If We Can't Win with Numbers Like This, It's Time to Move to Neptune

It might be time to move to Neptune anyway, but there is a case for optimism.

The Harvard/Harris poll, here, is not exactly known for beating the drum for conservative causes. So when it produces numbers like the ones it published yesterday, you can’t help but feel a bit better about the Republican Party’s chances next year. Let’s take a look.

— Country’s on the right track = 30%; wrong track = 62%.

— Roughly twice as many voters say their financial situation is getting worse than say it’s getting better, 49% to 26%.

— Biden is way underwater, with 53% disapproving his performance and 43% approving it. It’s been this way since last autumn.

— Biden is also in the tank on a big variety of specific issues. Oddly, he does best on handling COVID, with 49% approval. On no other issue does his approval reach even 45%. On dealing with crime and violence, it’s 37%; handling inflation comes in at 36%; and immigration (not surprisingly) brings up the rear at 35%.

— Neither political party is real popular. Republican approval is at 46% and the Democrats are at 45%. In my view, it’s remarkable that the parties are anywhere close, given the loud Democratic lean of almost all the MSM.

— None of the public figures the poll asked about is viewed favorably by a majority. Trump, Robert F. Kennedy and Elon Musk come closest with 45%. Right behind them are DeSantis (43%), Bernie Sanders (42%), and President Biden (41%). Hillary Clinton leads in public disapproval with 54%, followed by Biden (52%) and Trump (48%). Clinton also leads in strong disapproval with 40%, followed closely by Trump with 36%. The least disapproved figure among the arguably major candidates is Tim Scott, with only 25% disapproval.

— Public respect for major institutions has been falling for years if not decades, but two remain widely respected: the US military, viewed favorably by 79%, and the police, with 66%. Contrary to much of what we’ve been hearing from the press, the Supreme Court retains a decent favorability rating with 49%, well above the other two branches. Bringing up the rear are Black Lives Matter, CNN and MSNBC. But dead last are MAGA Republicans, the only group whose negative rating significantly exceeds its positive one.

— Trump overwhelms his Republican opposition for the nomination. This is hardly news, but the Harvard/Harris poll gives Trump even a bigger edge than I’ve seen before, 3 to 1 over Tim Scott and 2 to 1 over DeSantis. Biden is massively ahead of his Democratic rivals, and totally swamps the field with those in assisted living (sorry, some things I write by instinct).

— Biden’s major deficit (apart from ruinous policy), continues to be the public’s view that he’s just not up to it. By 3 to 2, respondents say he lacks the mental acuity for the office, and by 2 to 1, they say he’s too old. The press can hide a lot, and it does, but its ability to hide these facts has about run out.

— Trump wins a hypothetical matchup with Biden 45% to 39%, and with VP Harris, 47% to 40%. This is almost identical to the results the Washington Post/ABC poll found last month. DeSantis does not do nearly as well in such a matchup, barely edging out each. If this continues for very long, it’s going to do massive damage to DeSantis’ argument that he can beat Biden but Trump can’t.

— Of course Trump, like Biden, is no spring chicken. While 62% say Biden should not run for a second term, a reasonably close 55% say that Trump shouldn’t either. Big majorities of both parties (71% of Democrats and 61% of Republicans) say the county needs another choice beyond Biden v. Trump. (This tells me two things — that a third party could make some noise next year; and that despite their very large current leads, neither Biden nor Trump is a sure thing to get nominated. And the chance that public appreciation of either man will improve over time is, as we’ve seen, approximately zero).

— On the issues, Republicans retain their usual advantage when the discussion turns to taxes. Over 80% favor cutting taxes in their state while not even 20% oppose — although respondents were about evenly split on the idea of raising taxes on corporations and upper income individuals. On strengthening parents’ rights over their kids’ education and encouraging more charter schools, those in favor massively outnumber those opposed, by better than 3 to 1 (this was the issue that won Glenn Youngkin the Governor’s chair in blueish Virginia a year and a-half ago).

Abortion remains a potential trouble spot for Republicans. Evidence from last year persuades me that it’s a motivating issue for suburban voters who are vital to Republican success, but a majority of respondents (53% to 47%) were opposed to a law, like the one DeSantis recently sponsored in Florida, that would ban most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. A ban that firm and that early is simply not where the country is, and in my view, DeSantis is going to have to move toward the center on this question. Emphasizing his opposition to late term abortions (which opposition the poll finds wins a strong majority); or to abortions for sex selection or to harvest body parts, is one place he could start. With abortion as with everything else, you do not let the opposition frame the debate.

On the other hand, immigration is a DeSantis strong suit. More than two-thirds say that we should discourage illegal immigrants from settling in the United States. DeSantis’ bus rides and plane rides to states previously bellowing about their “compassionate” sanctuary status has been a masterstroke.

The poll also asked about the Trump indictment. I’ll save coverage of that for a later discussion, and will say for now only that decent majorities (55% and 56%, respectively) say that the prosecution is politically motivated and amounts to interference in the 2024 election, yet a slightly larger majority (58%) says that the Justice Department’s case is either somewhat or very strong — necessarily meaning that it thinks that Trump is probably guilty of some or perhaps many felony-level offenses. How that perception changes as the case unfolds is one of the head-scratching imponderables of the next several months.