LOS ANGELES.–Speaking to 56-year-old Fox News business host Maria Bartiomo yesterday, 77-year-old former President Donald Trump said that if 81-year-old President Joe Biden drops out, replaced by 56-yer-old Calif. Gov. Gavin Newsom, he’d be “easy” to beat. Newsom made headlines last month debating 45-year-old Florida Gov. Gavin Newsom on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show. Voters saw a mediagenic candidate in Newsom but someone who has a lot of questions to answer about the state of California, still the most populous state but losing residents due to the high cost of living. Trump questions, like many other Democrats, whether Biden will eventually drop out because he polls continue to slide, whether on foreign policy or the economy. Yesterday’s NBC News poll, a benchmark of liberal politics, put Biden behind the Eight Ball in every category.
Trump told Bartiromo that he didn’t think he’d face Biden in the fall, instead with Democrats bandying around names like Newsom and 60-year-old former First Lady Michelle Obama. Michelle Obama’s name is certainly mentioned but she consistently dismisses the idea of running for president. Michelle would be easy for Trump to beat, she has a much more narrow base than Biden. When Biden ran in 2020, he carried the independent vote concerned about the raging Covid-19 pandemic and race riots in the wake of George Floyd’s suffocation death at the hands of White Minneapolis police. Things are different in 2024, with voters getting the last three years to assess life under Biden. NBC’s recent poll showed Biden has lowest approval ratings of any president running for reelection, but, more importantly, fails in all categories covered by the poll.
Trump knows that Newsom has been hanging around with Hannity giving him airtime on the conservative network. Newsom denies that he’s running a shadow campaign, singing Biden’s praises, no matter how insincere. When Newsom is asked about the staggering homeless situation in San Francisco and Los Angeles, the state’s biggest cities, he says he’s in the process of fixing the problem. Anyone watching Biden knows he’s got one foot on the banana peel, could drop out at anytime. But any change would create a brawl inside the Democrat Party with 59-year-old Vice President Kamala Harris demanding to go next. Harris has even lower approval ratings than Joe at about 36%. Democrats would indeed be cooked in 2024 if Biden decides to call it quits. “I think Gavin’s easy because California is a disaster,” Trump told Bartiromo.
Newsom says Trump can’t be beaten in the primary but he’s an easy target for Democrats in the general election. Newsom assumes that voters haven’t gotten fed up with Joe, with his shaky economy and precarious foreign policy. “He can’t be beaten in the primary, but in the general election I think he’s the most flawed candidate in my lifetime,” Newsom said of Trump, not realizing that Biden has equal if not more problems. No question that Biden and Trump carry baggage into the 2024 election but Biden could actually be worse. Newsom forgets while demonizing Trump that Biden now has a track record for voters to consider and it’s not good. Things are different in 2024 because voters know what happened to Trump’s prosperity and no foreign wars. Biden started a proxy war against the Kremlin, ending decades of diplomacy, détente and arms control with Russia.
Newsom calls Trump “damaged goods” but he’s not looking at Biden’s track record, now put into focus by the 2024 election. Voters are asking whether or not they can gamble with a 82-year-old, whose best days are behind him, questioning the advisability of giving him four more year. Newsom forgets that no matter how Democrats demonize Trump, they can’t erase the fact that he kept the economy prosperous during the Covid crisis and the U.S. out of any foreign wars. Biden got the U.S. into a doozy of a foreign war joining Ukraine’s War against the Kremlin. Now Biden struggles to manage attacks on U.S. troops in the Middle East and Horn of Africa, dealing with Iran’s rogue mullah regime. When voters look at the news, they can’t help think things are more chaotic under Biden, certainly U.S. foreign policy and national security are less stable than under Trump.
Anyway Democrats turn, they’re stuck with Biden, despite polls showing that Democrats, Republicans and independents all think he’s too old for another four years. Polls show that despite the four-year age difference between Biden and Trump, voters don’t see Trump with the same disabilities as Biden. Voters wished for younger candidates but it looks like they’ve got a rematch of 2020 with key differences, giving Biden’s track record and Trump legal problems. Polls show that Republican voters believe Trump has been framed by the government for political reasons, trying to derail his 2024 presidential campaign. Democrats and the press think Trump deserves all four years of the Russian hoax and now his politically-motivated charges. Newsom thinks Biden is in good shape but voters have second thoughts of giving Biden four more years.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
