motivated pro-Choice voters could be boons for Jon Tester in Montana, Lucas Kunce in Missouri, Dan Osborn in Nebraska and Tom Suozzi in New York, while dooming reelection efforts Nick LaLota (R-NY), Anthony D’Esposito (R-NY), Mike Lawler (R-NY), Brandon Williams (R-NY), Marc Molinaro (R-NY), Lauren Boebert (R-CO). But the big shows will be in swing states Arizona, Florida and Nevada— with 47 electoral votes between them. What does 47 electoral votes mean?
Biden won by 74 electoral votes
Trump won by 77 electoral votes
George Bush (’04) won by 35 electoral votes
George Bush (2000) won by 5 electoral votes
Jimmy Carter won by 57 electoral votes