In less than a week, former President Donald Trump will return to the debate stage, this time facing off against Vice President Kamala Harris. Trump will no doubt bring his trademark swagger to the table, but next week's ABC News debate will undoubtedly take place in a political landscape that has changed dramatically since Trump and President Biden last faced off on June 28.
Trump's political woes go beyond a series of bleak polls showing Harris leading in both races. Nationwide And in key battleground states, Wisconsin, Michigan and PennsylvaniaIn the months leading up to the first presidential debate, Mr. Trump had portrayed a political inevitability that seemed to convince Democrats he would lose. Now that pessimism has evaporated. In the light of day, Mr. Trump's bravado seems anachronistic to most Americans.
As the campaign's nominee, the old man, Trump will have to prove her vitality and mental acuity against an opponent who has made her a successful political career. Dominating the TV debateThese 90 minutes will be a minefield for an already distracted and frustrated Trump.
Making matters worse, the former president is coming off the worst campaign week in recent memory.
Trump chose to stay in the shadows over Labor Day weekend, traditionally the start of the fierce race to Election Day. Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania And her running mate, Tim Walz, It excited a large audience At the Milwaukee Labor Day, Trump holed up in his Mar-a-Lago estate. A round of golf and Fewer angry messages Posted on Truth Social
Trump's Labor Day absence was especially notable, given that his 2016 campaign relied heavily on speaking directly to disaffected workers in the Midwest. Perhaps Trump has lost interest in the workers he once cared about. Or perhaps his campaign is still licking its wounds after the loss of Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance. He was nearly booed off the stage. It was conducted by union firefighters at an event in Boston.
Or maybe Trump is so hard to find these days that his campaign staff are refusing to acknowledge the solemn ceremony at Arlington Cemetery. Last week's political circusIn this case, the staff Physically assaulting a cemetery worker For trying to protect the dignity of America's fallen heroes. This incident was extremely harmful and rare. Public rebuke From the US Army, and Countless veterans People shared their frustrations with President Trump and Vance's social media accounts.
But Trump will almost certainly be questioned next week about his actions at Arlington. The Trump campaign will have a hard time concocting a plausible excuse for breaking the law and dishonoring America's war dead in the name of petty partisan politics. It's also clear that Trump cannot understand why his campaign's actions were so reprehensible in the first place. Speaking last week, Trump said the public attention given to the breach of protocol was “a ploy to get through to the people.”Scary.”
Trump's big “The Art of the Deal” Trump's strategy is to act like a winner even when he's losing. That can work when you're outworking your opponent and getting ahead, as he did with Biden. But it's hard to project a sense of ease when the Harris-Waltz pairing now dominates the nightly news headlines. And the way American voters see Trump and Vance is that they're both trying to win. Cyberbullying of civilians.
Trump's campaign no longer exudes the macho confidence that saw many voters see him as a relentless warrior taking on the political establishment. Instead, it exudes the anxiety and frustration of two men who seem well aware that things aren't going well and that no one around them has a plan to solve the serious problems they face.
The Trump the American public will see in next week's debate will be a stranger. The polls and momentum are now against Trump, and the vice presidential candidate he once touted as a game-changer is now Historical resistance When Republican candidate Trump found himself in a similar situation before, he quickly degenerated into a radioactive concoction. Bottomless self-pity And shifting responsibility.
Voters who saw that in 2020 ultimately abandoned Trump in droves. But those who want to stay in Trump's sphere of influence are unlikely to have the guts to tell him so. Is he really going to make the same mistake twice?
Max Burns is a veteran Democratic strategist and founder of Third Degree Strategies.
