Don’t underestimate President Trump

Photo source: National Review

With two months left until Americans head to the polls to decide who will lead the country for the next four years, the 2020 election looks set to be a close one between the divisive incumbent – Donald Trump – and Joe Biden – the former Obama Vice-president and political stalwart.

At the beginning of 2020, the political landscape was typically drawn on political lines between Republicans (Trump) and Democrats (Biden), and thus disapproval rates with the incumbent president (53%) were a key predictor of success.

Yet, the backdrop of Coronavirus and Black Lives Matter Riots has changed this, with the outcome too close to reasonably predict given the shift in campaign focus to rebuilding the economy and sympathetically addressing law and order. While the current polls have predicted that as it stands Biden would win the election on a margin of 11%, the potential re-election of Trump cannot be dismissed.

Undoubtedly President Trump faces a significant uphill climb, with his original campaign focus on a strong economy in tatters, he should not be underestimated given his 2016 underdog status.

The key factors to his success remain unchanged. Namely, the success and continuation of his ‘Make America Great Again’ (MAGA) rhetoric with an older male generation and the less educated, as this continues to touch heartstrings with those struggling as a result of job losses and less concerned with social change.As many pundits have indicated, Trump’s loyal base remain enthused despite revelations of dishonesty and in reality, swing voters could be won based on the growing unrest and falling coronavirus deaths.And so, Trump’s loyal base and focus on law and order, gives President Trump a realistic hope of victory.

More significantly, Trump remains a contender for re-election on the back of the Electoral

College, an outdated constitutional body established under Article II of the US Constitution; the effect of which restricts the influence of proportional voting (Kimberling, 1992). In a wider context, as a Constitutional Democracy, if its written in the US Constitution then it’s sovereign, this has the effect of overriding any Federal government or State legislation. For this reason, it is somewhat impossible to amend or abolish the Electoral college, with three such bills failing to be adopted between 1969 and 2017.

The significance of the Electoral College existing in 2016 is that when President Trump lost the popular vote by almost 3 million votes, he still won the election on the back of this ‘winner-takes-all system’. To win in this system a candidate need only win 1 more vote in a state to win all their elector, so in North Carolina Trump won 3% more of the vote and gained all 15 electoral votes, in effect this means that those who voted for Clinton in North Carolina had no representation at a national level.

Consequently, contrary to the Greek foundations of Democracy or ‘Demos Kratos’, a victory on the basis of an Electoral college and not the popular vote contradicts the Democratic ideal of rule by the people. Rather as De Tocqueville (1840) predicted this would signal a betrayal by soft despotism, namely the illusion that the population can influence the Government.

As a result of both factors, Donald Trump does not need to win a majority of voters across the US, only target strategic or swing states to win enough Electoral college votes.

Therefore, whilst it’s too early to conclude who will win the 2020 Presidency, President Trump remains a contender at the very least on the basis of a Constitutional flaw and his ‘outsider’ status. Moreover, the repercussions of the 45th President winning a second term would likely provide kindling for Constitutional amendment or further national upheaval contrary to his law and order manifesto.