OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
The longer Joe Biden is in office, the more harrowing it is for Democrats, who were already facing a historical headwind as the 2022 midterms approach.
Traditionally, the party in the White House tends to lose congressional seats as has been the case now for many successive administrations. And it doesn’t appear as though Biden’s going to break that trend.
In fact, as of now, Republicans are out-polling Democrats by double digits — something that has never happened before in a survey conducted by CNBC and NBC.
Hot Air notes:
Remember that it’s generally uncommon for Republicans to lead on the generic ballot, more uncommon for them to lead big, and really uncommon for them to lead big far in advance of the next election. In red-wave cycles, generic ballot polling is typically competitive until the final months before the election, when Republicans begin to break away. That’s what happened in 2014. The GOP did lead big a year before the 2010 midterms, but (a) that was at a moment when the backlash to ObamaCare was in full swing and (b) they went on to win 63 seats in the House the following year.
That’s the closest analog [sic] to what Democrats are staring at right now. A total wipeout next fall.
The site went on to quote CNBC:
Republicans now sport a historic 10-point advantage when Americans are asked which party they prefer to control Congress, holding a 44%-34% margin over Democrats. That’s up from a 2-point Republican advantage in the October survey.
In the past 20 years, CNBC and NBC surveys have never registered a double-digit Republican advantage on congressional preference, with the largest lead ever being 4 pints for the GOP.
“If the election were tomorrow, it would be an absolute unmitigated disaster for the Democrats,″ said Jay Campbell, partner at Hart Research Associates and the Democratic pollster for the survey.
The survey also notes that Americans are not very bullish on the near future, with a big plurality — 41 percent — saying they believe that the economy will worsen over the next year, a view that is continuing to drag down Democrats and Biden.
That’s “a modest improvement from last quarter but still a largely pessimistic number by the survey’s standards and up from a year ago” when Donald Trump was still president, CNBC reported.
Inflation is the key: CNBC said that it has “eclipsed the coronavirus as the No. 1 concern for the country, with those two issues followed by immigration, crime and climate change,” adding that “Democrats have lost ground on the issues.”
“Democrats have lost ground and Republicans have gained in critical geographic areas,” the outlet continued. “So-called urban ring counties (those surrounding cities) favored the Democratic candidate by 8 points in the presidential vote. Those counties now prefer a Republican control of Congress by 5 points.
“Getting control of Covid and inflation were seen as the obvious keys. But with off-year elections usually leading to losses for the incumbent party, the question is whether the Democrats’ losses will be bad or historically bad,” the report added.
Speaking of Trump, a separate nationwide survey found that more Americans prefer his policies than those of Biden.
The survey, commissioned by The Wall Street Journal, ALG Research, and the firm Fabarazio Lee asked voters: “Regardless of how you may feel personally about each man, would you rather continue pursuing Joe Biden’s policies and proposals or return to Donald Trump’s policies and proposals?”
The results: 46% said they somewhat or strongly wanted to continue Biden’s policies while 48% said that they somewhat or strongly wanted to return to Trump’s policies.
And to the question, “Specifically, would you say that the economy is going in the right direction or headed in the wrong direction?” a staggering 61% of voters said it was going in the “wrong direction.”
