Gun to your head: Will Trump be reelected?

[HisGrace]

I mean there are possibilities of Trump pulling a Dubya '04 and barely getting over the line, or for him to end up like Franklin Pierce against Kasich [his whole brand and ego won't let him go the way of LBJ or Truman], but these seem to be rather minute atm.

W ended his first year in office with 80 percent approval and was at over 50 percent when he stood for reelection. Democrats who thought he'd have no chance were delusional. Meanwhile, Trump is in the 30's after six months.

I'm not going to vote because I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if he isn't standing for reelection due to resignation/impeachment/choosing not to run. But for him to be reelected something has to change in the trajectory of his presidency. He has no legislative achievements to speak of. Health care's not going to happen, tax cuts probably aren't going to happen. If he's going to improve his approval ratings he's going to have to earn it. I don't see any path for him to do that other than him morphing into a different person who is a competent leader and can get things done.

If Trump's not on the ballot for some reason you'd have to assume that's because the sh**t has really hit the fan, in which case the Democrats would still win. Maybe an outsider Republican like Kasich or even Cruz could win depending on the conditions and their opponent.

You conveniently forgot the little "rally around the flag" event that would've pole-vaulted ANYONE, even a 30's ratings Jimmy Carter up that high, even a disgraced Richard Nixon would've gone up.

If you look right before that, his approvals were dropping quickly despite a decent start, and in '04, he was like Obama, flickering between 40s and 50s.

And like I said, those seem to be very unlikely possibilities.

9/11 is part of the point. In hindsight anyone thinking Bush would lose 3 years after 9/11 sounds crazy. It's surprising it was as close as it was.

I find it pretty difficult to picture him getting close to 50% ever again. He peaked at 46 in the RCP average.

[Liberalrocks]

Option 5

[NewYorkExpress]

If Trump is still President, yes. It's very hard to defeat an incumbent, especially one with followers as loyal as Trump's as 2012 proved.

However, if Pence is President, all bets are off.

[BoJack Horseman]

No. MSNBC just reported a poll showing Trump losing to John Kasich by 12 in New Hampshire for the primary. When you're in those kinds of numbers, you don't get re-elected.

[NewYorkExpress]

No. MSNBC just reported a poll showing Trump losing to John Kasich by 12 in New Hampshire for the primary. When you're in those kinds of numbers, you don't get re-elected.

MSNBC is about as selective as Fox News. They almost certainly cherry-picked that poll, just as Fox would cherry-pick one that showed Trump up 42 in New Hampshire against Kasich.

[Trump v. Wong Kim Ark]

Option 5

[Sir Mohamed]

Time may prove me wrong, but of these options, Trump loses to a Democrat in 2020. Now before I say why, I'd like to point out that I don't think these Russia investigations will go anywhere and Trump will not be impeached or resign. So he'll run in 2020. He'll most likely see a strong primary challenge, but he'll be re nominated none the less.

Anyway, Trump will lose because:

• Trump has thus far proven himself incapable of governing and leading his party. He can't unify his party behind him, and the party itself is divided. They can't even accomplish things that they've (both Trump and the GOP) been campaigning on for years (namely the Obamacare repeal). He has yet to win over very many "Never Trump's" (if he won over any at all) and while the Democrats have divisions to, theirs will be easier to overcome than the GOP's IMHO. Plus, the White House is always in chaos due at least in some part, to Trump and his tweeting. The craziness in the Clinton White House in '93 pales in comparison to the insanity of the Trump White House in 2017
• A Recession is bound to hit sometime between now and 2020. A recession was bound to hit regardless of who won the 2016 election as the recovery we've been in since June of 2009 has been weak and uneven so I doubt this expansion will exceed the one of the 1990s which was the longest of our history at 10 years (1991-2001). In order for it to do that, this recovery would have to go past June 2019 and I don't see that happening. Presidents of the post war era who have had recessions hit in their first term after their first year in office have always lost re election (See Carter in 1980, Bush 41 in 1992). Also, The "good" economic numbers we've been seeing in recent months have nothing to do with Trump. This is still Obama's last Fiscal Year and we won't begin to feel any economic impact of Trump's policies until very late this year or early next year.
• Trump has no coherent Foreign Policy, has thus far alienated our allies and we have increasing problems with North Korea and Russia. I can see either one of them being for Trump what Iran was for Jimmy Carter. With Trump alienating our allies though, we're not going to have very much if any support in dealing with the problems abroad, and Trump is very capable of making things much worse. After four years of Trump, for the first time in the Post Vietnam era, the Republicans could emerge as the party that is "weak" and "soft on defense" while the Democrats emerge as the opposite.

