According to a report from The Hill published on Friday, Republicans are becoming increasingly concerned about the 2020 presidential election .
GOP operatives apparently fear that former Vice President Joe Biden’s strategy is working. The Democratic Party’s presumptive presidential nominee has maintained a low profile, allowing President Donald Trump to take the spotlight as he grapples to deal with multiple devastating national crises.
Former Democratic Rep. Steve Israel laid out how the strategy is going simply.
“Joe Biden’s numbers keep growing, Trump’s keep falling, which means that Biden’s strategy is clearly working.”
“In contrast with Trump going back to risky rallies while COVID-19 cases continue to grow, Biden is conducting a daily schedule of interactions with voters in battleground media markets and raising money,” Israel continued.
The Trump campaign has made numerous attempts to “bait” Biden, but nothing has worked. Most recently, the president’s team tried to pressure the Democrat to agree to more debates, which he refused.
According to a Republican close to the Trump’s reelection campaign, the president and his allies need to start directly and aggressively attacking Biden.
“It needs to come from the campaign and the president directly, and they need to be the kinds of shots that force a response. Right now, the Biden campaign has no incentive to respond,” the Republican said, noting that he expects the press to become more antagonistic toward Biden.
According to Democratic strategist Joel Payne, Biden has no reason to change strategy because Trump “keeps making these self-inflicted errors.”
But some Democrats disagree. One strategist expressed concern about the Biden campaign’s strategy, suggesting that voters need a reason to vote for Biden as opposed to voting against Trump.
“Running a campaign from the sidelines is not running a campaign,” they said.
A second Democratic operative echoed this sentiment, pointing out that the party’s 2016 presidential nominee Hillary Clinton relied on a similar strategy and lost. Much like Biden, Clinton apparently hoped that letting Trump stay in the spotlight would create an opening for her to coast to the White House.
However, as The Hill noted, Biden seems to be a much stronger candidate than Clinton. The former vice president is polling better than the former secretary of state ever did.
Indeed, according to most polls, Biden has emerged as a clear favorite to win the November election. A Fox News survey released earlier this week found that Biden enjoys the backing of 50 percent of Americans, while Trump is supported by 38 percent. Furthermore, Trump appears to have lost ground among white evangelicals, independents, and suburbanites.