Opinion | Trump Actually Has Pretty Good Odds of Getting Back to the White House
Biden's desperate need for a rematch against Trump belies Democrats' feigned outrage. The indictments against Trump threaten his chances for becoming the Republican nominee. So, Democrats need to somehow rig the Republican primaries to ensure Trump wins. Trump losing the primaries poses the greatest threat to Biden's reelection.
While a head-to-head rematch provides the best chance for Biden's reelection, the problem is that Trump is still a better choice than Biden. Concerns about electability of the candidate are important during the primaries. But after the primaries, both parties focus attention on electing their nominee. And, just as important, defeating their opponent. Should Democrats get their wish of a Biden/Trump rematch, Biden will not escape unscathed. Both parties will be damaged in a Biden/Trump rematch.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
The thrice-indicted, twice-impeached, once-defeated, politically toxic Republican standard-bearer has a real shot at the presidency again.
By every conventional standard, Donald Trump should long ago have resigned himself to a pleasant retirement playing golf at his clubs, but instead he is marching toward the Republican nomination and could, quite plausibly, return to the White House.
Although the early polling of a potential head-to-head match-up between Trump and Biden is close, and 2016 remains a cautionary tale for anyone dismissive of Trump's chances, the Republican case against Trump leans heavily on the notion that he's unelectable, and Democrats clearly prefer to run against him on the assumption that he'll be beaten.
There is no doubt that Trump is the riskiest electoral choice for Republicans and the odds may be against him in a rematch with Biden. But the "can't" in the common formulation, "Trump can't win," is a strong word.
If nothing else, once you've won a major party nomination, you've got some significant chance of winning, just by dint of being one of two people in the country who could plausibly be president at that point.
A nominee is the almost-automatic inheritor of a solid electoral block constituting roughly half the country, or about 45 percent of the popular vote and 200 electoral votes. "Each party has now established a virtually impregnable sphere of influence across a large number of states in which they dominate elections up and down the ballot — from the presidential contest through Congress and state races," Ron Brownstein writes, pointing out that 40 states have voted for the same party in the past four presidential elections.
Regardless, let's say the odds are heavily stacked against Trump. If, say, Joe Biden has a 70 percent chance of winning and Trump only a 30 percent chance, the fact is that 30 percent things happen all the time. A good major-league hitter has about a 30 percent chance of getting a hit during any given at bat, and fans aren't shocked when he does it.
No one in a Trump-Biden rematch would be a robust, broadly appealing candidate.
Trump won a narrow victory against Hillary Clinton in 2016 and was portrayed by many Republicans as an electoral juggernaut, thanks, in part, to how relieved they were to be rid of Hillary.
By the same token, Biden won a narrow victory against Trump in 2020 and has been seen by many Democrats as — if not necessarily an electoral juggernaut — uniquely suited to beating Trump, thanks, in part, to how relieved they were to be rid of Trump (at least for a time).
The reality is that it's less that Biden is the indispensable bulwark against Trump than Biden needs to run against Trump to win.
Biden needs the 77-year-old Trump to mute his age as an issue, Trump to obscure his ethical problems and Trump to match his unpopularity.
Trump is weaker than he was in 2020, but so is Biden. Trump may not be capable of picking up any additional votes over and above 2020, but Biden certainly could lose some.
According to the latest New York Times/Siena poll, Biden has a dismal 39 percent approval rating; 42 percent strongly disapprove of the job Biden is doing, including 41 percent of independents. If the economy settles down into a cushiony soft landing, which is looking likelier, Biden could get a boost. Otherwise, he's a weak incumbent sitting atop a deeply discontented country.
Biden also has considerable downside risks. He could have an ill-timed fall or some other health event. There could yet be a smoking gun in the Hunter Biden scandal. Independent or third-party candidates could steal a small, but crucial increment of votes. The Electoral College gives Republicans an advantage. And the economy could still bounce the wrong way.
One of Biden's chief vulnerabilities, age, is by definition going to get worse, not better.
