A full one-quarter of all Americans hold an unfavorable view of the two main presumptive candidates for president —Democratic President Joe Biden and Republican Donald Trump.
According to a new poll conducted by Pew Research, this means that it’s the highest percentage of “double haters” at this point in the last 10 presidential elections. In just the last four years, the double-hater percentage nearly doubled, increasing to 25% from 13%.
This high level of displeasure among voters is contributing to widespread negative feelings about the upcoming election, which will feature a rematch between Biden and Trump. This time around, the roles are reversed, with Biden the incumbent and Trump the challenger.
The lead-up to the November election is sure to be extremely contentious. It’s already at high levels, but is bound to get even more contentious as election day draws closer.
Many political pundits believe that the election’s outcome could hinge on only about 6% of voters nationwide — all of whom will be located in swing states. It’s expected that a large portion of these voters are going to cast a vote for one of these two candidates, even if they do so reluctantly.
In addition to Trump and Biden, independent firebrand candidate Robert F. Kenndy Jr. is also on the ballot in many of these key states. He represents a third-party choice for people who are so unhappy with the two main party candidates that they won’t even give them their vote.
With a very narrow margin of victory predicted — for whomever is ultimately able to win the White House — swaying these “double haters” is going to be very crucial for both candidates.
Over the last few weeks, it appears that Trump is noticing that he is going to need some help and won’t be a slam-dunk winner. As such, he’s tried to mend relationships with some of his biggest critics in the Republican Party.
He visited Capitol Hill recently, meeting with one of his long-time foes, Mitch McConnell, in a move that many look at as being a show of unity among the GOP. While McConnell will be stepping down as the minority leader in the Senate in the near future, he’s still a powerful force among Republicans.
Trump received a potentially big boost last month, when Nikki Haley — who served as the U.N. Ambassador in the Trump administration and was the last of Trump’s GOP competitors to drop out of the primary race earlier this year — endorsed him.
Ever since she dropped out of the election, Haley’s base of supporters has been viewed as critical to Trump’s success come November. Now that she has thrown her full support behind him, it’ll be interesting to see if her supporters do the same.
All of this is critical to Trump, especially because a recent poll conducted by ABC News/Ipsos revealed that 67% of these double haters think that Trump should drop out of the race because of his recent felony conviction in New York.
