Trump’s lead on economy has vanished
President Donald Trump is no longer winning on his signature issue: the economy.
In a CNN poll released Tuesday, Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden were tied among registered voters at 49% apiece on the question of who would handle the economy better. Among likely voters, Biden gets 50%, compared with 48% for Trump, a statistical dead heat.
It’s not an anomaly either. The two candidates were essentially tied on the issue in the last poll taken Aug. 28-Sept. 1.
The findings represent a sharp drop in support for Trump in what had previously been his greatest strength. In May, 54% of registered voters said Trump would handle the economy better, compared with 42% for Biden.
The fact that Trump’s lead over Biden on the economy has vanished underscores the fragile state of the recovery from the coronavirus recession.
“People are still worried about evictions, foreclosures and small businesses going under,” said Greg Valliere, chief U.S. policy strategist at AGF Investments. “For an awful lot of people, there is still anxiety that the economy has not come all the way back and may not for some time.”
The Trump campaign responded to the CNN poll by talking up the administration’s pre-pandemic success.
“President Trump built the greatest economy in the world before it was artificially interrupted, and thanks to his pro- growth
policies, tax cuts, and deregulation, the Great American Comeback is underway,” Samantha Zager, the campaign’s deputy national press secretary, said in a statement.
At 7.9%, the unemployment rate is the highest it has ever been ahead of a presidential election since the government started tracking the monthly rate in 1948. Although the U. S. rapidly recovered more than half the jobs lost during the pandemic, the recovery is losing momentum.
The number of unemployed people who permanently lost their old jobs hit a seven year-high of 3.8 million in September. What many had hoped were furloughs or temporary job losses are becoming permanent.
Parts of the U.S. economy are enjoying a fast recovery. In particular, the housing market is booming as millennials and city dwellers venture into the suburbs and thanks to record-low mortgage rates. Yet large swaths of the economy are still hurting, and may continue to until a vaccine is widely available. Leisure activities like eating at restaurants, staying at hotels and flying remain below prepandemic levels.
The poll found that 48% of voters approve of the way Trump is handling the economy, while 48% disapprove.