Biden also received no post-convention bump, as most candidates do when more voters start paying attention to the election. Biden was of course at a historical disadvantage with COVID-19 canceling out the possibility of a large-scale convention, but the trappings were all there: video presentations, major endorsements, candidate speeches. Yet still nothing.
Then consider the fact that Trump’s base support has not eroded. Trump’s popularity with voters, as measured by FiveThirtyEight, shows his support has more or less remained between 40-44 percent throughout his presidency. While he currently trails Biden in the crucial swing states, Trump enjoys a rock of support, even after three years of Russiagate, Robert Mueller, sustained negative media and entertainment coverage, sports team boycotts, impeachment and of course the pandemic. Roughly 40 percent of the country, we can assume, has simply tuned out the media.
There are other curious similarities between the Biden and Clinton campaigns. A Politico piece by Alex Thompson titled ‘Trump’s campaign knocks on a million doors a week. Biden’s knock on zero’ should startle any Democratic strategist. ‘Biden and the Democratic National Committee aren’t sending volunteers or staffers to talk with voters at home, and don’t anticipate doing anything more than dropping off literature unless the crisis abates,’ Thompson writes. ‘The campaign and the Democratic National Committee think they can compensate for the lack of in-person canvassing with phone calls, texts, new forms of digital organizing, and virtual meet-ups with voters.’
That’s from Stephen Miller in Spectator USA. But there’s bipartisan support for the notion: Michael Moore warns of 2016 repeat: Enthusiasm for Trump ‘OFF THE CHARTS.’