Trumps electoral stance is not as disastrous as the Democrats say, but overall it is indeed weaker than it was four years ago. In addition, today his opponents treat him with great attention and seriousness, and direct more resources and energy to ensuring that he doesnt get a second term in office, Valdai Club expert Maxim Suchkov writes.
In 2016, America was preparing to elect its first female president. The overwhelming majority of polls showed that the majority of voters favoured Hillary Clinton. Leading forecasters used this data as proof that democratic America could not prefer a reality TV presenter and not-always-successful businessman to a woman who had devoted several decades to serving the country. Clinton herself was actively preparing to move into the White House, experts from Washington think-tanks were eyeing pre-assigned positions in the new administration, and the liberal media actively camouflaged the failures of Clintons election campaign with revelations of her opponents sex scandals and politically incorrect statements.
The morning after the elections, this idyll fell apart, and shortly thereafter, the four years of Trumps term in office began. Four years of tireless struggle have pitted the American establishment and liberal media with those who vowed to separate, as it seemed, the wheat of good old America from the chaff of the deep state. Over these years, America and the world have changed enough to make much of the world tired of America, and America tired of itself.
Today the situation seems to be repeating itself. Absolutely all the main polls (those which supposedly have the most effective, objective and proven methodologies) talk about Bidens 7-14% advantage over Trump. Negative assessments of the Democratic candidate are significantly less pronounced than those of Clinton four years ago. Trumps presidency is not easy emotionally: every day, the public is presented with new eccentricities of the President, talk about endless admiration for Putin, the insults he uses against his opponents and his attacks on the media. The year of the presidential election has turned out to be quite turbulent: mistakes have been made in the fight against the coronavirus infection, and criminal chaos persists on the streets of American cities, provoked by the killing of George Floyd in police custody and driven by the BLM movement and Antifa. While some Democratic Party officials can be considered partly responsible, consolidating the image of Trump as “evil” has been the last attempt of his opponents to contribute to the fight against the destroyer of American democracy.”