DEMOCRATIC VOTERS WILL DETERMINE THE FATE OF THE TRUMP PRESIDENCY

…This children’s tantrum is how the president is acting about the current shutdown.

 

Democratic voters are becoming motivated to give Trump a kick-in-the-ass.

 

OK, the big question:  “If the polls were all wrong about the 2016 election, why should we be believing all the polls that show Donald Trump, after his 1^st year, as the most unpopular president….EVER!”

 

Yes, last week was the anniversary of Trump’s first year as president, and he had to postpone a fund-raising party at his Mar-a-Lago resort charging $100,000 per couple to attend, and $200,000 if you wanted a picture with the First Couple.

 

The reality is that when you really look deep into today's polls, they aren’t just bad for Trump, they are exceedingly bad for the whole GOP.

 

There has never been a period as focused on one single individual as this period is, and that focus is the single biggest problem Republicans will face this November.

 

President Trump's first year on the job garnered him his historically low approval ratings. From his high-profile firings to his contentious remarks, let’s look back at the ups and downs of his first year.

 

Let’s begin with the top line of the national polls and their general approvals:

 

·       Pew Research Center puts Trump’s job approval at 37%, with 56% disapproving

 

·       NBC News puts approval at 39%, with 57% disapproving

 

·       CBS News puts approval at 37%, with 58% disapproving

 

·       The Los Angeles Times puts approval at 32%, with 55% disapproving

 

In the history of modern polling, there has never before been a president with such a net negative approval rating at the end of his first year. There’s always some degree of honeymoon as the public gives the president a chance to succeed or fail. It’s true that as partisanship has intensified in recent years, there’s an approval ceiling that any president will bump up against, barring some extraordinary event such as the 9/11 attacks.

 

But President Trump’s low general approval comes at a different time when the economy is extremely strong and the unemployment rate is at a mere 4.1%, one would normally expect that would make Americans pretty happy with the country’s leadership. But of course, when Donald Trump is the president, nothing is going to be normal.

 

There’s something else that is vital to understand.  Not only does Trump have high disapproval, the overall intensity of his disapproval is extremely high. For all the news organizations that write that “Trump Supporters Support Trump,” stories, intense dislike of Trump may be the most powerful force in the US electorate today.

 

Just look at these numbers of those with very strong approvals and strong disapprovals:

 

·       Pew Research: only 27% strongly approve of Trump’s performance, while 47% strongly disapprove

 

·       NBC News: 26% strongly approve, 51% strongly disapprove

 

·       Quinnipiac: 29% strongly approve, 49% strongly disapprove

 

·       Marist: 23% strongly approve, 39% strongly disapprove

 

·       LA Times: 15% strongly approve, 42% strongly disapprove

 

These are usually the most accurate of the national polls.

 

Other polls show that the support for Trump has slightly decreased over the course of this first year, while the opposition has slightly increased.  Yes, there’s a variation among polls, but the general picture is that for every single American who really loves Donald Trump, there are two Americans who really hate him.

 

That’s what produces the election results we’ve seen all over the country in recent months, where Democratic candidates dramatically over-performed compared with how they’ve done in recent elections. Trump has such a powerful negative presence that he nationalizes every local or state election, to at least some degree, which has become bad news for the Republican party.

 

OK, now let’s look at how this picture energizes angry Democratic voters, as well as those Republican voters who still support Trump, but they aren’t so enthusiastic about how it might play out in November. Despite the fact that this president is increasingly on everyone’s mind, the situation is very different for the voters of the two parties.  The Democrats can deliver Trump a crushing blow with their votes, because if their party takes back one or both houses of Congress, the effect will be seismic. Not only would the GOP legislative agenda be dead, with their newfound subpoena power, the Democrats could start investigating the Trump administration from tip to tail.

 

The reality is that if the polls are accurate and they stay as they are today, if you’re a Republican voter who’s only marginally motivated to protect Trump, what would be the burning desire to turn out and vote GOP in November?

 

And you need to look at it this way.  On the party’s big issues, many of the questions have already been settled. They got their tax cut. They tried and failed to repeal the Affordable Care Act. This government shutdown battle may actually end with some kind of positive compromise on immigration.

 

This administration will continue to keep cutting regulations on things such as environmental protection and workers’ rights regardless of who controls the Congress.

 

So if you’re a Republican voter, what is it you desperately want to keep House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-WI) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) in charge to do?

 

That’s not to say they don’t have an agenda.  But let’s face it, Paul Ryan has been itching for years to mount an assault on the nation’s safety nets of Medicare and Social Security.

 

But that probably wouldn’t be something that gets the aging Republican base all fired up, at least not to the degree that Democratic voters are becoming motivated to give Trump a kick-in-the-ass. 

 

Whether that changes between now and November, that will determine the future of the Trump presidency.

 

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