The Republican National Convention has just kicked off and Donald Trump is the first incumbent president in over two decades to be heading into the conventions over nine points down in the polls. The convention placed a major emphasis on Donald Trump and his family. A large part of it was fearmongering the Democrats and a large number of claims were downright false.
After the DNC wrapped up last week, new polls released over the weekend do show a slight edge for Joe Biden, but nothing compared to physical conventions. It is, therefore, expected that Donald Trump’s numbers will not rise significantly after this year’s virtual convention, which was originally scheduled to be held in Charlotte, North Carolina. The largest realistic gain for Donald Trump is about two to three points, which would still put him over seven points behind Joe Biden in the national average.
Some speakers at night one of the RNC included Donald Trump, the president; Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son; Nikki Haley, former S.C. governor; Tim Scott, S.C. Senator; Jim Jordan, Ohio Congressman; Charlie Kirk, founder of far-right youth conservative group Turning Point USA; and the McCloskeys, a St. Louis couple who raised their guns at BLM protesters. In case you haven’t gotten the point already, all of these people are staunch supporters of President Trump and hold far-right, conservative views. This is a major problem for the Republican Party—there are fewer and fewer moderates willing to endorse Donald Trump for president, which may put off many moderate Republican voters and independents. Many less-extreme Republicans, in fact, have chosen to endorse Joe Biden for president. Even former president George W. Bush isn’t endorsing Trump for president. Based on tonight’s convention, the Republicans really aren’t doing much to please more moderate voters, which could impact November’s elections. Just today, a long list of retired Republican congressmen and senators all endorsed Joe Biden for president.
Another ill-prepared segment of the convention was where speakers praised the administration’s handling over the COVID-19 pandemic. At no point was it mentioned that almost 180,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 or that the president had ignored serious warnings about the disease. In all honesty, the videos and speakers seemed to be discussing an alternate reality. This may not play well for the many thousands of people who lost a family member to the pandemic. Imagine losing a loved one, and then the president telling you that he did an excellent job and was an amazing leader. How would that go down?
There was also an excessive amount of false or otherwise over-exaggerated claims made at the convention. Some false statements include saying that Democrats “want a government takeover of health care,” wanted to “abolish suburbs,” “were trying to take away your guns,” were trying to get rid of postal workers, and that Democrats wanted to “defund the police.” In addition, other false claims include claiming Donald Trump “built the most inclusive economy ever, with record low unemployment for African Americans” with the “lowest unemployment in 50 years,” that “Trump’s policies have been like rocket fuel to the economy and especially the middle class,” and lots more. These are clearly false claims and make assertions which aren’t supported by Joe Biden nor other Democrats.
The conference was also used by Trump and his allies to throw all manners of unfounded accusations against Democrats, to continue his crusade against vote-by-mail, and bash Joe Biden on every issue at every moment possible.
In general, the conference highlighted the “Trumpification” of the Republican Party, signaling a major shift rightward in the party. Gone are the days of moderate Republicans climbing the ranks. To put it more blankly, the party now seems more concerned with sucking up at Donald Trump than upholding the party’s principles.
There seems to be a lot working against Donald Trump this year. He will be facing the most polarized election in a very long time, while many of his party’s members are turning against him, resulting in major internal turmoil, not too dissimilar to the Democratic Party in 2016. It would be virtually impossible for him to flip any state that voted for Clinton in 2016, and the Rust Belt is showing major leads for Joe Biden. As seen by the electoral map below, if the Rust Belt flips, no matter where the other 135 tossup electoral votes go, it’s all over for Trump.
To win, he truly will have to pull a miracle. We will find out in just over 70 days to see if he can do the impossible.
In other news, Black Lives Matter protests have been reignited over the near-fatal shooting of an unarmed Wisconsin Black man by a police officer, the Postmaster General has been grilled by a Democrat-led House panel, and a judge in Florida is blocking the requirement that all schools reopen for in-person class.