Biden has the stiff gait of someone who could take a nasty spill at any time. The White House decision to have him use the shorter, underbelly steps for Air Force One is wise and prudent. We've seen him almost nod off in the midst of talking to the president of Israel in the Oval Office and trail off at other times into mumbly incoherence.
Already, his reduced state is hurting him. According to the latest NBC News poll, 68 percent of voters have concerns about Biden's mental and physical health, and 55 percent have major concerns. The number, naturally, has gone up over time. Back in October 2020, only 51 percent had concerns. What will the figure be 15 months from now? This isn't a strictly partisan phenomenon, by the way — 43 percent of Democrats share these concerns.
Trump, of course, would enter a general election weighed down by his own deep, persistent unpopularity. According to that Times poll, 44 percent of people have a strongly unfavorable view of Trump, including 49 percent of independents.
The indictments are layered on top of his already radioactive image. They are a wedge issue, boosting him among Republicans while further undermining him among everyone else. 51 percent of people, and 55 percent of independents think Trump has committed serious federal crimes; 53 percent of people think he threatened democracy with his post-election conduct, including 58 percent of independents.
At the very least, the indictments and any trials will drain him of resources and time (they already have). And they will put an intense focus on subjects that will remind voters, if they needed reminding, of why they don't like him — payoffs to a porn star, willfully reckless handling of classified material and attempts to subvert the 2020 election.
He could easily end up convicted of felonies before the November 2024 election rolls around. But it's also possible that Trump succeeds in delaying trials past the election (the documents case, in particular, presents nettlesome issues around classified material that could prove very time consuming). And it's not out of the question that some charges could get tossed, or Trump could escape conviction thanks to a couple of recalcitrant jurors.
If he's convicted, that'd be a drag, and perhaps a killer. We shouldn't underestimate, though, the ability of our ceaseless news cycle to absorb anything and make it old news, and if the economy is unsatisfactory in a year's time, it's not impossible to imagine Americans focusing on that issue to the exclusion of almost anything else.
What we are looking at, then, is an unpopular incumbent who doesn't control Congress, so has limited power to change his image, and who's a hostage to fortune regarding his health and the state of the economy.
And he may well be challenged by an unpopular opponent who's one of the most famous people in America, with limited power to change his image and who's a hostage to fortune regarding his legal issues and the state of the economy.
It'd behoove Republicans not to play this game and offer someone who's fresh and relatively young, with much less baggage, beginning with not having committed or been indicted for any crimes.
Failing that, the GOP is going to bank on Trump not being literally unelectable, and hope for the best.
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So far all the analysis assumes Trump will be the Republican candidate for President. But what happens if Trump loses the Republican primaries?
Then the democrats will be in real trouble. Then again, they defied the conventional wisdom in the last two elections. I'm very pessimistic about all of it.
Ron DeSantis will never be president of the United States, he is a bizarre, unlikeable individual with a platform that only appeals to white christian nationalists and MAGA weirdos.
He has no chance, although if he is the nominee the Dem candidate will need to be forceful in attacking him.
I think that a Nicki Haley or someone like that would be better positioned to beat Biden.
Then instead pf being ecstatic about it, why are so many liberals pissed off all the time?
So I'll ask the same question of you that I asked in one of your seeds. If DeSantis, or for that matter Haley, end up coming close to Trump or even surpassing Trump in the early primaries, would you pull the "R" ballot and vote for either of them to make your vote count against Trump winning the primaries? Keeping in mind that the "R's" may end up having a candidate that could easily beat the "D" candidate, but at least not Trump.
This would only work if you vote the next most popular "R" candidate, not the least likely to win that "D's" do now.
The press has begun framing the Republican primaries as a contest between Trump and Mike Pence. Pence is a star witness, after all. There aren't any fat ladies on the stage yet so it's far too early to cue the orchestra.
What will be an interesting watch during the Republican primaries are the tensions between the neoliberal establishment, the TEA Party, and the emerging MAGA Republicans.
Of course, you don't like DeSantis. He is against that ideology you believe in!
