By Dave Andrusko
The Legacy Media is so intent on defeating former President Donald Trump that with any scrap of evidence that pro-abortion Vice President Kamala Harris is doing well, the almost irresistible temptation is to suggest it’s time to pick out curtains for the White House.
But, unfortunately for them, there’s almost seven weeks before the elections. And people still want Harris to fill in the gaps (What IS she going to do as president?). And she remains a terrible spontaneous speaker.
Trump and Harris remain even-steven in the seven battleground states while Harris leads in the popular vote by 2 or 3 points. Except, that is, for today’s Gallup poll which finds Trump up by 2 points!
“Favorable Ratings of Harris, Trump Remain Under 50%,” Megan Brenan writes. While, true, there much that will buoy the spirits of the Trump campaign. Let me list them.
First, Trump is ahead in favorability by two points—46% to 44%. “Harris’ bump in favorability after her unexpected nomination as the Democratic presidential nominee has moderated somewhat [down 3 points], while Trump’s favorability is up five points since last month, returning to the level he was at in June.”
She added, “The vice president’s current job approval rating matches her favorable rating, with 44% of Americans saying they approve. Last month, her approval rating was 47%.”
Second, “Independents rate Trump better than Harris, 44% vs. 35%.” That nearly double-digit advantage among an all-important demographic is huge. In addition, “Trump is currently viewed better than he was at a similar point in the 2020 and 2016 campaigns, while Harris’ positive rating is on par with Biden’s in 2020 and well above Clinton’s in 2016,” according to Brenan.
Third, David Strom of Hotair writes that Trump is up
Not by a lot, you understand, but it sure suggests that the media fluffing and constant attacks on Trump are not working as expected.
This, more than anything, puts the exclamation point on the failure of the Democrats and the media’s failure to understand the American people. As they keep pushing out a narrative meant to help Harris and harm Trump, they really haven’t moved the needle as much as they need to.
Strom adds
This data seems to suggest that Trump is in much better position to win than the public polls suggest, and it lends credence to the suspicion that the polls themselves are part of an attempt to create a narrative in which Harris is cruising to victory.
Fourth, then there numbers which no doubt shook the Harris campaign from a poll taken by the NAACP. Flynn Nicholls analyses the results and finds
While 79 percent of Black women over 50 said they would vote for her, only 66 percent of men in the same age group felt the same.
Among younger Black voters, aged 18 to 49, Harris’s support drops further, with just 56 percent backing her candidacy.
The NAACP poll found that 40 percent of respondents cited economic issues as their highest priority for elected officials, while 53 percent said protecting rights and freedoms was their primary concern.
Undecided voters could pose a challenge. While 59 percent of respondents overall reported a more favorable view of Harris over the past month, only 14 percent of undecided voters shared this view, with 25 percent of undecided voters saying that their opinion of her had worsened.
On the “who knows what this means?” front, Nick Arama wrote a piece for Redstate with some amazing results.
As we reported five days ago, they [CBS] sent Major Garrett out into the field in Michigan, and he came back with the report that the support for former President Donald Trump was “real and resilient.” That was just as a local Detroit News poll and an Insider Advantage survey were putting Trump ahead. Michigan is thought to be one of Kamala Harris’ best opportunities to pick up a swing state. She’s ahead in the RCP average there at 1.2 percent, but if it’s that tight, there is a real issue for her.
Finally, there are a major defection from two of the Democrats’ key voting blocks. The New York Times reports
Polls show that Mr. Trump’s standing with Latino voters has grown since his defeat in 2020, with some surveys finding him winning more than 40 percent of those voters — a level not seen for a Republican in two decades. That strength has Democrats playing defense to maintain the large majority of Latino voters whom they have relied on to win in recent years.
Adding to that, reporting for Bloomberg News, Skylar Woodhouse, María Paula Mijares Torres, and Riley Griffin tell us []
Biden carried 65% of the Latino vote in 2020 to Trump’s 32%, according to exit polls, support which the former president’s campaign has worked to expand.
“The Republican Party, over the last two cycles, 2020 and 2024, have made significant investments in Latino voters in key districts,” Diaz said.
Trump in August sat for an interview with Spanish-language outlet Univision and has held rallies in Black and Latino communities, including in the South Bronx, as well as attending a UFC fight, part of a series of unorthodox appearances focused on broadening his electoral appeal.
“The Trump campaign is engaging in both traditional and non-traditional outreach, including events and rallies, direct voter contact through door-to-door canvassing, phone banking, and festivals and parades alongside the Latino Americans for Trump coalition,” Vianca Rodriguez, Hispanic communications deputy director for the Trump campaign, said in a statement.
More tomorrow.