Trump Supporters Like to to Vote for Him Again
President Biden campaigns for California Gov. Gavin Newsom earlier this month. David McNew/Getty Images hide explanation
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David McNew/Getty Images
President Biden campaigns for California Gov. Gavin Newsom earlier this month.
David McNew/Getty Images
Many moderate Republicans switched allegiances in last year'southward ballot and backed Joe Biden because they could not abide iv more years of Donald Trump.
These voters, who swung from backing Trump in 2016 to Biden in 2020, helped brand the difference for Biden in places where the margins were close — oftentimes, the suburbs.
So today, about eight months into Biden's presidency, how do these voters view him?
In a pair of virtual focus groups NPR observed terminal week, featuring more than than a dozen such voters from key states, a picture emerged of disappointment with Biden — but no regrets that they helped send Trump packing after one term.
Handling of Afghanistan injure Biden's brownie
Let's commencement with the disappointment.
Polls bear witness Biden'south public approval ratings have taken a hitting in contempo months. The voters in these focus groups reflected that slide.
They were worried about the spread of the delta variant and how COVID-19 continues to hurt the economy. They were wary of Democrats' large spending plans on infrastructure and other programs, alarmed by the troubles they come across along the Texas border, and were very disturbed past the chaotic U.Due south. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
"What happened in Transitional islamic state of afghanistan, to me, was the worst thing that'south happened since Saigon." That reference to the 1975 U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam came from Paul, who lives in central Pennsylvania. (We agreed to identify focus grouping participants by start name but.)
He didn't buy Biden'southward caption that Trump prepare the get out in motion by committing to a withdrawal of troops in a deal with the Taliban concluding twelvemonth.
"He didn't take to stick to the timeframe Trump fix," Paul asserted, "just he kept sticking to it and sticking to it, and a lot of people died and a lot of people were left behind. And then I think that was squarely on him."
Still, perchance unlike the pandemic and the economy, Afghanistan may fade from the news over time and, as such, may not affect long-term impressions of Biden every bit much.
And on the coronavirus, the focus grouping participants — all vaccinated — mostly gave Biden solid marks. It's clear he benefits from comparisons to his predecessor on that.
"He's definitely been better than Trump on treatment COVID," said Xaveria from the Atlanta area. But she also said the fact that the delta variant is creating such problems means you lot nevertheless can't feel really great about how the current administration is doing regarding the pandemic.
Then she added that there's but an overall unease that's troubling. "It's just kind of, like, non really trusting what to look," she said.
As for Biden, she said, "I just put him at, like, the boilerplate. He hasn't done annihilation great. And exterior of Afghanistan, cipher awful." But she was conspicuously hoping for better.
Non thrilled with Biden, but admittedly not missing Trump
These two focus groups consisted of all Biden voters, just overwhelmingly they yet consider themselves Republicans. They oasis't yet left the political party, fifty-fifty though they're disillusioned past Trump's ongoing presence and the command he still holds.
In contrast to the majority of Republicans responding to polls, none of these voters falsely believes the 2020 ballot was stolen.
None said they regret their 2020 vote. And while they may be disappointed in Biden, they absolutely rule out voting for Trump if he runs for president over again.
Onetime President Donald Trump waves to the crowd at the end of a rally on Sabbatum in Perry, Ga. Sean Rayford/Getty Images hide explanation
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Sometime President Donald Trump waves to the crowd at the terminate of a rally on Saturday in Perry, Ga.
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Accept Christine from the Philadelphia suburbs. Like others in her focus grouping, she said she first voted for Trump because he was a businessman and not a politician.
But she got far more than she bargained for. She used blunt language to depict the former president: "I felt similar we had this monster in office that was bipolar, up and down, irrational, crazy thinking." She called Trump "childish," said that "crazy things came out of his mouth," and that he was "not good for the United States."
And afterward all of that, Christine confessed: "I didn't want to vote for Biden. And I'm going to be honest with you lot, I would have voted for everyone but Trump."
Others in the group blamed Trump for inciting racial tensions, citing how he described participants in a white supremacist march in Charlottesville, Va., as "very fine people."
As for Trump'southward oft-stated claim that he would "drain the swamp" in Washington, D.C., focus group member Mike, who lives in Georgia, had this retort: "I think he fabricated the swamp bigger."
"It's like, where exercise we go?"
These swing voters readily say that their frustrations with both a Republican Party in Trump'due south grasp and with Biden go out them feeling a scrap lost politically.
Georgia resident Xaveria asked a unproblematic question: "It's like, where practice we go?"
These voter discussions were part of a series of focus groups that have been organized by longtime political strategist Sarah Longwell, the publisher of The Bulwark website who herself is a Republican who's worked to defeat Trump.
She hears voters like Xaveria and Christine and says they turn down Trump and GOP candidates trying to exist "Trumpy" themselves. She says such voters are open to voting for Democrats, merely the party besides needs to nominate more moderate candidates to make these voters feel welcome there.
These moderate-to-conservative voters "are very clear that they feel politically unmoored, politically homeless," Longwell said in an interview.
"I really view these voters equally up for grabs in 2022 and 2024," she said. But Longwell says it matters who the candidates are and how the parties run into themselves.
And Longwell says it makes such voters worth watching. It too makes them potentially pivotal. "Right at present, people who are willing to modify their vote from one party to another really hold the keys to political power," she said.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2021/09/30/1041252418/they-voted-for-trump-and-then-for-biden-heres-what-these-swing-voters-think-now
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