As I began to write this article I thought to myself: "It's almost like Joe Biden is trying to lose the 2024 presidential election." While the embattled president might not be trying to lose in November, virtually every action he takes (or fails to take) and every utterance he mumbles suggest otherwise.
The latest Rasmussen Reports poll, released on Friday, further confirms Biden's difficult position.
The bottom line: Former President Donald Trump’s lead over Biden has nearly doubled since the previous Rasmussen Reports poll, and could increase even more after Friday's unexpected jump in unemployment.
The latest 2024 election numbers ... had Trump at 46%, Biden at 36%, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at 9%.
Last month, Trump led Biden by 6 points, 44%-38%.
In a five-person race that included two other long shots, Trump expanded his lead over Biden to 12 points, 48%-36%.
The new survey of likely voters showed that Trump has taken support from both Biden and Kennedy.
The poll also showed Trump maintaining his support with black voters, a demographic that typically votes for Democrats at 90 percent or more. Rasmussen found Trump's support among black voters at 21 percent, while the former president was favored over Biden by Hispanic voters, 41 percent to 33 percent. The impact of both demographic votes cannot be overstated.
While Rasmussen didn't suggest why Trump is surging, it doesn't take a proverbial rocket scientist to figure it out— starting with the contrast between Trump's reality and that of Biden.
As Trump's New York City hush money trial continues in Manhattan, the former president participates in daily press briefings with the media outside the courthouse. And as Naomi Wolf pointed out, Trump has either "become much more personable or he’s getting great advice and taking it."
"Which (either way) shows evolution" on Trump's part, Wolf added.
Trump has also seemingly been more focused on his second-term agenda.
Meanwhile, everything Biden touches (or refuses to touch) turns to— you know.
From bungling the Israel-Hamas war to continuing inflation, including ever-increasing grocery prices, to fumbling his response to antisemitic demonstrations on college campuses across America, Biden has always been and remains his own worst enemy.
Toss in the 81-year-old president's continuing cognitive decline, and visuals like White House staff attempting to conceal his stilted walk to or from Marine One on the White House lawn, and it's easy to see why the 2024 election continues to slip away from Joe.
Incidentally, Rasmussen's Daily Presidential Tracking Poll on Friday shows 40 percent of likely voters approve of Biden's job performance, while 59 percent disapprove. The figures include 22 percent of voters who strongly approve of the president's job performance and 49 percent who strongly disapprove.
In other words, Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. is in deep doo-doo, and the doo-doo continues to deepen.