The recent 2024 polls have been all over the place. But taken together, they still confirm just how competitive – and relatively stable – the contest between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump remains with nearly six months to go until Election Day. CNN's latest national poll found Trump up by 6 points (though still within the margin of error). NBC News' survey had Trump ahead by 2 points, while Marist had Biden leading by 3 points (both within the margin of error). And polls from Quinnipiac University and the Pew Research Center showed essentially a tied race. And the battleground state polling – especially in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – is just as close. No matter the survey you pick, the new polls underscore that voters continue to have fonder memories of Trump's presidency than they do of Biden's – and that maybe should concern Biden's re-election campaign more than any horse-race result out there. Take the CNN poll, for example, which finds 55% of Americans saying that Trump's presidency was a success, versus 39% who said the same of Biden's presidency. More strikingly, 61% in the CNN poll believe Biden's presidency has been a failure, compared with 44% who say that about Trump's presidency. Or look at last week's national NBC News poll, which showed Trump holding a 7-point lead over which candidate had the stronger record of accomplishment (46% of voters chose Trump, while 39% chose Biden). Or consider the Pew poll, which found 42% of voters saying Trump was a good or great president, versus 28% who said the same about Biden. Or even take the CBS News battleground poll of Michigan, which had Biden ahead by 2 points among likely voters in the state, but also showed 62% saying the condition of Michigan's economy under Trump was very or fairly good, compared with 38% who say the same of Michigan's economy today. The glass-half-full-news for Biden is that he has a strong story to tell voters – with the unemployment rate at a historically low level and hundreds of thousands of jobs being created each month. Team Biden can also remind voters about the millions of jobs lost during Trump's final year as president, when Covid wrecked the labor market. The Biden campaign has aired TV ads attacking Trump’s handling of the economy. Still, voters consistently say they have sunny perceptions of Trump's presidency and cloudy views of Biden's. That’s more revealing than any horse-race poll. |