It's looking increasingly likely that former and potentially future President Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee once more, setting 2024 up as a rematch of the 2020 presidential election between Trump and current President Joe Biden. Love it or hate it, that's how it's likely to go, at least when it comes to how things look at this point. The prognosticators and their analyses are thus looking to how Trump will fare in a Trump-Biden repeat showdown.
Tweeting from his political account, Rep. Jim Banks (R-IN), who has endorsed Trump for president and who has been endorsed in his Senate run, on Sunday tweeted out a CNN article from senior data reporter Harry Enten published that same day, detailing how "The chance of Trump winning another term is very real."
The chance of Trump winning another term is very real @CNN https://t.co/m5DXnOTM1D
— Jim Banks (@Jim_Banks) July 30, 2023
Enten acknowledges that Trump was, at the time, facing two indictments, but that "most of us know better by now," than to believe the "political wisdom" that Trump doesn't have a chance:
Donald Trump is facing two indictments, with the potential for more. Political wisdom may have once suggested the former president’s bid for a second White House term would be nothing but a pipe dream. But most of us know better by now.
Trump is not only in a historically strong position for a nonincumbent to win the Republican nomination, but he is in a better position to win the general election than at any point during the 2020 cycle and almost at any point during the 2016 cycle.
No one in Trump’s current polling position in the modern era has lost an open presidential primary that didn’t feature an incumbent. He’s pulling in more than 50% of support in the national primary polls, i.e., more than all his competitors combined.
It's not just Trump winning the nomination that's discussed. That almost seems to be taken as a given, considering that RealClearPolitics (RCP) currently has him with 53.9 percent support and a spread of +35.8. It's also telling that Enten acknowledges Trump can win the general.
After detailing how likely it is for Trump to win the nomination, Enten turns further to the general election, speaking to how polls show a close, competitive race between Trump and Biden:
What should arguably be more amazing is that despite most Americans agreeing that Trump’s two indictments thus far were warranted, he remains competitive in a potential rematch with President Joe Biden. A poll out last week from Marquette University Law School had Biden and Trump tied percentage-wise (with a statistically insignificant few more respondents choosing Trump).
The Marquette poll is one of a number of surveys showing Trump either tied or ahead of Biden. The ABC News/Washington Post poll has published three surveys of the matchup between the two, and Trump has come out ahead – albeit within the margin of error – every time. Other pollsters have shown Biden only narrowly ahead.
To put that in perspective, Trump never led in a single national poll that met CNN’s standards for publication for the entirety of the 2020 campaign. Biden was up by high single digits in the late summer of 2019. Biden is up by maybe a point in the average of all 2024 polls today.
RCP currently has Biden up with a spread of +0.9 against Trump, with 44.9 percent to Trump's 44 percent.
What it comes down to, Enten figures, will be the swing states, though he thinks Democrats also be concerned when it comes to a Quinnipiac poll from late June out of Pennsylvania:
The fact that the polling between Biden and Trump is so close shouldn’t be much of a surprise. Elections are a choice between two candidates. Trump isn’t popular, but neither is Biden. The two, in tandem, would be the most disliked presidential nominees in polling history, if their numbers hold through the election.
All that being said, the 2024 election will probably come down to a few swing states. Polling in swing states has been limited because we’re still over a year from the election.
One giant warning sign for Democrats was a late June Quinnipiac University poll from Pennsylvania, a pivotal state for the past few election cycles where Trump rallied base supporters in Erie on Saturday. The state barely voted for Trump in 2016 and for Biden in 2020.
Trump was up on Biden by 1 point in the Quinnipiac poll – a result within the margin of error, but nevertheless a remarkable achievement for the former president.
With the 2024 election still being 15 months away, what makes the general election so exciting is that the situation still can change, Enten reminds. "But for now, the chance that Trump is president in less than two years time is a very real possibility," he concludes his piece with.
Byron York referenced Enten's analysis in his own for the Washington Examiner, with that piece also published in Townhall and making its way to the Tuesday edition of RCP.
Since then, Trump has been indicted yet again by Special Counsel Jack Smith, this time for charges to do with January 6. Even still, the continued coverage from CNN acknowledges that Trump has a chance at winning the presidency once more.
A Tuesday piece from CNN referencing the indictment noted in the headline that "Even Trump’s indictments haven’t shattered the deadlock between the parties. Here’s why," which again discussed the 2024 election in the context of a Biden-Trump rematch.
