Months ago, President Trump’s political advisers were getting worried about his insistence on staying in the national spotlight. It wasn’t helping his prospects for reelection. But Trump has scarcely limited his presence in public at all. There was some hope among his advisers that he’d begin to let his campaign take over and save him for major events and important speeches, at least in the four months before Election Day.
That deadline has long since passed, and the president is as ubiquitous as ever. He’s become a kibitzer on whatever seems to cross his mind. He makes minor statements. He insults foes. Trump won’t shut up.
What’s the problem with this? For one thing, the beneficiary of his hogging the spotlight is Joe Biden, who is freed to sequester himself in his basement. It was the location for the announcement that he had chosen Sen. Kamala Harris as his vice presidential running mate.
By holding press conferences, the president makes it easy for the media to find quotes to attack and phrases to misconstrue. Biden wisely avoids the press, knowing that friendly reporters will let him get away with this. They let Trump get away with nothing. But here’s the overriding reason why Trump’s public appearances and idle comments are his biggest mistake: They freeze him in place as the No.1 issue in the election. And the longer he’s stuck there, the less chance he has of being reelected.
Doesn’t Trump know the spotlight is a danger zone for him in the presidential race? Maybe not. Polls show that Democrats are far more committed to defeating Trump than they are to electing Biden.
This is unusual. It underlines how much Democrats loathe Trump. They dislike his political views, but it’s his personality, his insults, and seeing him on TV that seem to feed their hostility all the more. The Washington Post was upset merely by his accusing Harris of being “extraordinarily nasty” to Justice Brett Kavanaugh at his confirmation hearing.
There’s little Trump can do to improve his likability. His pummeling of Biden for changing his views from centrist to left-wing may tighten the race by a few percentage points. But that’s all. To win, Trump needs an issue, or two, that rise above Trump v. Biden policy disagreements. If Biden skips the three scheduled debates, continues to linger in his basement hideaway, and shows signs of senility, that package could dominate the campaign.
But Trump can’t count on his opponent’s collapse. It sounds like an intervention too good to be true in Trump’s case. Biden might be able to nix the debates without excessive harm to his candidacy, since the media and plenty of Democrats would accept his decision. And chances are, his personality would still give him a lift.
Trump may have to create a “big picture” issue of his own, perhaps along the lines of asking what kind of America voters want, a country with a recovering economy, a vanishing COVID-19 virus, a chastened China, and better relations between black people and police? That would be contrasted with an America of burning cities, unsolved racial trouble, empty stores, and a still virulent coronavirus threat.
The reverse of that ad is easy to imagine. It would contrast a peaceful, prosperous, and racially harmonious America with a country with the opposite traits. Could an ad like that be made? Would it be possible to tone it down sufficiently to be accepted by a majority of the public? Would the TV networks agree to run it?
Tough, hot-button campaign ads have been aired before. The “daisy” ad against Barry Goldwater in 1964 ran only once. The “Willie Horton” spot against Michael Dukakis was controversial, but mostly in hindsight after the 1988 election had been won by George H.W. Bush. Some Democrats said it was racist. Republicans said it wasn’t. But the divisions in America weren’t as raw in those years as they are in 2020. An ad touching on racial matters, riots, and crime would surely be denounced and picketed.
An ad that doesn’t include racial disputes might work. Two Americas could be contrasted on the virus, the economy, crime, and the country’s role in the world. It would lack the punch of being full-throated and might not be worth the effort to produce and broadcast. But Trump needs something to boost his campaign. And it better be big.
