Donald Trump would be on track to win a historic landslide in November — if so many US voters didn’t find him personally repugnant.
Roughly 53 percent of Americans have an unfavorable opinion of the former president. And yet, when asked about Trump’s ability to handle key issues — or the impact of his policies — voters routinely give the Republican candidate higher marks than President Biden.
In a YouGov survey released this month, Trump boasted an advantage over Biden on 10 of the 15 issues polled. On the three issues that voters routinely name as top priorities — the economy, immigration, and inflation — respondents said that Trump would do a better job by double-digit margins.
Meanwhile, in a recent New York Times/Siena College poll, 40 percent of voters said that Trump’s policies had helped them personally, while just 18 percent said the same of Biden. If Americans could elect a normal human being with Trump’s reputation for being “tough” on immigration and good at economics, they would almost certainly do so.
Biden is fortunate that voters do not have that option. But to erase Trump’s small but stubborn lead in the polls, the president needs to erode his GOP rival’s advantage on the issues.
Gridlock doesn’t benefit Democrats like it does Republicans.
How so?
Democrats run on a platform of “we want to do x, y, and z to make things better. Vote us in and we will do those things.”
Republicans run on a platform of “we want to destroy things a, b, and c to make things better. Vote us in and we will destroy those things.”
Filibustering helps destroy things. It does not help to build things.
It’s easier to destroy than build.