Trump Is Mad at Polls Showing He Might Lose in 2020
Photo courtesy of Getty Politics Features Donald Trump
For a long time now, polls have showed that most Democratic candidates for president would fare well against Donald Trump in the 2020 general election, and the latest came Wednesday from ABC/WaPo:
New @ABC News/WaPo poll: https://t.co/x33Ow3gb89
Trump v. Biden: 38-54%
Trump v. Sanders: 40-52%
Trump v. Warren: 40-51%
Trump v. Harris: 40-50%
Trump v. Buttigieg: 41-47%— ABC News (@ABC) September 11, 2019
Again, this is not new, but something about it clearly woke the Trumpian Dragon:
In a hypothetical poll, done by one of the worst pollsters of them all, the Amazon Washington Post/ABC, which predicted I would lose to Crooked Hillary by 15 points (how did that work out?), Sleepy Joe, Pocahontas and virtually all others would beat me in the General Election….
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 11, 2019
….This is a phony suppression poll, meant to build up their Democrat partners. I haven’t even started campaigning yet, and am constantly fighting Fake News like Russia, Russia, Russia. Look at North Carolina last night. Dan Bishop, down big in the Polls, WINS. Easier than 2016!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 11, 2019
As Vox explains, the Trump-Clinton polls weren’t as bad as he claims, and in fact the ABC/WaPo poll he bashes specifically was still within the margin of error—they called it 47-43 for Clinton, and it ended up 48-46 for Clinton.
None of that matters, clearly. This one got under Trump’s skin, and he even trotted out a few nicknames in his rage. “Pocahontas” made a comeback, along with “Sleepy Joe,” but for some reason we didn’t get a “Crazy Bernie.” Is Trump part of the mainstream media conspiracy to silence Sanders?
He’s right about the fact that polls can change between now and the election, but what Trump seems to ignore in these diatribes is that no matter who he faces, the candidate won’t be as bad as Hillary Clinton, who had to be historically bad to give him a chance to squeeze out an electoral victory. Without that kind of figure standing opposite him, the 2020 election will always be a hard ask.