Donald Trump is going through the darkest days of his presidency. He is losing the politics of the pandemic and is in growing danger of losing the coming election.
He has lost, through no fault of his own, the robust economy that was his strongest case for re-election. But now Trump appears to be gradually losing the confidence of Americans in his ability to steer the nation through the coronavirus crisis.
A 17-state survey commissioned by the Republican National Committee has found that the president is struggling in key election battleground states and is on course to lose the election without some sort of economic rebound before the November poll.
And yet, polls also show that two-thirds of Americans are more fearful of the virus that has claimed more than 55,000 lives than they are of the ramifications of the collapsed economy. As much as these voters want better economic circumstances, they are fearful of the economy being reopened too quickly and triggering a deadly second wave of infections.
It is a perfect storm which many leaders around the world, not just Trump, are facing as they try to strike a “Sophie’s Choice’’ balance between public health and livelihoods.
But Trump’s prospects of re-election are being undermined by his erratic leadership so far during this pandemic.
Trump’s speculation that injecting household disinfectants could be a coronavirus treatment was merely the latest misstep for a president who is failing to reassure a nervous nation that it has the right leader in its darkest hour.
An AP-NORC poll last week showed than 58 per cent of voters disapprove of Trump’s handling of the pandemic (compared to 41 per cent who approve) but it also found that less than a quarter of voters (23 per cent) have high levels of trust in what the president tells them about the virus. Even Republicans are sceptical, with only half saying they have a high level of trust in what their own president tells them.
Trump and his supporters dismiss criticism of his leadership during this pandemic as a falsehood generated by left-leaning mainstream media.
But there is a reason why Scott Morrison has record approval ratings while Trump’s numbers are underwater — leadership in a crisis does matter, and most Americans believe they are not getting that leadership right now.
Trump began this pandemic poorly by playing down the gravity and danger of the virus — especially during three crucial weeks from late February to mid-March — which meant that he moved too slowly and too late to slow its rapid spread across the country.
Since then he has largely refused to use his position as president to co-ordinate a national federal response to the crisis. Trump is right to leave it to state governors to choose when they should reopen the economy because the virus is impacting unevenly across the country.
But on other issues, Trump has baulked at the very notion of exerting federal leadership. Most remarkably, he has refused to order a wartime-style federal effort to co-ordinate mass testing across the country, instead leaving it to the states who are short of equipment and trained personnel.
Trump continues to peddle falsehoods about the success of testing across the US when the reality is that the US is far behind many other nations in per capita testing.
Yet at the same time Trump has been encouraging state Governors to reopen their economies. This means that Americans are being encouraged to go back to normal life while not having the widespread testing in place to give them confidence that it is safe to do so. Imagine this being considered acceptable in Australia.
Trump’s own coronavirus press conferences have showcased his erratic management of the crisis — from calling for the country to be reopened by Easter, to touting untried drugs, to casting blame for failures on others including state Governors, China and the media.
Trump has not used his press conferences — a powerful prime time bully pulpit — to try to unite the country and express empathy for the dead but has used it instead to try to settle scores and attack his critics.
After the unedifying spectacle of his disinfectant comments at the weekend, Trump has retreated and will appear less frequently on the advice of his own aides who fear he is damaging his re-election prospects.
In theory this should have been Trump’s moment to shine. Americans have a long history of rallying around a president in times of crisis. Trump has had a daily prime time opportunity to persuade voters that he is the wartime-style president he has called himself.
By contrast Trump’s opponent, Joe Biden, is locked-away in a basement in his Delaware home, barely visible to voters and yet he is increasing his lead over Trump in the polls each day.
There is still six months to go before the November 3 poll so there is time for Trump to reverse this narrative. But so far, the president is failing the test of leadership in this pandemic and Americans are less safe because of it.
(Cameron Stewart is also US Contributor for Sky News Australia)
More Coverage
Join the conversation
Nevermind the Middle East, Tony Armstrong’s departure ABC Breakfast’s big story
Despite the abundance of news on Friday morning, ABC News Breakfast spent a large amount of time fawning over Tony Armstrong who has left the program after three years.
Read more
Iran’s on the verge of a nervous breakdown
The supreme leader was left shaken by the assassination of Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah, his friend and ally-in-chief. The Islamic Republic has never looked weaker.
Read more