Trump takes underdog role in campaign against Biden
By Jonathan Easley
The Hill, Published 05/06/2020
Trump’s allies acknowledge that they face an uphill climb, with polls showing Biden leading nationally and in key battleground states. If the economy does not prove to be as resilient as Trump claims, the election is all but lost, campaign insiders say.
But Republicans believe Trump may have bottomed out amid the pandemic and there will be opportunities to sell an economic recovery and to damage Biden, who has kept a low profile since the coronavirus outbreak first hit.
“The polling right now doesn’t look great, but we’re seeing a snapshot taken at the most stressful moment of COVID-19 plus economic shutdown,” said Chris Wilson, a Republican pollster and president of WPA Intelligence.
Wilson said the president’s team knows it needs to get the economy going but added that opening it up won’t guarantee activity. As for Biden, he said there are negatives there, but the twin economic and health crises create a difficult environment for the president.
“Joe Biden has enough negatives that the Trump team will have no problem finding one that works,” he said, “but the political environment needs to be there for Biden’s negatives to swing the race.”
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