Should We Be Worried About Trump's Polling Lead?

Scott Morefield | May 26, 2024 6:00 PM

Contrary to what many political pundits, including this one, thought would happen as soon as Donald Trump became the presumptive GOP nominee, the former president has maintained a slim but steady polling lead over President Joe Biden. As of today, the RCP Average has Trump with a 1.1% overall advantage, with Quinnipiac being the only May poll showing Biden leading, albeit by a mere 1%. By contrast, Biden enjoyed a 5.6% advantage this time in 2020, an election in which Trump never actually took the average polling lead.

Still, are there signs that Trump's lead might be softer than we think? Nate Cohn, chief political analyst for The New York Times, recently published a piece claiming just that. Titled "A Polling Risk For Trump," Cohn contends that Trump's lead is "built on gains among voters who aren’t paying close attention to politics, who don’t follow traditional news and who don’t regularly vote."

Cohn breaks down the last three New York Times/Siena national polls to show that Biden, in contrast to his overall polling malaise, has maintained a consistent lead among voters who actually voted in 2020. Conversely, Trump has built his lead with potential voters who didn't vote in the last election (or, if you will, "less engaged" voters).

From Cohn's piece:

Importantly, these low-turnout voters are often from Democratic constituencies. Many back Democratic candidates for U.S. Senate. But in our polling, Biden wins just three-quarters of Democratic-leaning voters who didn’t vote in the last cycle, even as almost all high-turnout Democratic-leaners continue to support him.

This trend illustrates the disconnect between Trump’s lead in the polls and Democratic victories in lower-turnout special elections. And it helps explain Trump’s gains among young and nonwhite voters, who tend to be among the least engaged.

Trump’s dependence on these voters could make the race more volatile soon. As voters tune in over the next six months, there’s a chance that disengaged but traditionally Democratic voters could revert to their usual partisan leanings. Alternately, they might stay home, which could also help Biden.

These "irregular" voters, Cohn points out, lean Democrat, yet are "far less likely to identify as liberal" and "more likely to worry about the economy" than social issues like abortion. In other words, they likely feel the lifestyle crunch imposed by the Biden regime and are expressing support for Trump as an alternative.

Will that pain and frustration turn into actual results on election day? Will those "irregular" voters turn out for Trump, or will they stay home or, worse, come home to Biden? Nobody knows, even Cohn, who points out in his piece that a quarter of voters in any election did not vote in the last one. So, there is plenty of room for as many Trump voters as possible to turn out.

Still, it is clear that Democrats are taking heart from Cohn's piece: