OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
President Joe Biden could become former President Joe Biden sooner rather than later over his botched and deadly withdrawal from Afghanistan, according to former White House speechwriter and Fox News contributor Marc Theissen.
During an appearance on “America Reports” on Friday, Theissen recounted the heartwrenching testimony of several Gold Star families before Congress last week when he predicted that the Afghanistan debacle would harm Biden electorally.
“Your heart breaks for these families, but second of all, here’s where the accountability will come in. Joe Biden could lose the presidency because of Afghanistan, and I’ll tell you why,” he began.
“People aren’t voting on Afghanistan in 2024, but they’re voting a referendum on Joe Biden. If you look at the poll numbers before the Afghan withdrawal, he was above 50 percent approval, and after that withdrawal, he’s sunk below 50 percent and has never recovered and not only did he sink below 50 percent on foreign policy and fighting terrorism, [but] on every single issue,” Theissen continued.
“Why is that? Because Americans looked at this and they said, ‘One, he’s lying to us and two, he’s incompetent,’ and when people decide that you’re an incompetent liar, you don’t recover from that,” he went on.
“That is a permanent, indelible mark on his presidency, and so all the polls we’re seeing in the two years since this happened are a reflection that it all started in Afghanistan,” he claimed.
“It all started in Kabul when his polls went cratered, and they have never gone up above 50 percent again because the American people know he is a liar and he is incompetent. That’s why he’s going to lose the White House,” he added.
To that end, former President Donald Trump and Biden are tied in a hypothetical presidential rematch, according to an early August survey.
Both Biden and Trump would get 43 percent of the vote overall if the 2024 presidential election were held today. Nevertheless, voters continue to have high levels of disapproval for both men, with 54 percent disapproving of Biden and 55 percent of voters disapproving of Trump, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll.
The national poll was released less than six months before the first primary and roughly 15 months before the election on November 5, 2024. Biden and Trump are still in the lead for their respective party’s presidential nominations.
The survey found that Trump received 54 percent of the support from GOP primary voters, while Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis came in second with just 17 percent of the vote.
In the Democratic primary, Biden currently enjoys a larger margin of victory with 64% of the vote compared to his rivals Marianne Williamson and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
However, the data shows that the majority of Democratic voters are still seeking a strong challenger to Biden, with half of those who plan to participate in the primary preferring a different candidate for 2024.
Of those, 39 percent said that Biden’s advanced age of 80 was the main reason they would have chosen someone else. Roughly 20 percent said Biden’s subpar job performance was their justification, while 14 percent merely wanted a replacement.
Only 5 percent of respondents said that Biden’s mental capacity was a reason to vote for another candidate.
Trump not only maintains significant influence within the Republican Party but, according to a recent report, he is also dominating the early primary race in a manner unparalleled in modern history.
Polling experts who spoke to The Daily Caller claimed that Trump’s commanding lead in most surveys is so overwhelming that it must be disheartening for the rest of the GOP contenders.
The outlet noted that the current Republican primary cycle is unlike any other, with a former president leading the race, holding a substantial advantage in the polls, and facing competition from his former vice president. Additionally, Trump carries the weight of one state and two federal indictments.
