The President may not care that his policies have taken him farther than the Democratic Party base.
Norman Soloman (founder of Roots Action)
On July 4, Pew Research reported more than twice as many adults “strongly disapprove” of Biden’s job performance as “strongly approve” (45% vs. 18%). Even worse, the New York Times reported last week that 64% of Democrats don’t want Biden to run in 2024. After a record 81 million votes, he’s unwanted two years later. How did the President fall so far so fast? 14 years of Gallup polls and 8 election analyses from Pew Research provide the answer.
Republicans Come Home
The Biden-Pelosi dumpster fire scared GOP moderates back onto the reservation. Right now, only 3% of all Republicans support Biden, after 6% voted for him in 2020. Support from the “conservative wing” has been static at 3%, but 16% of “moderates” voted for Biden in 2020. Today, 72 times as many Republicans feel “very unfavorable” toward Biden as feel “very favorable” (72% vs. 1%). So, yeah, there’s been some buyer’s remorse.
Biden’s GOP support feared an alt-right takeover far more than it opposed the policies of America First. With Trump gone, they’ll vote for “good guy” Republicans with Family First policies (help businesses, lower crime, and support parents), like Glenn Youngkin in Virginia. This has all resulted in a spike in Republican registrations, record turnout in GOP primaries, and ever higher Republican disapproval of Biden. Bottom line: you were transitory, man!
Independents Seek Safe Haven
Independent-voter support for Biden has plummeted from 52% in 2020 to just 28%, because America is heading in the wrong direction. That is Biden’s reality, because 78% of Democrats see it and say it (source: AP-NORC). This is a strong leading indicator that independents will vote against Biden and his party in November.
This was predictable, because the last eight election-year polls show one thing: independent voters dislike the in-party. Their party support since 2008 is tracked in the table below.
If the table proves anything, it’s that independents support divided government and usually vote for the winner, but the big reveal is twofold; independent voters grew to dislike Obama and never warmed up to Trump. Right now, their approval of Biden is half of what it was one year ago (28% vs. 61%), because two-thirds are very concerned about “inflation, jobs and the economy” (source: The Hill).
The fact of the matter is independents are the “swing voters” that checked both Obama and Trump, and this president has even lower approval. Bottom line: they see a “bunch of malarkey” and don’t like it.
A Party Divided Against Itself Cannot Govern
The STORY heading into the mid-term elections is Democrat division. They are divided – and do nothing – because Biden was elected on a lie. The DNC was afraid voters would not pick a “socialist” over Trump, so they made Biden the nominee and talked up “bipartisanship” during the campaign. Once elected, Biden locked arms with the socialist, forgot bipartisan legislating, and bullied the few party moderates left.
His party is controlled by its left flank; hence, 64% of Democrats don’t want Biden to run in 2024. The Roots Action portal has a “Stop Joe Biden in 2024” tab, and its founder described the President as “tone-deaf” to The Hill. The far-left “short list” includes activist Nina Turner (OH), Gavin Newsom (CA) and Ro Khanna (CA). Khanna wants to go “after Wall Street for driving up housing prices” and strategist Steve Hill wants “this to be a multicultural country unapologetically” (woke).
Rising prices and woke dogma have alienated Asians and Hispanics, who want schools that teach and police that arrest. 55% of Asians and 52% of Hispanics now disapprove of Biden (source: Pew Research). That opinion was FACT in 2021, when the Virginia GOP won a majority of Asian and Hispanic votes (source: AP-NORC).
It is also a fact that Democrats cannot hold onto power, if they lose minority voting blocs and refuse to pivot to the middle. Bottom line: c’mon, man!
None of this statistical, in depth analysis - as impressive as it is, answers a fundamental question. Why would any political party commit electoral suicide? There is no sign whatever of any "pivot" to the middle, or moderation of deeply unpopular policies. On the contrary. So what do the strategists in the Democratic party know about the mid terms that we do not?
Great article Spencer. Spot on description of loyal conservatives dissatisfied with Trump. The polls look good now for a red wave in the mid terms, too bad 4 months to go is plenty of time for either party to ruin their advantage.