In the face of poll after poll showing his approval rating underwater, Trump has taken to tweeting about any poll that even hints at showing him doing well. Yesterday, Mike Pence tried to get in on the act.
He was highlighting a recent poll by the Civitas Institute, the leading conservative think tank here in North Carolina. It shows Trump ahead of all of the major presidential contenders in North Carolina.
But, as they say, the devil is in the details. Civitas found that Trump isn’t above 50 percent in any hypothetical matchup.
- Trump 45, Biden 44
- Trump 46, Sanders 44
- Trump 46, Warren 43
- Trump 47, Harris 41
Not exactly numbers worth crowing about. Moreover, in every matchup, 10 percent or more were undecided. Indeed, even Civitas had to note that Trump led by a “razor thin margin” over the major Democratic challengers.
Even worse, the poll has a 4.38 percent margin of error—meaning that in three hypothetical matchups, Trump is in a statistical dead heat.
What does this mean? Well, in 2016, Hillary led Trump in North Carolina with well over half the vote in. Trump was only able to pull it out by running it up in exurban and rural areas. If a partisan Republican pollster can’t find a way to get Trump above 50 percent or in a statistically significant lead even at this early stage, Trump definitely has his work cut out for him if he wants to keep North Carolina red. If I were a Democratic strategist in North Carolina, I’d take this as a sign that Democrats have an opening here.
One has to wonder if Pence actually bothered to read the results of this poll. If he did, it’s not likely he’d merrily tweet about it. After all, there’s really no good news for Trump in this poll.