Why Trump’s strength is illusory

The Times released a new poll this week showing that Donald Trump is ahead of Joe Biden in five crucial swing states, and that he’s leading because of monumental upheavals within the president’s coalition.

The popular takeaway Monday was that Trump is a strong candidate, because of adverse reactions among Democratic voters to the president’s economic policies and approach to the Israel-Hamas war.

Trump is weak, though.

The Times poll shows it.

To be sure, the numbers are what they are. They suggest the former president’s “strength among young and nonwhite voters,” Nate Cohn wrote, and that “has at least temporarily upended the electoral map.”

Trump is surging, he said, “to a significant lead in Arizona, Georgia and Nevada — relatively diverse Sun Belt states where Black and Hispanic voters propelled Mr. Biden to signature victories in the 2020 election.”

However, the appearance of Trump’s strength is just that. It’s based on the idea, underscored by this poll, that he’s witnessing a “breakthrough among traditionally Democratic young, Black and Hispanic voters” who expressed “discontent over the economy and the war in Gaza.”

But deep into the piece, Cohn acknowledges that such an appearance “may not rest on a solid foundation.” Trump’s strength, he said, “is concentrated among irregular, disengaged voters who do not pay close attention to politics and may not yet be tuned into the race,” he wrote. “They may be prone to shift their views as the race gets underway."

Trump’s strength is illusory.

Also deep in Cohn’s piece is this:

“Around 13 percent of the voters who say they voted for Mr. Biden last time, but do not plan to do so again, said that his foreign policy or the war in Gaza was the most important issue to their vote,” Cohn wrote.

That’s around one in 10 Biden voters. That’s, you know, not a lot of people, who may also “shift their views as the race gets underway."

The numbers contradict themselves, but they also contradict history. Black Americans, especially Black women, are the beating heart of the Democratic Party, and they have been a pivotal voting bloc since Franklin Roosevelt’s Democrats passed the Social Security Act of 1935.

Yet this new poll suggests a massive, epochal shift, with Trump winning more than 20 percent of Black voters – “a tally,” Cohn said, “that would be the highest level of Black support for any Republican presidential candidate since the enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1964."

That’s … just not believable, but I guess that’s what we can expect from a poll that also asked respondents whether the president bears any responsibility for the fall of abortion rights. The Times knows for a fact that he has no responsibility, whatsoever, and that Trump is entirely to blame. Even so, the Times asked, and lo! Twenty percent blame Biden.

Michael Herriot explained the disconnect between the numbers and the apparent disconnect with Black American political history. In 2020, he said, Trump won 8 percent of the Black vote. The poll’s “weighted sample contains 391 Black voters. Thirteen percent of all respondents were between 18-29. If weighted the same as the total group, in this poll, the difference between 8 percent and 20 percent is six responses.

“Yep,” he said. “Even with all that math and science, the entire notion that Trump is gaining ground among 1.2 million young Black voters is essentially based on phone conversations with six Black people.

“Six.”

There’s reason why it’s incredible to see a poll finding that Donald Trump is winning more than 20 percent of Black voters – “a tally,” Cohn said, “that would be the highest level of Black support for any Republican presidential candidate since the enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1964” – and that’s because it’s literally incredible.

Trump’s strength is illusory.

The problem isn’t the Times poll. It is what it is. The problem is the Times poll being taken as the voice of God. It’s not. There are plenty of other polls, many of them higher in quality, but only the Times has the influence and prestige that sends liberals and Democrats into a panic.

And the problem is the Times’ interpretation of the Times poll, as if that, too, were the voice of God. It’s not that either. As I have demonstrated, I can spin the same numbers differently. Where the Times chose to highlight Trump’s strength, I chose to highlight his weakness. I think my interpretation is better. It’s grounded in history.

I’ll close with this curiosity. Nowhere in the Times interpretation of the Times poll is there an acknowledgement of the risk being taken by the Republican Party in sticking with Donald Trump, nor is there recognition that the Times’ poll itself continues to expose that risk.

All things being equal, and they are pretty equal, even by the standards of the Times’ polling, victory for Trump may depend on an epochal realignment among Black voters. In order to win, his tally of Black voters has to be better than any GOP candidate in the last 60 years.

That’s incredible.

And incredibly weak.