USA TODAY International Edition
Time for swaying voters almost up
President running out of chances to change minds
WASHINGTON – Trying to claw into the lead in the race for president as time is running out, Donald Trump is specifically calling out the voters he’s struggling to win back.
“To my favorite people in the world,” the president said in a video last week.
“The seniors.”
Tuesday in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, Trump turned to another demographic that could stand in the way of his reelection. “Do me a favor, suburban women, would you please like me? I saved your damn neighborhood,
OK?”
As Trump’s support erodes among voters ages
65 and older, women and suburban voters, Democratic nominee Joe Biden has taken a double- digit lead in several national polls and widened margins in battleground states.
The former vice president’s position has brought
“There’s very few people who are looking over the choices right now. That makes it very uphill for the president.” Lee Miringoff Marist College Institute for Public Opinion
back memories from 2016 when Democrat Hillary Clinton led in polls three weeks from Election Day, before Trump’s victory. Trump faces a problem unlike four years ago: The majority of voters – 95% or higher in most polls – say they have already decided who they back and can’t be persuaded.
Adding to the troubles for the president: More than 26 million people have voted early, and Democrats have a major advantage in mail- in voting.
“I think it’s vitally important that the current president move out of the White House and on to his business practices,” said Bob Lowe, 72, a retired superintendent from Le Center, Minnesota, who voted for Biden after backing Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson in 2016.
Lowe, a political independent, is “not enamored by either candidate” but called Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic “nothing short of abysmal” and said his “personality, actions and behaviors demean the office of the president of the United States.” He said he made up his mind in August: “I think the lines have been drawn, perhaps for some time.”
Biden polling above 50%
There are fewer undecided voters in this year’s election and not as many considering a third- party candidate. Biden consistently wins support in polls from more than 50% of voters, while Clinton typically polled in the high- or mid- 40s in October before the 2016 election.
Strong opinions about Trump after his four years in the White House have proved challenging for the president. Biden lacks the high negative marks that Clinton did. It has made for a stable race with little tightening in polls compared with past elections. Trump has not led in the Real Clear Politics’ average of national polls since Biden became the Democratic nominee in August. Biden’s lowest mark has been 48.7%. Trump’s highest has been 43.3%.
An NPR/ Marist University poll released Thursday found Biden ahead of Trump 54%- 43% among likely voters. Only 2% say they are unsure whom they will vote for, and 1% say they back a third- party candidate. Only 5% of voters say they could be persuaded to change their opinions.
“There’s very few people who are looking over the choices right now,” said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. “That makes it very uphill for the president. It’s a very steep incline for him. People are comparing it to 2016, but I think it’s a very false comparison.”
In the Real Clear Politics average of national polls, Biden held a 51.3%42.3% lead over Trump among likely voters as of Saturday. Trump was at roughly that same position in 2016, 42.2%, but Clinton’s polling average was lower than Biden’s, at 47.7%.
The percentage of undecided voters in October polls four years ago generally ranged from 4% to 9%.
Clinton and Trump received sizable bounces after their party’s conventions. Trump captured the lead in late July. In the last month of the race, Clinton got a boost after the release of Trump’s “Access Hollywood” recording – in which he made vulgar comments about women – followed by a bounce for Trump after FBI Director James Comey announced an investigation into emails on Clinton’s personal server.
In addition to more undecided voters in 2016, more voters were willing to vote for Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein. Johnson finished with 3.3% of the vote and Stein 1.1%, enough to be a factor in several battleground states that Trump won by narrow margins.
This year’s third- party candidates – Libertarian Jo Jorgensen, Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins and rapper Kanye West – barely register in most polls and won’t be on every state ballot.
David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, said Biden has not become polarizing like Clinton and Trump. Paleologos said many voters disliked Clinton “with a higher intensity” than they disliked Trump. “This time, you don’t have that,” he said. “You certainly have a negative on Trump, people who feel unfavorable to him, but it’s not matched to an unfavorable for Biden. There’s less interest in waffling. And there’s less interest in voting for a third- party candidate.”
‘ A long way to go’
Biden campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon sought to dispel any complacency and early celebrating among the left last week.
“There is still a long way to go in this campaign, and we think this race is far closer than folks on this website think,” she wrote on Twitter. “Like a lot closer.”
Trump won many late- breaking voters in 2016, but this year, he’s struggled to keep his coalition intact.
Mike Loewenstein, 72, a self- described moderate conservative from Ocala, Florida – a retiree- heavy community where Trump campaigned Friday – voted for Trump four years ago. He has second thoughts about doing so this year, arguing Trump “blew his leadership role” addressing the pandemic. “A national emergency of that size, he blew it as a leader. He blew it politically.”