Democrats’ strategy was for communications to close Biden’s policy and political deficit in 2024. It has failed miserably. Rather than closing, Democrats’ communication failures threaten to widen their gap.
Biden entered 2024 trailing Trump in the polls. According to Real Clear Politics’ Jan. 1 national averages, Biden trailed by 2.3 percentage points in a two-way race, 5 percentage points in a five-way race, and 3.7 percentage points head-to-head in top battleground states.
These deficits can be attributed to Biden’s policies during his (then) three years in office. Although low, Biden’s overall job approval (just 40.4 percent on Jan. 24) has been above his rating on the most pressing issues: the economy, foreign policy, immigration, inflation, crime, and the Hamas-Israel war.
With less than a year before the election and a divided Congress blocking legislation, there was little Biden could do on the policy front. However, communications offered opportunities and assets.
Biden’s deficit was hardly insurmountable. Democrats had a sizable fundraising advantage. Biden also had an opponent seen as divisive and with “favorables” barely higher than his. Biden’s incumbency advantage also allowed him to make news at will. And he had a pliant establishment media eager to help him make it — and willing to cover his mistakes.
Democrats’ strategy was as simple as it was necessary for them: Drive Trump’s negatives higher than Biden’s. They would paint Trump as a lawbreaker (facing four felony cases) and leverage his perceived divisiveness. As Biden did on Jan. 5, they would paint Trump as “willing to sacrifice our democracy.”
But Democrats’ communications counteroffensive has fallen flat.
Biden’s State of the Union speech, followed by a fanning out of administration surrogates, didn’t work. The Biden campaign’s massive spending also failed. The felony conviction Democrats had long longed for (and organized) brought them no more traction.
Trailing, their quiver approaching empty. and time growing short, Biden’s campaign rolled the debate dice, accepting a shared stage where all the elements favored them (CNN, favorable moderators, no audience, mic cutoffs and just 90 minutes).
The dice came up “snake-eyes.”
As all know by now, the June 27 debate was horrendous for Biden: He looked bad, sounded worse,and stumbled his way through an hour and a half that encroached on eternity. However, what goes overlooked in that disaster is the broader destruction of Democrats’ communication counteroffensive.
A $50 million ad buy was running through June in which Trump was called a “convicted criminal;” it was aimed at swing states and minority voters. However, entering July the idea voters had was not that Trump was unfit for the presidency, but that Biden was.
That message of Biden’s unfitness was then echoed by Biden’s own party members and the establishment media. Democrat after Democrat in dribs and drabs came forward calling for Biden to withdraw as nominee; establishment media flagships did likewise.
The contrast couldn’t have been greater: Trump was running for president while Biden was running to retain his nomination. That contrast — the very reverse of what Biden’s campaign had intended — dominated the news for over two weeks. Until the evening of July 13, when Trump escaped assassination by inches.
Then, the contrast grew worse for Biden. Images of blood-streaked Trump, fist in the air, made him seem not just fitter, but fighting fit. The opponent Democrats wanted to burn into America’s mind as a convicted felon was now the victim of horrific violence — a violence that Democrats’ confrontational rhetoric had liberally used.
Trump’s shooting also undercut the Democratic elite’s effort to force Biden out now and Democrats’ anti-Trump message over the coming months.
Democrat elite’s effort to force Biden off the ticket was dependent on ongoing attention to Biden’s frailty. Following the attempted assassination of Trump, those efforts could get no airplay.
The attack on Trump has dominated airwaves since it occurred; only to be handed over to coverage of Trump’s pick of Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) to be his running mate, then into the Republican convention in Milwaukee, and finally highlighted by Trump’s acceptance speech. Only now are the Democratic elite able to ramp back up their effort to oust Biden.
Democratic elites needed media focus on Biden; instead, media focus has been on Trump.
Finally, the assassination attempt has severely hamstrung Democrats’ intended vilification of Trump over the coming months. Having exhausted all options to raise Biden, their only hope was to lower Trump. Yet now attempts to do so will appear to be inciting violence like that which has just occurred against Trump. At best, their message will look hypocritical, at worst, culpable.
Perhaps any strategy predicated on Biden and Harris’ communications abilities was doomed to fail. They are arguably the worst communications duo in modern presidential history. And pursuing a decidedly negative message strategy, one that has gotten increasingly histrionic was an innate liability (one that Republicans would have been excoriated for if they had implemented it).
However, most important to Democrats is the fact that it is not working: on Jan. 2, Trump’s favorability advantage was 0.6 percentage points; on July 18, it is 4.3 percentage points.
In contrast, Trump has been outperforming, not only Biden but himself, in communications. Of course, he retains his ability to attract crowds and excite them. But he has also been restrained while Democrats publicly fight over their nominee and in his shooting’s aftermath.
So, as Biden reverses, Trump surges, making the separation between the two all the clearer: Trump caught a bullet and Biden caught COVID. By overestimating Biden and underestimating Trump, the Democrats’ communication counteroffensive has collapsed.
Make no mistake: Democrats aren’t losing because they can’t communicate, but they are failing to close their deficit as planned because they can’t — despite having substantial advantages. This is also why this race may get even more out of hand over the next three and a half months.
J.T. Young was a professional staffer in the House and Senate from 1987-2000, served in the Department of Treasury and Office of Management and Budget from 2001-2004, and was director of government relations for a Fortune 20 company from 2004-2023.