Fox News’ latest presidential poll shows Biden with a 10% lead over Trump (53% to 43%) — a 5% increase in one month. It is in line with other current polls including Rasmussen, normally a source of relatively good news for Trump, which has Trump trailing by 12%. It is not good news when even two steadfast allies can’t cook the books to your advantage.
Under the top line are other favorable numbers for Biden.
Coronavirus tied the economy (at 44%) as being the most important single issue for the voter. Here Trump gets his one glimmer of good news. He leads Biden by 12% among those for whom the economy is the most important issue. However, on handling coronavirus, Biden leads Trump by 39%.
On healthcare, twice as many voters want to keep Obamacare as want to repeal it (64-32%). And voters, who prioritize health care, favor Biden by 32 points.
A majority (58%) think Trump’s rhetoric on racial inequality leads to increase in violence. While 38% say Biden’s language incites violence.
On the Supreme Court, the majority (54% to 44%) think that, this close to an election, the next President should fill the vacancy.
On an issue dear to his heart, leadership, Trump lags Biden. Asked whether Biden was a strong leader, the majority (49% to 44%) said he was. Whereas Trump lagged 47 to 51% on the ‘CEO metric’.
To a disinterested reader, these stats are a complete disaster for Trump. The issues he has opted to prioritize (violence and the Supreme Court) are less important to the voter. And even on these, he is behind. And on issues that the voter prioritizes (COVID, the economy, healthcare) Trump only shows life on the economy. And even here the margin is far less than he should have on his signature issue.
All this raises the question, are these polls to be believed? Should we dismiss them as just the 2020 version of the 2016 polls that showed Clinton with a solid lead — including in some swing states she lost.
There are two differences. Biden is solidly above 50%; Clinton never was. He doesn’t need an independent or uncommitted voter to break for him. Biden’s lead today (October 8th) is 9.8% in the aggregate of polls. On the same date in 2016, Clinton led by 5%.
And Trump is now a known quantity. There is no illusion that he is — despite being a pussy-grabber — an outsider and the best choice for Americans ignored by the establishment. He is now running on a record. He promised a booming economy — it isn’t. He said he would clean up ‘the swamp’ — he didn’t. He promised a Mexican-paid for wall — there isn’t one.
He can claim he is winning the trade war, but the trade deficit is the largest it has ever been. And his boast that he would eliminate the national debt in eight years is a stinker. Even before COVID, deficits and the national red ink were exploding.
And on the two issues where he has had success, that success hasn’t resonated with the people. His tax cut is widely seen as benefiting only the rich. And regular Americans haven’t embraced his packing of the federal courts with unqualified incompetents.
Nationally he has 40% of the electorate locked down with another say 5% who will pull the lever for him — but he will lose the national vote. And as for the electoral college, he may have caught an overconfident Clinton by surprise in 2016 — but in 2020, the Democrats have not ignored their erstwhile base. Trump’s road to reelection would be tough for a man fully on his game. But the COVID-infected, megalomaniac, posturing Trump of the last two weeks has scared the daylights out of even the right-wing brain trust.