Election Day is finally here and before I settle to watch the returns, I wanted to write a brief piece about where I think the race stands. I have been very negative about Trump’s prospects for re-election. I was 100% sure he would lose and drag the GOP down with him up until Joe Biden chose Kamala Harris as his running. Documentary evidence below:
It wasn’t just the Kamala pick. Although initially the protests sparked by the death of George Floyd enjoyed approval across racial lines, as they became more violent and as the anti-white rhetoric increased, the racial attitudes returned to norm i.e. white opposing the protests while black support remained unchanged. The Democrats were too slow to condemn the violence and that hurt the Biden/Harris ticket.
Whatever ground Biden lost over the protest, he regained it back in the first debate which was an epic disaster for the president. The Trump campaign spent the entire summer portraying Biden as a dementia patient who would meltdown during the debates. Not only did Biden not meltdown, Trump reminded white suburban voters why they despise him. Following the first debate, Biden build up a huge lead but Trump started to chip away at it.
Starting with the vice presidential debate, the Trump campaign began turning the tide. Vice President Mike Pence absolutely crushed Kamala Harris. She did not come across as well informed, her nervous laugh is annoying and her “I am speaking” line came across as rehearsed and insincere. It was clear that Biden blundered his first presidential decision just like John McCain did in choosing Sarah Palin. When will old candidates for president learn to choose wisely their vice president????
Trump contracting COVID may be the best thing that happened to his campaign. His quick recovery, followed by a campaign schedule that would tire much younger men, showed seniors that the virus is not a death sentence. After all, Trump is in his 70s, he’s overweight and yet in just a few days he bounced back. It wasn’t just Trump recovering. Chris Christie, another very high risk individual, also recovered relatively quickly. None of the other Senators who tested positive for the virus spent a day in the hospital. The virus is simply not the killer that it was back in March.
The Democrats bet everything on COVID or, more precisely, on Trump’s mishandling of the pandemic. They are counting on voters being as terrified of the virus as they were when it first landed on our shores. However, it may turn out that COVID hurt them more than Trump. Biden was reduced to fear mongering about a “dark winter” in the final days while Trump was delivering an upbeat message about “rounding the corner”. The focus on the virus may have also hurt Democrats by having to rely on mail-in votes. It will also be interesting to see whether the closing of universities and churches impaired the turnout of students and “Souls to the Polls” – two key demographics for the Democratic Party.
Trump’s recovery was not the only good news for his campaign. The death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg provided Trump the opportunity to deliver a solid conservative majority on the Supreme Court. Amy Coney Barrett’s performance during the confirmation hearings and her entire biography probably helped the president recover Republican leaning women in the Mid-West and gain Catholic voters. The GDP bouncing back 33%. All these factors allowed Trump to surge in the last couple of weeks of the campaign. The only question that remains is whether Trump ran out of time. We will know in a few hours.
