According to the latest ABC/Washington Post poll, President Biden looking Increasingly unelectable. Even worse for Democrats, Trump is looking electable.
It is very early to be predicting winners and losers in the respective Democrat and Republican primary elections. But the current situation – and the trend line – seems to bode ill for a Biden-led Democrat ticket in 2024. Based on the numbers, it is conceivable that Biden could actually drop out. He is in the worst shape of any President at this point since Harry Truman in 1952 – and he bowed out.
According to the ABC/Post poll, Biden’s approval rating stands at an abysmal 36 percent – with 68 percent of Americans saying he is too old for a second term. That is one factor that can only get worse as more time goes by – Biden likely has more gaffes, more senior moments and more falls in the future.
Biden is basing his campaign on the economy – at least his rose-colored-glasses view of the economy. The problem is that the folks back home are not feeling it. They are still facing inflationary costs that exceed increasing incomes – and not everyone’s income is increasing. There are still shortages on the shelves. Medical costs are soaring even with the reduction in the co-pay costs of some pharmaceuticals. The American economy is growing at a paltry 1.6 percent.
The Biden campaign has taken on the term “Bidenomics” to be the strategic rallying call for his rosy view of the economy. In a sense, he may be leading with his Achilles Heel. For months, the White House has been proffering the argument that the problem is “messaging.” But no matter how often they message the good news version of the economy, it has not been resonating with the people living with the economy on a day-to-day basis.
In terms of the economy, the ABC/Post poll gives Biden a kick in the political groin. According to the poll, Trump trumps Biden on handling the economy by almost 20 points — 54 percent to 36 percent for Biden.
In the head-to-head theoretical contest, Trumps bests Biden by 10 points – 51 percent to 41 percent. The same is true for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who tops Biden by 50 to 40 percent. To a political strategist, that suggest that almost any Republican could beat Biden in the 2024 presidential election.
Biden’s problems are not reserved to one issue. He gets only a 44 percent favorable rating for handling the Covid Pandemic … 40 percent on immigration … 38 percent on inflation … 37 percent on foreign policy … and 35 percent on crime and gun violence.
Then there is the character issue. A primary Biden strategy is to compare the admittedly flawed personality of Trump to the “Good old Joe” persona of Biden. Unfortunately for Biden, his illegal possession of White House documents and the ever-unraveling Hunter Biden issues has taken most of the sheen off the Biden armor. I would love to see these polling questions: Do you believe President Biden was aware of Hunter Biden’s business activities? Do you believe that President Biden was personally profitably involved in Hunter Biden’s business activities?
As if his own ratings were not enough of a problem, Biden has saddled himself with an equally unpopular Vice President. Kamal Harris’ favorable rating went underwater in June of 2021, and descended to 41 percent recently, according to RealClearPolitics. Her unfavorable rating stands at 53 percent. Ironically, Harris’ 41 percent favorable rating is now higher than Biden’s – which was not the case in the recent past. Metaphorically speaking, Biden and Harris are two drowning people clinging to each other.
The economy has always been a significant driver of votes – and is likely to be true again in 2024. Other issues – such as gun regulation, voting issues, government spending, education and woke issues — are likely to win ballot support from those already in the hardcore Democrat and Republican camps. That leaves abortion as the one issue that Democrats can gain potential support among independents and suburban women, but I doubt it will loom as large as other issues. It probably had more effect in 2022 in the immediate wake of the Supreme Court decision on Roe v. Wade than it does now as left-wing hysteria and fearmongering is ebbing in terms of public impact.
Making Trump THE issue – as many left-wing Democrat strategists and their media are doing — not only is not working, but it may be backfiring. The more the establishment attacks him – including all those court cases — the stronger he appears. Until recently, I had been among those who believed that Trump was not likely to win the GOP nomination – but not totally impossible – and that he could not win a General Election. I am recalibrating my crystal ball on both those opinions.
As we reflect on these numbers, we should keep in mind that neither ABC/Post nor RealClearPolitics have conservative leanings. These are polls conducted by ostensibly left-wing organizations.
While there is a lot of road ahead in terms of the 2024 presidential election, these are the days in which the political trends begin. Biden has already launched his campaign. He has set out the strategies and the themes. He is taking to the hustings to bring his message to the people. Based on recent polling, Biden is off to … an incredibly bad start.
So, there ‘tis.