National Report & Minnesota Report
The summer of 2024 will be a long one for President Joe Biden (D). This will literally be the longest Presidential Campaign in modern history, because the competitors are known so early in the nomination process. It is common knowledge the sequel election between Biden and Donald J Trump (R) will be fought largely in the seven swing states of Arizona (AZ), Georgia (GA), Michigan (MI), North Carolina (NC), Nevada (NV), Pennsylvania (PA), and Wisconsin (WI). Of these four AZ, GA, PA, and WI have gubernatorial elections, which might significantly impact the elections in those battlegrounds due to how strongly each candidate ties themselves to the top of the ticket. Additionally, MI and AZ have open US Senate seat elections, which should increase turnout and again the proximity the presidential candidates will play a factor for each candidate both ways, top down and bottom up.
When Checks & Balances commenced publishing December 8, 1995, our focus was on swing voters and moderate voices, which now have gone virtually extinct.
Since Biden only won all seven states swing states by less than 3% local issues and the war in Gaza may come into play, but the appeasement he has tried in regards suspension of the delivery of large munitions doesn’t seem to have helped and in fact may have hurt with his base. The greatest factor for Biden is Trump and that hasn’t changed since 2020. What is at hand here is Trump’s electoral ceiling which seems to be sit at 42% across the various states, but when the issues of inflation or fundamental change in the system are focused on Trump’s support increases.
Not surprisingly, abortion is Biden’s hole card, because Trump provides a clear assist when he touts his 3 US Supreme Court selections, who overturned Roe v Wade. This may stimulate disaffected voters and additionally the reclassification and decriminalization of marijuana to a Category 3 drug might provide an additional appeal. The nagging issue is Inflation and the costs, which will never likely go down, are a constant reminder of the state of the economy, but while people wax nostalgically about the Trump era, they place the burden on the wrong set of shoulders. Inflation was directly a result of policies of the Trump Administration and the impact of his failure to address the pandemic other than cursorily. Trump denial of the full scope of the pandemic because he will never accept credit for failure is why Biden had to act far more aggressively and actually got the nation on a more solid footing.
Today, wages are up in most parts of the nation and are ahead of inflation, but the hangover is still with us. Once the Federal Reserve decides that the economy has cooled to a point where they can cut prime interest rates things will seem to languish. This will be a long, hot summer financially and literally due to climate change and again another issue that Trump denies is real.