With less than 100 days to go before Election Day, optimistic Republicans maintain that there is plenty of time for President Trump to steady his campaign and come up with a winning strategy. But there are at least two groups that may sink his hopes and it looks like little can be done to get them to change their minds.
It’s no secret the president has always had a problem with women. Over a long period of time, Donald Trump has never hidden his sexist views about women. His interviews on the Howard Stern show, revealed his attitude that women are a thing to be toyed with and not to be shown any respect.
The now famous “Access Hollywood” interview, in which the president called his disgusting comments “locker room talk,” didn’t change the mind of many of the women voters. Luckily for Trump, many women liked Hillary Clinton even less and Trump was the beneficiary.
There is no recent president other than Mr. Trump, who is said to have paid $135,000 to a stripper to keep her from talking nor is there any president who is alleged to have been having an affair with a Playboy Playmate soon after their wives had given birth. That’s definitely not a winning strategy with the female world.
If you have ever watched one of those presidential press conferences, the interaction between the president and male reporters compared to the female media is clearly visible. The president is often hostile to the men asking questions, but when it comes to the women, he is nasty and insulting. He has often challenged their competence and on a number of occasions, he has been totally mean-spirited in his answers.
Are the potential women voters watching the president? It seems so. The most recent Fox News poll shows that Vice President Joe Biden leads Donald Trump by 19 percent among women in general. In the case of suburban women, Biden enjoys a 22 percent advantage. The president’s efforts to win back women voters are evident in his commercials claiming that all women will be in danger if the Democrats win in November.
In the battleground states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, Fox reports that women favor Mr. Biden over Trump by a 53 to 35 percent margin. So much for the women. The second and equally dangerous group are senior citizens. Back in 2016, senior citizens were guaranteed Trump voters. But that is changing.
The latest national polls show seniors supporting Joe Biden by a margin of 54 to 37 percent in Michigan and there are similar numbers in other key states. In Florida, which has been wracked by the pandemic, seniors favor Biden over Trump by 11 points. That is a scary number for Trump campaign officials because in 2016, seniors gave the majority of their votes to Trump.
The Covid-19 virus has had a dramatic impact on the thinking of many voters. Seniors are the most likely group to contract the virus and stories about the thousands who died in nursing homes have made seniors even more panicky. As we go into the month of August, the president has done nothing to make America feel like he cares about the death toll. He wants the country to go back to business and the country isn’t ready to go there.
There is no doubt that almost every minority group will not vote for Mr. Trump. If you subtract the majority of women and seniors from his camp, his prospects to get to 270 electoral votes are not very good. Two other groups that get less mention are independents and white voters with no college degree.
The latest opinion polls show that Biden has gotten fresh support from the independents and is close to breaking even with the non-college voters. So is there a chance that the president can revive his flagging numbers and turn the election into his favor? Like any election, the answer is yes.
The three presidential debates may change the equation or the October surprise of a new vaccine could help the incumbent. But at this stage, I would rather be Biden than Trump.
