Steering wheel
It is now less than half a year before the US presidential election.Trump is undoubtedly one of the most polarized presidents in American history.American politicians and observers are asking the same question: What will have a significant impact on the Trump's campaign for re -election in Trump's campaign?
On the surface, protests are helpful for Trump's re -election, and it has adversely affected Democratic candidate Biden.Because Trump can now take this opportunity to focus on restoring the legal system; his Democratic opponent is now calling for reducing the appropriation of the police system.This will make Biden lose a large number of votes with a mild political attitude, including white middle -class women living in the suburbs.
Economist Weekly commentators said that from a historical point of view, Republican presidential candidates often benefit from street violence, while Democrats have benefited from peaceful resistance.However, with today's domestic situation in the United States, there are multiple misunderstandings of economists.
First, many people abroad think that the riots brought by the protests will cause widespread dissatisfaction among the American people.However, the latest polls show that most American voters support the current protests.Many American voters believe that the existing police system must be fully reformed.Voters holding this view, among those with no obvious party tendencies, account for 76%; 53%of Republicans also support such views.Even among those who think that protests are too violent, 53%of people still support demonstrations.The polls also found that 61%of voters did not recognize Trump's way of dealing with protests.
In addition, 69%of Americans believe that George Middot; Freud's killing is not an isolated incident, but a part of the broader racial issues.In 2014, Middot, Midel, Ferguson, Missouri; after Brown was killed by the police, the public opinion survey that year found that only 43%of people held this view.This year's polls show that half of the Americans hope that the president can solve the problem of racial discrimination; 37%of Americans hope that the president can restore social order through legal channels.
As a president, Trump is now capable of restoring the legal system under the legal framework, but many voters do not trust him and believe that he has repeatedly called the protesters on Twitter as a mob, and it is impossible to expect him to achieve racial reconciliation.
Second, although many protesters demand reduction of funding to the police system, Democratic candidates Biden did not support the reduction of police funds.Trump can claim that Democrats and presidential candidates are affected by radical left -wing, but voters also see that radical left -wing people cannot force Biden to accept the administrative program he disagree.
During the mid -2018 election, Trump popularized its Republican Party to attack the Democratic leaders in the same way, but voters were not controlled by such remarks.In the end, the Democratic Party recaptured the House of Representatives, which was originally controlled by the Republican Party in the election.
Third, these protests broke out during the coronary virus epidemic, and more than 100,000 people had died of the epidemic.The epidemic triggered an economic recession and pushed the unemployment rate to the highest level (13.3%) since the Great Depression, and the living standards of American voters were seriously affected.
Judging from historical experience, street violence in the United States helps Republican candidates to win support from voters;situation.At present, the economic situation in the United States is worrying. Trump constantly brags about economic recovery, but there are many potential crisis. If there is no major change before November, his campaign will be a fatal blow.
Fourth, the domestic situation in the United States is changing, and no one has expected that the epidemic is not over, and the national anti -racial discrimination protests have occurred.What happens next, no one can accurately predict.In the past, the United States has also had a major epidemic in infectious diseases, and has experienced many economic recessions, as well as various large -scale protests. However, the United States has never experienced economic recession, outbreak, and national protests at the same time.
In the end, there is no reason to think that Trump can convert protests into his political advantages.However, Trump is a presidential candidate who cannot predict common sense.Can he get re -election again?I think that the vote is over less than November, and no one can predict.Who thinks he can predict, it just shows that he does not understand Trump.
However, one thing to be sure is that if you ask any Republicans on the streets of the United States, whether Trump can be successfully re -elected, most of the answers you get are yes; and ask any Democratic party, the answer may be the opposite.
The author is the State University of Pennsylvania, the United States
Associate Professor of the School of Communication