The person they would love to go against almost as much as Trump would be Pence. Then all we'll hear about is abortion!
What will be an interesting watch during the Republican primaries are the tensions between the neoliberal establishment, the TEA Party, and the emerging MAGA Republicans.
And Trump will be in all the news going to court hearings. They put a lot of thought into this. Give the dems credit. They are diabolical.
Pence is only running against Trump. Pence has not been running against Biden. That may be intentional.
There's a lot of Republican deadwood worried about saving the Republican Party. But the Republican Party backsliding into neoliberal/TEA Party nonsense will only hasten the demise of the party. Keep in mind that Trump was intended to nuke the political establishment. And Trump has succeeded to a great extent. But it's only possible to use a nuke once.
Tim Scott may not yet be competitive but, IMO, Tim Scott is more like the new face of the Republican Party. Republicans may get hung up on the Goldwater mystic but, hopefully, will shift toward the progressive conservatism of Teddy Roosevelt.
Trump will be in the news, period. That's not diabolical; that business as usual for the unbiased press. But it's way too early to know if Democrats can rig the Republican primaries like they have in the past. The press bias toward highlighting Trump may allow a challenger to rise unchallenged. Then it could be too late for Democrats.
trump won't see the inside of the white house again, but he's doing a great job of marginalizing the mentally defective within the GOP base and making all their down ballot candidates walk a precarious tightrope. [Deleted]
Is that why Biden has been claiming Bidenomics is a MAGA success? Bidenomics isn't being sold as DEI in action. Bidenomics is MAGA all the way, baby. Even Biden knows that Trump would be the better choice.
Republicans can still choose someone other than Trump. Democrats are stuck with Biden and Harris no matter what. And Biden needs Trumps a lot more than Republicans need Trump.
This article , from an on and off Trump lickboot named Rich Lowry, is disgusting.
Yet here you are......................why subject yourself constantly to self inflicted pain?
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These are the people that think radicalism, Marxism and mayhem are all better than Trump.
Do they know that Cartel gunmen are now entering over Joe Biden's wide-open border? Along with the fentanyl and all the illegal migrants coming from all over the third world?
Armed men believed to be Mexican cartel members wearing body armor spotted crossing southern border into Texas (nypost.com)
Do they know that California is legalizing pedophilia?
Do they know that American energy is being sacrificed for a green dream?
Oil collapse: 'Right now everything I have is shut down' - BBC News
This is the world these crazies have brought to us!
That is possible.
Just like it is entirely possible that you do that but in a different way than you think.
There are very few people in America that are not better than Trump, and they all either wear white hoods or are in prison for grisly crimes.
No john, they wear suits and work at the DOJ.
The country has become a banana republic and all you can think about is Trump.
Of course you do
from side splitting laughter maybe.
And you inflict pain on me? How is the air up there on that high horse? I believe it has taken a toll on your vision of reality.
Can't forget about more than 900 children being smuggled into and through Texas from Mexico.
Thank you for the laugh.
I really needed it.
I will agree. It is painful watching Trump consume your entire life. The amount of space in your head that Trump is living rent free is truly astounding. You prove it with each and every post.
Why is it disgusting, John?
Because Trump is a traitor entirely unfit to hold office and Rich Lowry knows it.
and for that matter so does the seeder.
The only traitor is the dumb ass you defend
People who proclaim Trumps innocence are pathetic.
or--maybe they are just going by the standard definitions of words and know that Trump has never been convicted of treason. Maybe they still believe in the rule of law.
Maybe they just don't swallow the Trump tripe bandied about so frequently here and on much of the media.
Because it isn't the left-wing Pablum usually consumed in copious quantities?
STRAWMAN!
This thread was removed for a slap fight. Knock it off. Only warning.
[The thread to which you responded was locked for a reason. Do not resurrect it.]
Only in the dystopian world of the left would 306 to 232 (electoral votes) be considered "a narrow victory".
IMO if he DOES succeed in getting back to the White House, America DESERVES him.