When you consider his approval ratings and matchup polling, Joe Biden looks to be in a heap of trouble. Biden hasn’t led in the RealClearPolitics average since mid-September, and Democrats are panicking, wondering what they can do to save the ticket this year. But Joe Biden’s problems may not be his alone. He may have doomed his party for years to come.
Here’s how.
As you know, the Democratic Party has long leaned on specific demographic groups, such as women, minorities, and young people, as steadfast pillars of their electoral support. But now, thanks to Biden’s horrific presidency, many of the once-reliably Democrat-voting demographics aren’t nearly as reliable as they were in previous cycles. That is a huge problem for the Democrats, especially if the voters who are abandoning Biden realize that Biden isn’t the only Democrat who isn’t working for them.
A new poll by USA Today and Suffolk University reveals a significant shift in several key demographics. "Biden now claims the support of just 63% of Black voters, a precipitous decline from the 87% he carried in 2020, according to the Roper Center,” reports USA Today. "He trails among Hispanic voters by 5 percentage points, 39%-34%; in 2020 he had swamped Trump among that demographic group 2 to 1, 65%-32%."
Latino voters also favor Donald Trump over Joe Biden. That’s a devastating shift from 2020, when Biden secured 65% Latino voter support. Today, Trump holds a 39% approval rating among Latino voters, surpassing Biden's 34%. This is a rather ominous sign for Biden. As The Guardian notes, "The decline in support among Latinos is seen as a canary in the coal mine for Democrats, signaling potential challenges in retaining a key part of the electoral coalition that built Biden’s election victory in 2020."
Related: Whoa! NBC News Admits That Biden Is a Huge Gamble for the Democrats
And then there's the young voters. Young voters are another stereotypically left-leaning demographic that Biden appears to have lost his grip on. The USA Today/Suffolk poll shows that Trump currently leads among voters under 35, with 37% support compared to Biden's 33%—a substantial decrease from Biden's 24-point lead in this group during the 2020 election.
Does this mean that the black, Latino, and young voters who have become disenchanted with Biden are now hardcore Trump supporters? Not necessarily. "The possible good news for [Joe Biden] is that much of the support he needs to rebuild has drifted to third-party candidates, not into the camp of his likely opponent. Twenty percent of Hispanic and Black voters, and 21% of young voters, now say they'll back someone other than the two main contenders."
"Although Trump hasn't grown support among Black voters, he has closed the deficit because third-party voters come off of Biden's support among Blacks," David Paleologos, director of Suffolk's Political Research Center, explained to USA Today. "A young voter or a person of color voting 'third party' is a vote away from President Biden, and a vote away from President Biden is a vote for Donald Trump."
What does all this mean? It means that these once reliably Democrat voting blocs aren’t as reliable as Democrats previously thought. Maybe they aren’t climbing all over each other to vote for Trump, but they’re willing to vote third party in protest of the Democrats' failures. Perhaps this means that in future elections, without Trump and his baggage on the ballot, black, Latino, and young voters won't be so married to the Democratic Party, and will be more open to voting Republican.
