Donald Trump's approval ratings have a taken a one-week hit on Gallup, logging a 4-point drop in approval from 44 to 40 percent between Oct. 21-28. Pundits have been marveling over Trump's recent gains in approval/favorability even as Democrats's generic-ballot advantage held relatively steady at between 8-10 points. In actuality, the two aren't always correlated.
Other prognosticators have wondered how Trump's approvals could still stay relatively low given the fundamentals of the economy looking decent, such as a historically low unemployment rate, among other factors. But the last time Trump suffered such a precipitous 4-point drop (45 - 41 percent) was from June 17-24 when Trump's policy of ripping babies from the arms of their parents was fully settling into America's conscience. For instance, the audio of a distraught crying baby asking for her mother was published by ProPublica on Monday, June 18.
It was about two weeks ago on Oct. 16 when Trump began tweeting about the "caravan" of refugees, ramping up his fearmongering rhetoric throughout the week. “This will be an election of Kavanaugh, the caravan, law and order and common sense,” Trump declared on Oct. 18 at a campaign rally in Montana.
Trump's disgraceful reaction to last week's bomb terrorism targeting Democratic officials and donors cannot be left out of this equation. His unconscionable tweet lamenting how "this 'Bomb' stuff" was interrupting the GOP's momentum at the polls was among the rankest expressions of political opportunism imaginable. And by the end of the week, an absolute tragedy unfolded with the slaughter of 11 innocent people at a Pittsburgh synagogue, perhaps reinforcing to the public the venom Trump has injected into our political system.
Whatever the case, Trump's preferred "caravan" crisis doesn't appear to be doing anything but hurting his approval ratings. That cannot be a welcome sign for Republicans a week out from the election.
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