Could Trump Actually Lose?

With all of the media clamoring about how Joe Biden is having a hard time doing what you and I probably do in a normal day, and that he can’t put two sentences together without screwing up, it’s a wonder that Donald Trump could actually lose to Biden, right? I mean, here we have a guy that’s so old, so out of touch, so addle-minded, that how in the world could anyone in their right mind pull the trigger and vote for him?

Well, they could.

Actually, Trump can lose again to Biden if he has some bad luck. He really doesn’t even need bad luck, just certain things to go his way. The Hill came out with the five hurdles that could screw up Trump’s reelection chances, recently. And while I don’t agree with all of them, some of them are valid.

1. How much will the conviction on 34 counts actually hurt him? Well, since most of his trials have been postponed until probably after the election, it comes down to whether enough independents turn against him and believe in the conviction. This one is interesting. And you know as well as I do that he’s going to get the whole thing thrown out on appeal, but that won’t take place until after the election. About 20% of the people say they will “reconsider” voting for Trump if he’s convicted of a crime, but only 4% say they won’t vote for him. That could be enough to sway the election, especially in the battleground states where Trump leads Biden in six of the seven states, but only leads in three states by more than four points.

2. What happens if Trump actually falls apart during one of the two scheduled debates? Trump is saying Biden is a terrible debater, and I would tend to disagree with him on that. Biden had been a decent, but not great debater in his prime. Now, he’s an old man that has no business being on the stage. But the fear is that Trump plays it wrong. If Trump is seen as a bully, or someone that rambles on about his own accomplishments (kind of like he did during the Bronx rally), then the ego has a tendency to take over. That’s never good in debates. Just ask Al Gore who watched his presidential dreams disappear when he debated George W. Bush in 2000, and constantly sighed and chortled during Bush’s answers. It could happen. Not likely, but possible.

3. One of the other things that could happen, and again, it’s not likely, is that somehow the Democrats are able to turn the messaging away from the economy and the border as the top two issues, and again focus on abortion. That’s in the playbook, and Biden is going to attack it as hard as he can. K-baby Harris is already on the campaign trail hitting college campuses and is already talking about totally losing “a woman’s right to choose”. But as I’ve said, the right is always there…it’s just a lot earlier than what K-baby is talking about. Her right to choose is to choose whether or not she has sex with the guy. But again, it could happen.

4. What if something happened that Trump had nothing to do with? The Hill points out that it happened to Kristi Noem, the South Dakota Governor, when she admitted she killed a dog. All hell broke loose. It’s the whole “hockey mom” thing that helped sink Sarah Palin’s bid to become Vice President. Of course, she didn’t need to help John McCain’s hopeless candidacy to lose, he was doing great on his own. But the point here is, if Trump says something, and the left takes it out of context, is it going to be able to sink him if he can’t rectify it in time? It happens to all politicians at one point or another.

5. Finally, there’s the theory that the “blue wall” of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, that helped spur Biden to victory in 2020 will re-emerge again in 2024. Trump leads in all of those states right now, but if Biden is able to win two of the three, it could be over for Trump. That could happen, though at this point it seems unlikely.

One thing Trump has going for him is his ability to flip states. He did it in 2016, but didn’t do it in 2020 because he was the incumbent, but ran like he was the challenger. And he wasn’t able to defend against Biden’s claim that he could “reunited America” which he hasn’t come close to doing. But if Trump could flip a solid blue state, something like a New Jersey, or a New York (which he said at the Bronx rally he could do), it would be game over for Biden. Joe Biden cannot afford to lose a solid blue state. That means if Minnesota, or New Jersey, or New York, or even some place like Virginia were to flip, he’d be dead man walking.

As it sits today, I think the odds are more likely that this one becomes a blowout and Biden, if he does end up running all the way through the election, which more and more people doubt, will get crushed in the Electoral College, and maybe even the popular vote. Stranger things have happened!

Carry on world…you’re dismissed!