Willie R. Tubbs, FISM News
Even his most vocal critics have been forced to admit that, in the eyes of Republicans, former President Donald Trump appears to be unassailable. For the second time in a month, a study shows that an effort to discredit or prosecute Trump has only served to make him stronger with his base.
According to a recent Politico poll, in the wake of the FBI’s raid on Mar-A-Lago, Trump has increased his lead over Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in public opinion regarding both men’s potential as 2024 presidential candidates.
Trump enjoyed a 10-point bump in the poll as 57% of respondents said they’d support Trump if ran in 2024, up 4% from only a month ago. DeSantis, who last month polled at 23%, dropped to 17.
It strikes one as an “only in 2022” occurrence when the FBI raids Donald Trump’s home and Ron DeSantis is the one who suffers.
These results follow a Monmouth University poll that suggested the Jan. 6 committee hearings did little to change public perception of Trump, and indeed that the hearing had served to convince a growing number of people that he was not culpable for the Capitol Building riot of 2021.
A different poll, conducted by Rasmussen, suggests Attorney General Merrick Garland is fairing relatively poorly following the raids. In a statistical oddity, both Garland’s “favorable” and “unfavorable” numbers increased, month-over-month.
While 36% of respondents said they viewed Garland favorably, up 6% from last month, 42% of respondents said they viewed him unfavorably, an increase of 3% from a month ago.
Garland’s numbers, while odd in one sense, are quite easily explained as the attorney general becoming a polarizing figure. Therefore, it’s hard to extrapolate much from these numbers, other than the simple fact that people are becoming even more polarized.
Kimberley A. Strassel, an opinion writer for the Wall Street Journal, says Democrats will face even more trouble.
“Trump derangement syndrome has a curious way of scrambling coherent thought,” Strassel wrote in a recent column. “Witness the Democratic-media complex’s blind insistence the Justice Department raid on Donald Trump’s home is just and necessary—rather than a dangerous move for their party and the republic.”
As for Trump and DeSantis, the Politico poll offers little more than confirmation that, even in a Republican presidential field that has not yet been named, the two men are far and away the leaders in what will become the race for the 2024 Republican nomination.