Donald Trump is not as popular as everyone thinks
www.newsweek.com
On Super Tuesday, the former president lost the state of Vermont and more than 2 million votes to Nikki Haley.

Despite resounding victories on Super Tuesday, there are indications that Donald Trump is still struggling to get strong, united Republican support, which he may need in the presidential election.

Speaking to CNN about the Super Tuesday results, columnist and political commentator Molly Jong-Fast said: "There is a real ‘Never Trump’ contingent, and remember, Trump is a primary candidate. He has only ever tried to appeal to Republican primary voters, and he cannot marshal that group together the way he needs to.

“Part of his trick in 2016 was, he got these low-frequency voters out, these people who almost never voted, which is why the polling was so off, and you’re just not seeing that same type of enthusiasm.”

  • Hapankaali@lemmy.world
    1·
    9 months ago

    I remember. The polls were accurate. The pundits were not. People were shocked because they didn’t want to believe that there are really that many loathsome morons around, not because they looked at what polls said.

    Here are the main polls for that race on the eve of the election. What they actually said was that the race was close to a tossup, with Clinton perhaps very slightly favoured to win.

    Here and here are favourability ratings. As you can see, Trump’s are substantially less negative.

    • KevonLooney@lemm.eeOP
      01·
      9 months ago

      You are comparing “approval” ratings with “favorability” ratings. Trump has no favorability ratings because he’s not in office. These are not the same.

      Biden’s “favorability” is lower because there are people who want him to be more progressive. That doesn’t mean they won’t vote for him in a race against Trump.

      You can’t use “favorability” to gauge whether people will vote because it compares the candidate to a mythical generic person. The ballot doesn’t ask “do you like what Joe Biden is doing?” it asks “do you prefer Biden or Trump?”

      Those are very different questions. Biden will pull ahead once people actually think about Trump being president. It’s not a hypothetical like in 2016. He was president and he lost in 2020.