In politics, a victory differential of 10 points or more is considered a landslide. Depending on the snapshot you use, Republicans are up by anywhere from 11 to 13 points heading into November’s midterm elections.
The latest poll from Rasmussen Reports found that if the election were held today, 50 percent of likely voters would choose the Republican candidate compared with 39 percent for the Democrat. Five percent would vote for “some other candidate,” and 7 percent would remain undecided. The report was released on Friday.
An 11 percent GOP advantage is no small thing. Generic congressional polls tend to favor Democrats. The fact that Republicans are so far ahead at the moment spells serious trouble for the Democrats’ current House majority.
If the GOP can maintain this edge, all indications show Republicans will win back control of Congress in a landslide.
Of course, the midterms are still seven-and-a-half months away, and much can change.
In March 2018, Democrats were ahead of Republicans by 46 percent to 40 percent. By November, the GOP had managed to close the gap and even take a small lead. A poll taken right before the 2018 midterms showed the Republicans with 46 percent and the Democrats, who won back the majority, with 45 percent.
The party of the president typically loses House seats in the midterms anyway. But making matters even worse for then-President Donald Trump in 2018 was the ongoing and fraudulent special counsel investigation. The Democrats had claimed he colluded with the Kremlin to win the 2016 election.
Rasmussen attributed the Republicans’ current lead to “greater GOP partisan intensity” and to strong Republican support among independent voters. The poll found that 46 percent of independents favored the Republican candidate compared with only 27 percent who preferred the Democrat, a difference of 19 percent.
The survey also found that 94 percent of Republicans would vote for their party’s candidate while 82 percent of Democrats said the same, a 12 percent differential.
The poll even showed a shift toward the GOP among black and other minority groups. Twenty-eight percent of black voters, 48 percent of other minorities and 54 percent of whites said they would support the Republican candidate.
Sixty-two percent of black voters, 35 percent of other minorities and 36 percent of whites would favor the Democrat.
The poll found that 49 percent of men and 50 percent of women would choose a Republican candidate.
Fifty-three percent of respondents age 40 or under preferred a Democratic candidate, while 31 percent favored a Republican. Among voters ages 40 or over, 59 percent chose the Republican.
Rasmussen surveyed 2,500 likely voters between March 13-17. The poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 2 percentage points with a 95 percent level of confidence.
A separate Rasmussen poll released on March 8 showed that over half of all respondents continue to “believe cheating affected the 2020 election.” It also found that voters strongly support an increase in U.S. fossil fuel production.
The final generic congressional polling average on the eve of the November 2020 election, as per Real Clear Politics, was 6.8 percent in favor of the Democrats.
What would account for such a dramatic reversal just 14 months into the Biden administration?
It probably began with that stack of executive orders President Joe Biden signed within hours of taking office. They included the revocation of the license for the Keystone XL Pipeline project and the moratorium on new oil and natural gas leases and drilling permits on federal lands and waters, which was the opening salvo in the administration’s war on fossil fuels.
Biden’s orders also relaxed the Trump administration’s tough stance on illegal immigration and pushed transgender rights and “racial equity.”
President Joe Biden signs executive orders targeting Trump policies on immigration, climate change, racial equity and the coronavirus pandemic. #Inauguration https://t.co/Hb0SEaiVJe
— The Associated Press (@AP) January 20, 2021
Biden officials proceeded to take wokeness to new levels, most notably in the military, with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s declaration that climate change and domestic terrorism were the most serious threats to U.S. national security.
Two months into Biden’s presidency, his top diplomats were utterly humiliated by their Chinese counterparts at a geopolitical summit in Alaska.
In July, Secretary of State Antony Blinken invited the United Nations to investigate “the scourge of racism, racial discrimination, and xenophobia” in the United States.
Biden’s most defining moment came in August with his disastrous exit from Afghanistan. His poor judgment and his projection of weakness had directly led to the fall of Kabul and the Taliban takeover of the country. It shook up the world order, undermined America’s standing in the world and emboldened our enemies. If Russian President Vladimir Putin had been wavering in his decision to invade Ukraine, this event gave him the green light.
It will take time for the United States to recover from that debacle. Strong leadership is needed. Even so, the world has become a far more dangerous place. It is unlikely that Biden himself will ever recover.
Coming quickly on the heels of our withdrawal from Afghanistan came the announcement of Biden’s vaccine mandates, possibly to reset the news cycle. Forcing Americans to decide between taking an experimental vaccine or losing their job, particularly the health care workers who had risked their lives in the early months of the pandemic, was unconscionable.
Throughout the fall, even as Putin was building up a troop presence along the Ukrainian border, Biden dithered. Had he been more decisive, he might have been able to prevent the Russian invasion of Ukraine. At the very least, he should have quietly led a NATO effort to prepare the country to defend itself.
Books could be written about the lunacy of the Iran nuclear deal Biden is close to signing. The very idea that Russia is negotiating the agreement defies logic.
I haven’t even mentioned the record levels of inflation or the sky-high price of gasoline that began long before Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
This is a failed administration.
Frankly, it’s surprising that so many Democrats still support Biden.
Story cited here.
