Election polls continue to show a close race with former President Donald Trump. A Wall Street Journal survey out Saturday has Trump up 47%-43%, but other polls have given Biden the edge. Biden’s approval rating was a dismal 37% in the Journal poll.

New economic reports late in the week suggested a softer landing than expected, and there were 9,000 more jobs created than the 190,000 expected, a positive cited by Democratic pollster John Zogby in giving Biden a “C” for the week. Still, he noted, Americans are in a funk over the economy.

The border crisis got worse, again making history with new illegal crossing numbers. Conservative Jed Babbin said in giving Biden a “D-minus” for the week that the Biden “clown car” is driving the chaos at the border.

And then there is first son Hunter Biden, charged in a federal tax indictment of spending nearly $900,000 on sex while ignoring his tax bill. The president wouldn’t address his wayward son’s behavior, though Hunter blamed MAGA for the charges.

Jed Babbin
Grade: D-

It was another big giveaway week for President Joe Biden, shoveling money into the United Nations climate fund and forgiving another $4.8 billion in student loans. And that wasn’t the half of it.

Biden — whose horrific overspending has brought about the inflation that takes money out of every American family’s pockets — still wants to hand out more. He’s sending $3 billion to the U.N.’s Green Climate Fund, which will be absorbed by overpaid U.N. staff and consultants doing fancy studies that no one will ever read, far less use. And what’s another $4.8 billion in student loan forgiveness on top of all that? It’s no more than budget dust in Biden’s $17 trillion budget. And never mind that the Supreme Court ruled that Biden lacks the power to forgive student loans without congressional action.

FBI Director Christopher Wray’s warning that not just one but all of the warning lights on terrorist attacks were blinking red shocked some people, but the Biden White House doesn’t care. There’s still no thought there even to slow the flow of illegal aliens across our northern and southern borders. How many terrorists are already here thanks to Biden’s open border policy? Nobody knows. Almost two hundred Chinese people came across the southern border in one group this week. How many of them are agents of Chinese intelligence?

And, naturally, the Biden clown car redeployed elite Border Patrol units — including its tactical unit — to babysit illegals, not to even try to catch the “gotaways” who slip into our country. The gotaways — people who evade the Border Patrol’s “catch and release” system — amounted to about 1.7 million since Biden opened the borders, according to the House Committee on Homeland Security.

To cap it off, Biden said he might not be running for reelection if Donald Trump weren’t. Maybe there’s a deal to be made there.

John Zogby
Grade: C

A new report, as cited by political risk strategist Ian Bremer, notes that objective economic data does not square at all with public opinion about President Joe Biden and his economy.

Thus, the middle class does, in fact, have more spending power than 10 years ago. They also have a higher standard of living, more healthcare access, more job opportunities, etc. Add to that, that in November, the economy grew 199,000 new jobs, and the unemployment rate dropped back to 3.7%. This growth was not expected by economists and is in line with last quarter’s annualized GDP growth of 5.2% — the best in years.

The president has changed his tone (a teeny-weeny bit) with Israel and is now openly disagreeing with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

First son Hunter Biden has been indicted on nine federal tax fraud counts, and new House Speaker Mike Johnson says he has the votes to launch a formal impeachment inquiry. This is in a House where you can barely squeeze a bacteria cell between majority and minority seats.

A couple of new polls have Biden leading by a whisker over former President Donald Trump — but it is very close. I guess when it comes to the public’s mood, it’s the feeling about “the economy, stupid.”

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Jed Babbin is a Washington Examiner contributor and former deputy undersecretary of defense in the administration of former President George H.W. Bush. Follow him on Twitter @jedbabbin

John Zogby is the founder of the Zogby Survey and senior partner at John Zogby Strategies. His podcast with son, managing partner, and pollster Jeremy Zogby can be heard here. Follow him on Twitter @ZogbyStrategies