Trump hits bottom? Trailing, says polls
A better-than-expected jobs report gave Prez boost last week
Montclair (US), June 8: US President Donald Trump enters the week hoping to rebound from one of the lowest points of his presidency as recent polls show that 8 in 10 Americans believe the country is headed in the wrong direction and even spiralling out of control. He got a boost late last week with a better-than-expected jobs report, but he’s struggling to show consistent leadership on the Covid19 pandemic, the related economic fallout and nationwide protests against police brutality.
Joe Biden has clinched the Democrats’ presidential nomination and begun to venture out beyond his basement home studio, but amid competing national crises that focus attention on actual governance the 2020 poll continues to be all about Trump.
Last week’s jobs report was a desperately needed bright spot for the Republican president as a growing set of polls show him trailing Biden less than five months before Election Day. That’s as his former defence secretary — with the backing of Trump’s former chief of staff — warned that Trump was violating the Constitution and needlessly dividing Americans. To cap off the week, a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll reported 80% citizens feel the country is spiralling “out of control”.
Republican operatives close to the Trump campaign concede the situation is dire but suggest there is an opportunity for Trump to convince voters that the nation is moving in the right direction again if the economy rebounds from its current state of Depression-level unemployment. At the same time, Trump has considerable hurdles in his way as the debate over police brutality rages and Covid-19 infections continue.
Trump has offered warm words to George Floyd at times, but his frequent racially charged rhetoric has overshadowed any sense that he's taking seriously the black community’s concerns about police brutality. He shared a tweet over the weekend with his 82 million followers in which a supporter said Floyd being “held up as a martyr sickens me”. He has repeatedly highlighted looting and protest-related violence, even as it subsides, and referred to protesters as “thugs”, while ignoring their concerns.
And he has resumed attacks against black athletes who support kneeling during the national anthem to protest police brutality. Trump’s willingness to use race to inflame tensions is a defining characteristic of his political bran. The question is whether it will work a second time. Before the protests exploded, polls suggested that Biden was eating into Trump’s support among white people.