Biden can thank Trump for his improved standing
America enjoyed one of those rare split-screen moments on Tuesday when two visions of the nation were starkly juxtaposed across cable news. On one side was President Joe Biden, preaching a vision of America that hasn’t substantially changed for decades. It was a speech heavy with Joe-isms: slightly stumbling at times but still powerfully articulating old-fashioned virtues, folksy wisdom, small-town Americana, the nature of Democracy, and the importance of the law. By a good measure, it was one of Biden’s strongest performances. Adjust your gaze a few inches, however, and you would see a quite different America. That was the America of former president, Donald Trump, who was busy on his social media platform, Truth Social, engaging in the new politics of outrage and memes that tacitly call for political violence.
Almost lost in the subsequent headlines was that this marked the start of the midterm fight. Monday is Labor Day in the US, traditionally the day when the campaigning sparks into life, but this year Biden pre-empted it with a speech in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania (a key swing state) that established the tone of the elections, as well as underlining a few things we already knew.
What we already knew is that Biden’s standing continues to improve, as does the position of the Democrats. A few months ago, the betting on the Democrats taking both the House & the Senate stood at 15-1. Then it shortened to 10-1 and I reported at the time that even that felt too pessimistic given the underlying pragmatics of the two parties. The odds are now 3-1 which feels more in line with expectations. It’s still no certainty that there won’t be a red wave in November, but the direction of travel is clear. Last week, a special election was run in New York 19th congressional District. Previously, the state had voted for Bill Clinton, then George W. Bush (twice), Obama in both his terms and then Trump before switching back to Biden. If you’re looking for a strong bellwether, it’s New York’s 19th congressional District, and despite all the political wisdom suggesting that the Dems would struggle, Democrat Pat Ryan defeated Republican Marc Molinaro by 51.8% to 48.1%.
A lot of the momentum is explained by the other side of the split screen. Donald Trump is experiencing a meltdown and trying to intimidate the Department of Justice by threatening to start a civil war, a theme picked up by Linsey Graham in a much-condemned interview on Fox News over the weekend. “If there’s a prosecution of Donald Trump for mishandling classified information, after the Clinton debacle […] there’ll be riots in the streets,” he said.
To state the obvious: America is not about to engage in civil war to placate the former infant-in-chief. There is a chance of violence, certainly, and the threat of home-grown terrorism is now higher than ever. Last month, a 42-year-old man dressed in body armour and carrying an AR-15 attempted to break into the FBI’s Cincinnati office. The man had previously been part of the January 6th attack and was further provoked by the FBI’s raid on Trump’s Florida home.
Certainly, the former president seems to be engaged in a crude form of radicalisation. Had the former president been an Islamic preacher posting “Your Enemy Is Not In Russia” superimposed over the faces of Biden, Kamala Harris, and Nancy Pelosi, he would probably be getting a visit from officials from The Department of Homeland Security. He is, however, preaching to a diminishing audience. His social media platform appears to be in financial trouble and his support remains a small fraction of the electorate. Even the January 6th crowd (about 10,000 people) was small compared to marches in favour of more progressive causes, such as 2018’s “March For Our Lives”, with an estimated 500,00 – 800,000 people in attendance in Washington DC alone.
The numbers are significant. It underscores the looming significance of Roe vs Wade. Pat Ryan won in New York by campaigning on abortion which keys right into voters’ fears. Predictions that November would only be defined by the economy were always too simplistic given the Supreme Court’s judgement was so epochal. The economy remains a consistent factor from election to election. A court removing fundamental rights that Americans have enjoyed for decades is another matter. This makes these midterms different to the bulk of elections that establish “conventional wisdom”.
It also fits into the bigger picture. Trump is embracing QAnon culture with a recklessness that is shocking even by his standards of political depravity. This week it was also revealed that the Republican Party will no longer be funding Trump’s legal defence over his removal of government documents. The evidence now points to a deliberate attempt to hide them at Mar-a-Lago. Given that Trump still commands such a hold over the Republican base, the GOP’s caution is indicative of the seriousness of Trump’s legal jeopardy.
Biden, meanwhile, needs to do very little beyond maintaining a moderate presence and signing off on small but meaningful victories such as his Executive Order that granted relief for student loans. His approval rating has been slowly ticking up and, even if 44% at the end of August doesn’t feel like a great improvement from his low of 38%, it represents a better midterm standing than either of his two predecessors, who both suffered losses at comparable stages of their presidencies. If Biden can keep momentum in November as the GOP continues to struggle with the chaos caused by their potential candidate (and all his numbskull proxies such as Dr Oz and Herschel Walker) then even 3-1 begins to look like a good place to stake fifty pence. By November, a return of £1.50 might even be enough to boil a kettle.