"While surveys now usually show Biden leading Trump, the president’s margin rarely exceeds his four-point margin of victory from 2020. The latest national NBC poll, conducted by another bipartisan team of prominent Republican and Democratic pollsters, also found Biden leading Trump by the exact same four percentage point margin he amassed in 2020," the lengthy analysis reads in part.
Although a Wednesday morning analysis from CNN on "Why Trump’s latest indictment will reverberate for years to come" was particularly solemn with regards to the indictment, there was a section on how "GOP remains loyal to Trump." As that section reads in part:
While it was hard to read the evidence in the indictment and not be disturbed by Trump’s alleged conduct, Republicans immediately portrayed it as partisan, reflecting the ex-president’s strong grip on his party and the fact that its base voters have reacted to his previous indictments by redoubling their support and boosting his fundraising.
...
But most of the GOP reaction to the indictment was a reminder that while Smith’s prosecution is an attempt to account for Trump’s aberrant presidency, it will only deepen America’s gaping political divide.
It was perhaps another Wednesday morning piece from CNN, "Could Donald Trump serve as president if convicted?," which came as the biggest admittance that Trump could win even with the indictments. That was part of Wednesday's edition of RCP.
Even if Trump is convicted of charges, he could still serve if he were to win the 2024 presidential election, the piece answers, citing UCLA Law Professor Richard L. Hasen. It remains unclear if Trump could pardon himself, with the CNN piece noting the U.S. Supreme Court would likely have to weigh in. He'd also likely get his Justice Department to dismiss the case.
The unprecedented indictments against a former president for the first time in our nation's history have raised questions as to if they would help or hurt Trump.
The first indictment was announced in late March, from Soros-backed DA Alvin Bragg in Manhattan. Trump was arraigned in early April. Those 34 felony charges over hush money payments in particular are regarded as politiczed, especially since Bragg could have gone for misdemeanor charges. Further, the statute of limitations had expired, and it's an untested legal theory.
There was considerable analysis at the time as to if indictments would hurt or help Trump, including in a VIP piece from March 31:
A Friday morning analysis from FiveThirtyEight looked into the scenarios as to if the indictment would hurt, help, or not matter for Trump, with the indictment helping him being "a distinct possibility in the primary," as Trump "could experience a polling boost similar to a rally-around-the-flag effect that presidents sometimes experience when the nation comes under threat--except this time, Trump himself is under threat."
"Another reason why politicians often experience rally-around-the-flag effects in times of crisis: their political opponents go quiet and stop criticizing them. That looks like it’s already happening with Trump," the analysis goes on to mention about such an effect.
Not mentioned is that these potential and actual opponents are rallying around because bringing forth the charge is such a political move.
Americans feel the same way, as reflected in an Ipsos/Reuters poll showing that 75 percent of Republicans agree, including 51 percent who say they do so "strongly," that "some members of the Democratic Party and law enforcement are working to delegitimize former President Donald Trump through politically motivated investigations." By 50-32 percent, overall respondents agree with that statement.
Madeline also covered how that same poll that 54 percent of respondents, which included 80 percent of Republicans and 32 percent of Democrats, thought the charge was "politically motivated."
The poll was conducted March 20-21 with 1,003 adults and a credibility interval of plus or minus 3.8 percentage points.
Charges brought by Smith in other cases are also regarded as politicized, polling shows.
Considering that Trump is at among his highest levels of support in the polls, it looks like we have our answers as to if these indictments help or hurt Trump. Of course, it'll be worth seeing what polls conducted in the days following these Tuesday indictments have to say.
As Enten mentions in that CNN analysis from Sunday, Biden is also deeply unpopular. More damning details have increasingly come out that then Vice President Joe Biden was involved in business dealings with his son Hunter Biden. This includes the Monday testimony from Devon Archer, a former business associate of Hunter, before the House Oversight Committee.
It's worth reminding that even though CNN anchors in May decried the Trump town hall that took place on their own network, they were as fired up as they were because they were aware of and they feared that he could win another term. Anderson Cooper in particular comes to mind.
During his monologue from May 11, Anderson mentioned in part that "the man you were so disturbed to see and hear from last night. That man is the frontrunner for the Republican nomination for president. And according to polling, no other Republican is even close," he said about Trump winning the nomination, adding "that man you were so upset to hear from last night, he may be president of the United States in less than two years."
CNN and the mainstream media are running scared about Trump returning to the presidency and perhaps they should. It continues to be a real possibility.
Anderson Cooper calling for mutiny after Trump crushed the CNN Town Hall:
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) May 12, 2023
"You have every right to be outraged today and angry and never watch this network again." pic.twitter.com/Tk7M1HDHL4