Trump says it's 'very unfair' his poll numbers are so low

A bevy of new polling over the weekend suggests Donald Trump’s reelection bid in serious peril, with Joe Biden leading by an average of 7.2%, according to RealClearPolitics.

A CNN poll released Monday morning showed Trump at his lowest point yet, trailing Biden by a whopping 14 points. The survey — which found Trump’s approval rating falling 7 points — showed Biden leading Trump 55% to 41%.

A handful of other high-quality polls showed Biden with a lead in the high single digits.

The polling comes as Trump faces criticism for his response to protests against police brutality and systemic racism in the United States, which were sparked by the death of George Floyd in late May.

It also comes as more than 20 million Americans remain out of work thanks to the fallout from the coronavirus, which has now killed more than 110,000 people in the United States.

Trump made excuses about his standing in the polls, blaming his numbers of the Russia investigation and impeachment — even though Trump’s campaign has said impeachment would be good for his reelection chances.

“If I wasn’t constantly harassed for three years by fake and illegal investigations, Russia, Russia, Russia, and the Impeachment Hoax, I’d be up by 25 points on Sleepy Joe and the Do Nothing Democrats,” Trump tweeted on Sunday night. “Very unfair, but it is what it is!!!”

Trump’s standing in the polls less than five months from Election Day is bad news for him.

At this same point in the 2016 cycle, Trump trailed Hillary Clinton by 3.1%, according to the RealClearPolitics average. And in 2016, the race tightened multiple times, with Trump even taking a lead or narrowing the gap to almost 0 multiple times throughout the cycle.

This time around, however, Trump has never once led Biden in head-to-head polling, with Biden always holding at least a 4% lead over Trump.

The polling is so grim for Trump that his advisers gathered last week to try to come up with a new narrative to change the direction of the race, according to a report from Axios. But Trump has never shown a willingness to expand beyond his core base of supporters — which is not enough to win reelection as independents sharply swing toward Biden.

Any changes in messaging from the campaign are often short-lived, ended either by a Trump tweet or outburst from a media question.

Ultimately, while there are still a few months to go until voters head to the polls, election experts say Trump is in bad shape.

Nate Cohn, the elections and polling expert at the New York Times, said Biden’s current polling lead is so big it “would easily withstand another 2016-sized polling error or a wide gap between the Electoral College and the nation as a whole.”

And Harry Enten, a polling expert at CNN, said Trump is in worse shape than Clinton was.

“Joe Biden hits a milestone Hillary Clinton never did from June onward: 50%,” Enten tweeted. “Unlike four years ago, Trump will likely need to win back voters who are already backing the Dem nominee.”

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.