With data like this, can you really blame Trump for considering a 2024 presidential run? In fact, with Biden’s numbers doing so poorly, and claims he plans to run for reelection in 2024, can you blame Trump for wanting a rematch? Trump lost in 2020, but not by much, and not by numbers that couldn’t be overcome now that Biden has a terrible record causing financial distress on a daily basis in the lives of average Americans. Plus, 2024 will see less Covid-related loosening of mail-in ballot requirements and other means by which Democrats seek to undermine and control the election process. The Russian hoax, now fully debunked, will also be fully behind us.
The gist of the numbers focuses on five states that flipped from Trump to Biden in 2020 but could be poised to flip back if there was a rematch: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Trump wouldn’t need all of them to flip to win, just most of them. He would need to take back Georgia and Arizona, which are long-held GOP strongholds in presidential races. He’d then need one or two of the other three to break down the blue wall of the rust belt as he did in 2016 with his clean sweep.
That being said, let’s just cut right to the poll numbers that show Trump now potentially ahead of Biden in the five decisive states he would need to win in 2024:
The five states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — delivered a total of 73 electoral votes in 2020, enough to produce a decisive Electoral College victory for Biden. Since then, Trump has held four rallies, endorsed dozens of candidates and played a key role in shaping contests that could put his allies in top offices in those states in 2024.
Trump’s shadow campaign also recently polled Trump-Biden matchups in the five states, all of which were decided in 2020 by fewer than 3 percentage points. According to the poll, a memo of which was obtained by POLITICO, the former president led Biden in Arizona by 8 percentage points, Georgia by 3 points, Michigan by 12 points, Pennsylvania by 6 points and Wisconsin by 10 points.
The caveat here is that the poll was conducted by Tony Fabrizio, who continues to do polling for Trump’s “Make America Great Again, Again!” super PAC. Therefore, these are basically internal polls at best or visions of grandeur based on poor sampling at worst.
Whatever the case, there’s a reason Trump’s team leaked them, either as a warning to Biden about how vulnerable he is, or a warning to other Republicans, like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, that Trump is still driving the GOP train. It would seem likely to be the latter option, perhaps working to rebut any arguments that Trump suffers from a problem of electability. He can now argue, with some data to back it up, that a Biden-Trump rematch in 2024 would end up with a more favorable outcome than it did in 2020.
Politico also notes, beyond the leaked poll numbers, that Trump is making more moves aimed at bolstering a potential 2024 campaign, including upcoming fundraisers and expanding his PAC’s board of directors:
In another sign that Trump is gearing up for a White House bid, his super PAC is holding its biggest planned fundraiser to date on Dec. 2, when the nation’s top Republican donors are expected to gather at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Fla.
The super PAC is also expanding its board of directors to include Trump’s former acting national intelligence director Ric Grenell and his former acting attorney general, Matt Whitaker. They will serve alongside former Florida state Attorney General Pam Bondi, who defended Trump in his first impeachment trial.
Nothing concrete would happen until after the midterm elections, but with Trump, it wouldn’t be very far into 2023, if not sooner, that he would likely announce a 2024 run if he’s going to pull the trigger. The door does seem to be left open for the chance that he doesn’t, which is also possible. It could be a means to hold a grip on the party simply by showing possible intent or ability to run and possibly win, to keep his GOP rivals in check.
Steve Schale, the CEO of Biden’s super PAC, says the numbers seem plausible right now because the current President has taken a beating in the court of public opinion:
Steve Schale, CEO for Unite The Country, said he had no reason to doubt Fabrizio’s polling for Trump as Biden’s poll numbers have dropped for months. But Schale noted that midterm polling a year out is hardly predictive of what happens in a presidential election in three years.
“There are historical headwinds we’re facing, that any president faces during a midterm: five of the last seven midterm elections have been wave cycles for the other party,” Schale said.
If Biden’s prospects don’t turn around soon, Trump will be the least of his worries as it’s unlikely Democrats would want to risk running him again in 2024 if his approval numbers remain in the toilet. Running against Trump for him might be easier than say, Ron DeSantis, a Trump-like guy without full-blown Trumpiness.
Republican Glenn Youngkin wrote a new playbook in the Virginia gubernatorial race earlier this month, embracing Trump’s ability to fight a culture war, build a strong relationship with his base of voters, and drive a broadly acceptable populist message, but stay away from the mean tweets. The result? A big win back in the suburbs of the nervous box wine moms who voted for Biden in 2020 just to avoid criticism at the next neighborhood cul-de-sac gathering.
Make no mistake, Trump seems eminently electable in 2024, at least as it stands in 2022, against Joe Biden. The kicker is whether Democrats want to risk running such a weak candidate getting less popular by the day. If Biden doesn’t run for reflection in 2024, does that make Trump more or less likely to run? I’m not sure I can answer that one.
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