What Is Donald Trump’s Mandate?

Voters want big changes from Biden’s failed policies, but many are not in Trump’s plan.

Democratic leaders sound understandably cautious when talking about whether President Donald Trump has a mandate, or what steps Democrats should take now. They are respecting the voters who put Trump back in office, and they recognize the elites have gotten a lot of hot-button issues wrong.

We will have no clue about the Trump mandate or what Democrats should do, of course, unless we are frank about what happened with Joe Biden and what changes voters want. Major parts of the mandate will help Trump, but failure to deliver change will hurt. And other parts of Trump’s agenda insult voters in ways that will push down his already unimpressive approval ratings.

Knowing what happened starts with knowing voters were more fearful of “Biden continuing as President” than “Trump winning a second term.” A 53 percent majority in a Democracy Corps survey felt that. And that majority grew to 54 percent after seeing all the Trump attacks.

President Joe Biden gave an upbeat account of his progress, but he was deeply and singularly unpopular. About 60 percent disapproved of his presidency in our November election poll. And other polls have shown his approval and favorability decline further as he left office in January.

Kamala Harris ran much worse with working-class voters than Biden did in 2020, but his approval in our November poll was below her vote. His support was eroding further. And how do you get a strong vote in the base when 37 percent of Blacks, 56 percent of Hispanics, and 59 percent of white millennials disapproved of Biden on Election Day?

According to Gallup, 3 in 5 Americans thought the country “lost ground” under Biden on debt, immigration, crime, the economy, “the gap between the wealthy and less well-off,” and “United States’ position in the world.”

What is so difficult for all of us to process is that Trump has a mandate to fix where Biden failed on the border, the economy, crime in cities, and certain aspects of the woke agenda. Those actions will help Trump.

The full article can be read at The American Prospect.

Donald Trump Won as the Champion of Working-Class Discontent

Kamala Harris had a more powerful offer, but feared being anti-business.

Donald Trump won the 2024 election because he was the change candidate who championed working-class discontent. He also successfully branded Kamala Harris, so voters worried about the kind of changes she would bring.

Harris had been speaking to more powerful currents of working-class discontent, and that put her in the lead. She promised to help with the cost of living, blamed monopolies for inflation, and vowed to shift power from the billionaires to the middle class. But she became ambivalent about championing those changes. That allowed Trump to regain momentum and win.

I do not believe Trump’s winning coalition will endure. Trump won a mandate on immigration, prices, and anti-“woke” policies, but he’s can’t maintain all of those priorities. Prices won’t rapidly fall unless there’s a damaging recession. His policies may raise interest rates, mortgage payments, and credit card debt. Tariffs may raise prices. And Trump is going to give the billionaires and big corporations the sweetest tax cut possible and make it as hard as possible for workers.

But Democrats will be forced to address many of the challenges raised by this election.

The full article can be read at The American Prospect.

The Campaign That Pushed Harris Into a Tie With Donald Trump

A closing act that battles for the middle class again can change the race.

The Harris campaign had been moving effectively into at least a 3-point national lead, with impressive margins in the key battleground states, until it stalled and slipped into an effectively tied race. Knowing why will enable Democrats to close the high-stakes 2024 campaign with a focused campaign that engages voters and wins.

Election margins shift on this scale when the competing party bases get more people united, registered, and turned out to vote.

Biden was slipping to at least a 3-point deficit when he passed the torch to Kamala Harris. I was sending daily emails to the Biden team. The reason I was confident she would reverse the slide and move into a big lead was because Biden was underperforming with the young, millennials, unmarried women, Blacks, and Hispanics. Three in five Democratic base voters thought the country was on the wrong track. She was looking at a base that was discontented and wanted visible change.

The full article can be read at The American Prospect.

Trump Is Laser-Focused on the Final Duel. Harris Is Not.

That will put Trump and Vance in the White House.

This is a change election increasingly dominated by two dominant factors. The most important is voters choosing which leader will stand with the hardworking middle class being hit by high prices and the cost of living, while the big corporations make super profits at its expense.

And the second is who will get control of the border and immigration, while U.S. citizens get in line for public services.

Likely voters put cost of living 18 points higher in importance than the border, but both of them well above everything else.

You can see voters’ increased anger in the double-digit rise in those choosing those two issues. This is how voters are expressing their feeling of being victimized and wronged. With both, they see changes in the policy offer that will make their lives better if the right side wins. They get excited about bold offers, like the expanded monthly tax credit and big corporations paying their fair share. They also like closing the border or building a wall.

The full article can be read at The American Prospect.

Will Democratic Reformers Save America?

Donald Trump has reshaped the electorate, but by focusing on the cost of living, Harris could still make meaningful gains.

We are five weeks away from Election Day in the 2024 presidential election, and the right-wing populist party led by Donald Trump is competitive.

Nonetheless, the Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris will likely win. She has a 3-point lead in national polls. And according to my new poll for Democracy Corps, as well as most surveys in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, she has momentum in the Rust Belt. She is winning by about 2 points in each state, putting her ahead of Joe Biden’s razor-thin margins four years ago. Our poll shows increased support for Democrats in the House and Senate battlegrounds as well.

The full article can be read at The American Prospect.