Will ‘We are not Trump’ win the Presidency for Dems?

With less than two weeks to go until the US election and the last debate taking place tonight it will be interesting how it all pans out. It seems that whilst Biden’s lead is solid nationally in around 9-10 % the swing states are still very much up for grabs with Biden’s lead narrowing in states like Florida and Arizona. To be fair I still am not convinced about the Democrats optimism about Arizona as it has been a state they have been eyeing for years, but in the last election Trump actually managed to get more votes than Romney in 2012 and even more surprisingly McCain in 2008 with a pretty high turnout. The outcome is definitely still in balance. It is not difficult to see Trump winning again as with less than 2 weeks to go really I for one do not really know much what Biden stands for. Democrats have really hinged their hopes on people voting against Trump rather than offer any meaningful programme that would address the grievances that propelled Trump to the White House in the first place. Similarly to the remain camp in the aftermath of the Brexit referendum with Lib Dems being the worst – holding and possibly winning the second referendum would not be the end of Euroscepticism and would definitely not solve any longstanding grievances. It is not difficult to see the appeal of Trump as he outflanked the ‘left’ on messaging on the economy in 2016. For one he promised an alternative to the economy that focused on price control – outsource jobs to abroad with cheaper labor so that you can get cheaper goods which whilst benefits the white-collar workers does not do so for those working in the manufacturing industries with factories closing down (not all down to outsourcing). You can see why promises (which were never fully kept) to withdraw from free trade agreements such as NAFTA which hit Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, California and Indiana the hardest (three of which are swing states that Trump carried in 2016) would appeal to people who worked in manufacturing with professions replaced with Taco Bell equivalent jobs. One can see why abstract notions of growing GDP’s hold little emotional relevance to people who see their jobs disappear. A good example of this would be the video that was posted online of an American company Carrier Corporation announcing the relocation of their production operations from Indianapolis to Guadalajara, Mexico. It is not difficult to imagine that the workers who just found out their imminent work loss couldn’t care less about the GDP. Naturally Trump’s success in 2016 cannot be explained by economics alone as actually people with lower incomes were more likely to vote for Clinton as his largest share of votes came from whites with no college degrees regardless of income. This is yet another sticking point for Biden – how to appease those white voters who are anxious about immigration, ethnic change etc….If Trump is as I hope beaten at the election this will not mean the end of right-wing populism in the US and will be back with a bang in 2024 should Biden’s presidency be as static and meek as his campaign suggests.