Former President Donald Trump leads incumbent President Joe Biden by 46 to 44 percent in an NBC News poll published on Sunday. This represents the first time Trump has been ahead of Biden in a major poll. The poll included 1,000 registered voters, including 833 who were interviewed via cellphone, between November 10-14.
Biden trailed Trump for the first time in a hypothetical general election matchup, even though the gap is within the margin of error. It’s also just under a year from election day. In September, the same poll showed them tied at 46% each.
Support for Biden has dropped among younger Democrats, over the president Israel policy. A majority of Democrats say Israel has gone too far in Gaza, and among voters ages 18 to 34, an astonishing 70% disapprove of Biden’s handling of the Gaza war. Overall, only 34% of all voters approve of Biden’s handling of the war, and 56% disapprove.
Here’s the problem for Biden: even if he ignores the younger Democrats, the overall approval for his Israel policy in his own party is a very slim 51%, with 41% disapproving. It gets much worse among the independent registered voters: only 31% support Biden’s Israel policy. And among Republicans, only 22% do.
If you’ve been wondering why the president is reversing his open-arms embrace of Israel’s right to defend itself, replacing it with outrageous demands to pause the war efforts for five days to allow Hamas to recuperate, and his bizarre attacks on an imagined “settler violence,” we may have just hit the reason: Biden’s pollsters have long known what NBC News has only now found out.
The NBC News poll shows only 40% of registered voters approve of Biden’s job performance, and 57% disapprove, which is an all-time low for Biden in this poll since becoming president. In September, the president’s approval rate stood at 41%. So, he is slipping.
Now, it’s true that Americans don’t vote based on foreign policy, only on their wallets. But things stink for the president in that area as well: only 38% approve his handling of the economy.
Biden leads Trump in the latest NBC News poll among Black voters (69% to 20%), women (52% to 39%) and white college graduates (51% to 40%). Trump leads among white voters (53% to 39%), men (55% to 35%) and rural voters (58% to 35%).
Also, Trump leads Biden among younger voters, ages 18 to 34 (46% to 42%). Several recent national surveys are showing Trump is attracting more younger voters than he did in his two other presidential elections. Meanwhile, Biden is losing this age group.
A Friday Harvard-Harris poll showed Trump with 53%, and Biden 47%, a 6-point advantage for Trump.
The same poll found that with Robert Kennedy Jr. running as a third candidate, Trump blew Biden out of the water with 44%, vs. Biden’s 36%, and Kennedy’s 21% – an 8% lead for Trump.
