By my count, there have been six polls released in July that look at the Trump/Biden matchup in Texas, including a Quinnipiac survey that was released Wednesday. With the exception of the Gravis Marketing poll that had Trump up by two point, all of these surveys were conducted by reputable and well-rated outfits. Biden led in three and Trump led in three.
The best result for the former vice-president came from a B/C-rated University of Texas-Tyler survey that had him up by five points. Trump led in two B-rated YouGov polls, the first of which found him up by four points and the second of which found him leading by one. Gravis, which is basically Trump’s C-Rated personal pollster, gave Trump a two point lead.
The B-rated Public Policy Polling survey found Biden up by two and the B+-rated Quinnipiac that came out on Wednesday has Biden in the lead by a single point.
Add that all up and you have a dead heat, but it’s not kind of dead heat that should comfort the president. First of all, this is Texas. Trump shouldn’t be struggling here. Then there’s the direction of the polls. It’s true that YouGov still has him ahead, but he’s lost three points since the beginning of the month. Public Policy Polling shows essentially the same thing. They had him up by two in late-June and now has Biden up by two. The Texas-Tyler survey from May had the race tied and now they have Biden up by five. So, there’s a consistent finding that Trump has slipped several points as spring turned to summer.
Quinnipiac provides plenty of evidence that this is primarily related to the COVID-19 pandemic hitting Texas hard in this time period. A plurality of respondents are still net-positive on Governor Abbott, but his approval rating has slipped a net twenty points. Most Texans are very concerned about the virus, know someone who contracted it, and believe that Abbott is responsible because he opened the economy up too soon. Trump has a negative 45-51 percent job approval rating and independents back Biden 51-32 percent.
Texas is the biggest prize the Democrats could win, and it’s completely within reach. One more month like July and Biden should be opening a narrow but discernible lead. If you’re looking for hope, here’s hope.
Would be amazing to win Texas. For so many reasons, many of which you’ve shared Martin. Would almost force Republicans to reassess their total opposition strategy. I say “almost” because it’s hard to quit drugs cold turkey and racism and oppositional defiance are strong drugs. They may need to get their asses whomped more than once. First time they’ll blame it on Trump. We’ll probably have to do it again, either in the mid-terms or the next presidential cycle.
When and if we start winning mid-terms in places like Texas, it will be safe to say it’s over. They can rant and scream and act like asses but not enough folks will be impressed at that point for it to be an effective strategy. I pray that I live to see that day.
Agreed about needing to hit rock bottom before attempting to change. Here’s hoping Texas goes blue at the presidential level in 2020, trends more blue in 2022, and stays blue in 2024. That will give the Republicans something to think about.
Obviously, there were captains of industry who vehemently opposed FDR and the New Deal, but by the Kennedy administration there was a kind of broad acceptance of how the system was working, even in the business community and certainly among upper management types working in our urban centers. The Republican Party was mainly a vehicle for keeping the system rational and in its lane. It wasn’t a serious opposition party before Goldwater got his hands on it. Cranks were tolerated, but they didn’t offer any realistic chance of bringing ascendancy to the GOP.
The business holdouts latched on the opposition to Civil Rights legislation to recraft the GOP into something much more formidable, and they’ve been building on it, crushing unions, developing right-wing media, stacking the courts, etc.
But this only works as long as it works. Without Texas, it’s right back to permanent minority status.
Any thoughts on how the feds invading Portland will play in Texas? I like to think that it won’t go over well, or at least be a wash, but I haven’t spend significant time there and don’t know the culture(s). Maybe someone could use a clip of Waybe LaPierre making his “jackboot thug” comment about federal agents in an ad.