(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Trump's Pathway To Win In 2024 Will Be Difficult, But More Likely Nonexistent. [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2024-01-10 I know there is a danger of being complacent when the greatest danger to Democracy in the last 200 years is Donald J. Trump (Inmate No. P01135809); with the hope that Biden’s campaign thinks that the 2024 election wil NOT be a cake walk. Knowing this, I think the pathway for Trump to win in 2024 is much much muuuuuch more difficult for Trump than it is for Biden. I might be biased but here is my rational (there are more reasons by these are the ones that comes to my mind): 1.) It’s The Economy Stupid — As long as thre are not any crazy surprises like in the 2009 CDO housing 2009 crash or the 2020 pandemic that shuts the USA down, ceteris paribus (all things being equal), the economy seems to be past its lowest point and is headed upwards towards a very strong post pandemic recovery: Inflation is under control; job growth is solid; consumer and business spending on is on the uptick; interest rates are past its peak levels etc etc etc. So unless there are no surprises, and the economy steadily improves and the stock market improves this will all work in Bidens favor. 2.) Trump is moving further to the right — If you’ve been paying attention to Trump’s speech and social medial posts in the last 6 months you will notice he is not going further into the middle he’s actually going further and further to the right. Moving further to the right helps him raise campaign funds but it also hurts his chances with Independents and Democrats. Remember the electorate is 1/3 Republicans, 1/3 Democrats and 1/3 Independents. He can’t win with just Republicans alone he must win over a majority of the independent voters in key battleground states to get to 270 or more electoral college votes. Pay attention to his campaign rhetoric the trend seems to be Trump moving further and further to the right, e.g. “poisoning the blood of America” or “Haley is not qualified to be President because her parents are brown” simply does not win over NEW Trump supporters. 3.) Trump is an established Political Candidate — Reminder that Trump lost the popular vote in both 2016 and 2020. The only reason why Trump won in 2016 was in battle ground states but at that time Trump was an “unknown” candidate and there was enough hate for Hillary that people “gave Trump a try.” Most voters within the rust belt areas hated Hillary because of NAFTA being passed by Clinton back in the 1990s — so she was considered not friendly to blue collar workers or union workrs — Biden on the other hand is the complete opposite. So, Trump was able to win because his reputation was unknown as a Politician, but after 4 years of Trump who he is, what he did, all his campaign empty promises not being delivered, and his reputation as a serial liar and him going further to the right I think his chances of winning the general election in 2024 is and will be further diminished. What helped Trump was Independent Voters in Battleground states — I’m not so sure Independents will vote for him in 2024 as much as they did in 2016. As we move towards election day notice that Trump will do very little to win over Independent or Democrat or even middle of the road Republicans. 4.) Rank and File Republicans and Who will be his VP Pick — Lets think about this there are still a lot of Never Trumpers and since January 6 a lot more Republicans joined the Never Trumpers side than in 2016 or even in 2020. Based on what Trump has done so far very few people have endorsed Trump for 2024 and if you look at Trumps team running his current 2024 Presidential Campaign, it seems most are made up of sycophants and MAGA loyalists. You don't see a lot of rank and file middle of the road Republicans. Also, who will be Trumps VP pick? I doubt it will be Pence and I doubt it will be Haley, given what he said last few days about Haley. Whoever his running mate will be it must be a Christian Conservative, that would appeal to middle of the road Christians and as of right now I doubt it will be anyone that that can help balance his ticket. Either he moves too far to the middle and alienate his base or move too far to the right and alienate Independents. His VP pick will not be easy and in the end, I doubt whoever he chooses will help his campaign. 5.) No More Free Advertising by the Networks — In 2016 Trump had billions of free advertisements from all the major networks when they would air his entire campaign speeches. They stopped doing this in 2020 and if you notice, recently, even Fox News will only air a third and maybe at best a half of his speeches before cutting him off. The major networks stopped doing this in 2020 and I think this helped Bidens campaign, I think this time around in 2024 they will allow at a minimum equal airtime for both Presidential Candidates. This will not give Trump the advantage he had in 2016. 6.) Polling Data — for the last two months of 2023 the mainstream media has whipped up the hysteria of Trump beating Biden in the polls (within the margin of errors I might add). But keep this in mind, Obama was losing against Romney in the Polls in the last quarter of 2011 but only started beating Romney starting in January 2012. If you look at recent polling for January 2024 Biden’s polling is recovering over Trump. As Biden ramps up his presidential campaign, Biden’s polling should start improving. I would be concerned with the polling data if Trump starts beating Biden, 2 or 3 months before November 2024. To be honest it's still too early to rely on Polling Data at present. One other comment, if you compare any other potential Democratic candidate against Trump like Newsom or Kamala, they actually poll worse than Biden against Trump. So issue of Biden performing poorly against Trump in past polling data isn't Biden as a candidate but rather Democrats in general, I wrote about this before please reference my prior posting. 7.) Presidential Debates — Believe it or not Biden is a very professional and disciplined debater, review his VP debates in 2008, 2012 and as Presidential Candidate debate in 2020. If you look at Trump’s debating performance in 2020, he’s ill prepared and undisciplined. I see two scenarios for the upcoming 2024 Presidential debates: a.) Trump decides not to debate, this only will hurt him with independent voters and might even hurt him with Republican voters; b.) Trump does decide to debate most likely it will be one debate (maybe two but doubtful on two or more), again keep in mind Biden is a very professional and disciplined debater who is well informed with current public policies and issues, Trump will have a very hard time just like he did in 2020, expanding public policy ideas or rationalities outside of simple right wing talking points. Thus, If you’ve noticed I didn’t mention the court cases against Trump or even Trump being taken off the ballots, we’ve all been flooded with news about this daily. But think about the above reasoning outside of the political mainstream media echo chamber and you will see Trumps path to winning in 2024 is very difficult and quite possibly nonexistent. Again, I hope Biden takes Obama’s heed and not take Trump’s candidacy for granted and runs his campaign based more on why people should vote for Biden rather than “not vote Trump.” But then my gawd, if I am wrong and Trump wins in 2024 GAWD HELP US. 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