White House in ‘freakout mode’ as polling looks woeful for Biden

For the first time in living memory, America’s political observers are gripped by the outcome of this weekend’s Washington DC’s Republican primary.

In this city – a Democratic Party stronghold – the outcome of the Republican primary election is usually little-noticed. But with 19 convention delegates up for grabs, it may be the last chance for Nikki Haley and moderate Republicans to claim at least one victory in their efforts to derail former President Donald Trump.

That it has come to this illustrates the depths of despair among “Never Trump” Republican moderates about the state of their party’s Presidential race. Trump celebrated three more wins on Saturday: slam dunks in Michigan (68.1% of the vote), Idaho (84.9%) and Missouri (100% of the 924 caucus votes cast).

The question is no longer “if” Trump will be the Republicans’ standard-bearer this November, but “when” he will be able to claim that he has crossed the threshold and become the party’s “presumed nominee”.

Mathematically, that is unlikely to happen this week, although “Super Tuesday” – when the race goes national, with primaries and caucuses being held in 15 states and the US territory of American Samoa – will take him much closer to his goal. In no state can Haley expect her Tuesday to be particularly “super”, with Trump comfortably ahead across the board.

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It may be next week, on Tuesday, 12 March, when Hawaii, Mississippi, Georgia and Washington state cast their Republican primary ballots, that Trump crosses the finishing line, having secured more than half the 2,429 delegates at this summer’s nominating convention.

Whenever it happens, it’s going to be soon. And at that point, a more-than-seven month election slog between Trump and President Joe Biden will begin.

Biden spent the weekend at the Camp David presidential retreat, working on two intractable problems: how to resolve the crisis in the Middle East, and how to revive his flagging political fortunes. The latter may prove even more complicated than the former, after a Siena College poll commissioned for The New York Times revealed the depth of the President’s problems.

The survey showed Trump now leads Biden 48 to 43 per cent nationally, with 10 per cent of voters undecided or refusing to share their choice with pollsters. Less than a quarter of voters said they believed the country is “moving in the right direction”, with 61 per cent of those who voted for Biden in 2020 saying he was “too old” to serve effectively. He has a record 47 per cent strong disapproval rating, and none of the President’s efforts to turn his fortunes around have made any impact.

Biden’s next big chance comes on Thursday night, when he makes his State of the Union Address to a joint session of Congress – and, more importantly, to a national audience across all the major broadcast and streaming networks. He has no room for error, nor for any kind of stumble – physical or figurative – during the primetime event.

No single speech can entirely overcome the President’s problems, but the pressure on Biden is mounting amid polling evidence that 10 per cent of Biden’s 2020 voters now say they plan to back Trump. Congressman Adam Smith, a Democrat from Washington, described the “level of freakout” at the White House as “high”, telling Politico: “I am personally less freaked out than most… but I too wish Biden and his team were stronger campaigners.”

Democrats can take some solace from the determination of “Never Trump” voters to maintain their position. In New Hampshire, 35 per cent of Republican primary voters claimed they would not back the former President in November under any circumstances. Nationally, polling suggests that at least a fifth of Republicans may be beyond Trump’s reach, but that number could change in either direction depending on the tone of the long campaign ahead.

A Bloomberg poll taken last week in the key battleground states where the election will be won or lost, found that “Biden is too old, but Trump is too dangerous”. The survey found Trump ahead in seven key states, but was a fresh indicator that the number of “double-haters” (voters who disapprove of both men) remains substantial.

In an election in which millions of Americans would prefer neither man was running, the outcome may hinge on which of the two candidates is less loathed than the other.