I could be proven wrong (especially if the Democrats nominate that bad of a candidate), but based on what I've seen thus far, Trump will be toast in 2020.

I completely agree with your points.

Currently I just don’t see it how he'd manage to win reelection, though 2020 is a long way. The 2016 numbers were actually Trump's ceiling and he has not much room for error. If he continues to "govern" the way he did in the first six months, and right now I have little reason to believe it will change, his approval ratings will be in the low 30s at best. Let alone a possible primary challenge (by Sasse or Kasich for example), that would further cut into his support for the GE.

So is the consensus that the electoral college is the only thing holding up Trump? Is there anything that can be done about this? Surely there are people who realize what an undemocratic and illegitimate system this is.

the electoral college could have easily gave us president kerry in 2004.

Or President Obama in 2012 while losing the PV to Romney.

true as well.
People have a way too recent-event-colored view of the EC. The fact remains that it just disadvantages the party with a more concentrated voter base. That party could be the GOP at some point in the future. It's been like that in the past. Romney was piling up massive landslides in Mormonland and the Deep South, and Bush did extremely well in Texas. In both years Dems won most of the Midwest by relatively tiny margins.
Looking at things more broadly, it's not clear the EC even hurts Dems at all overall, if you take all of the past 10-15 years into account. Rs could have just ended up lucky.

The Midwest (plus Florida to a lesser extent) seems to be the region that has decided Presidential elections from 2000-2016 more or less.

Very true.
Now it's interesting if the GOP is able to paint most of the MIdwest red, but loses the West (and Mormons). It's a margins game now. How Dem would states like UT, NV, and AZ be compared to the GOPness of IA, WI, and MI? That would determine how likely EV/PV splits are.

I don't agree on this assumption. President Obama won 2012 fair and square, by about five million votes or four percentage points. So he wasn't anywhere close of losing the PV. He was also the first Democrat since FDR who won a majority (50%) twice. Even if you count JFK/LBJ as one (JFK won 49%, like Truman in 1948).

[HisGrace]

If Trump is still President, yes. It's very hard to defeat an incumbent, especially one with followers as loyal as Trump's as 2012 proved.

However, if Pence is President, all bets are off.

Obama's approvals were 10+ points higher when he stood for election than Trump's are now. If he's still this unpopular in three years he won't win.

[Medal506]

No, he will lose to a Democrat. The problem for Trump is that he can't play the outsider anymore and he will actually have a record to defend (so far it's not a good one).

As did Truman in '48...

Because Trump is totally comparable to Harry Truman.

Trump I would say has the political ideology of Richard Nixon but the temperament of Jimmy Carter. Problem for dems is if they elect a full on communist like Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders they'll also have the same temperament of Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama. Honestly I think if Trump loses his re election I think we'll be entering an age where we almost always only elect one term presidents rather than what we do now which is usually give almost every president two terms.

[GoTfan]

No, he will lose to a Democrat. The problem for Trump is that he can't play the outsider anymore and he will actually have a record to defend (so far it's not a good one).

As did Truman in '48...

Because Trump is totally comparable to Harry Truman.

Trump I would say has the political ideology of Richard Nixon but the temperament of Jimmy Carter. Problem for dems is if they elect a full on communist like Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders they'll also have the same temperament of Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama. Honestly I think if Trump loses his re election I think we'll be entering an age where we almost always only elect one term presidents rather than what we do now which is usually give almost every president two terms.

Sanders and Warren are not communists.

[HisGrace]

No, he will lose to a Democrat. The problem for Trump is that he can't play the outsider anymore and he will actually have a record to defend (so far it's not a good one).

As did Truman in '48...

Because Trump is totally comparable to Harry Truman.

Trump I would say has the political ideology of Richard Nixon but the temperament of Jimmy Carter. Problem for dems is if they elect a full on communist like Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders they'll also have the same temperament of Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama. Honestly I think if Trump loses his re election I think we'll be entering an age where we almost always only elect one term presidents rather than what we do now which is usually give almost every president two terms.

People act like there's some kind of magic thing that makes incumbents win or lose. If you're popular enough where most people want you to stay on, you win, if not, you lose. The opponent might have to do with it too. Obama/Bush/Clinton won because they were popular enough at the time of their election, as opposed to Ford, Carter, or Bush 41. With where Trump is right now he's not popular enough to win again.

[Chief Justice Keef]

At this point I'd expect another Democrat to beat him in 2020 by a moderately-sized margin, maybe in the low-300 electoral vote range. But there are a ton of things that could go wrong with that prediction.