The likely lasting shift toward Trump

A few days ago, there was a report that the Harris campaign is in trouble and the Trump campaign is “extremely bullish” on former President Donald Trump’s chances to win the presidency. The reporter, former ABC News journalist Mark Halperin, said his account is based on “robust private polling” and talks with sources on both sides. “She’s in a lot of trouble,” Halperin said of Vice President Kamala Harris. “Pennsylvania is tough for her right now. … Wisconsin and Michigan are looking worse for Harris than before. … The conversations I’m having with Trump people and Democrats with data are extremely bullish on Trump’s chances in the last 48 hours. Extremely bullish.”

Not long after, Trump himself released the results of the campaign’s most recent swing-state polling. It showed Trump ahead in every state, although by small margins: up by 3 points in Arizona, by 5 in Georgia, by 1 in Michigan, by 3 in Nevada, by 1 in North Carolina, by 1 in Pennsylvania and by 1 in Wisconsin.

Meanwhile, nationally, Trump appears to be rising, and Harris falling. A new NBC News poll showed Trump actually ahead of Harris by a single point, 47% to 46%, in a matchup in which fringe candidates are included in the field, and tied, 48% to 48%, in a one-on-one matchup. Compare those to the last NBC News poll, in September, which showed Harris leading Trump, 49% to 44%.

Trump has been “bolstered by Republicans coming back home to support him after last month’s rough debate and a subsequent polling deficit, as well as by a favorable assessment of Trump’s term as president,” NBC News concluded. On the other side, the survey showed “Harris’ popularity declining compared to a month ago, after she got a big summertime boost.”

At the same time as Trump’s rise have come reports about growing concerns inside the Harris campaign. A representative account was CNN’s “Democrats grow anxious as Election Day nears,” which reported that “Democrats are increasingly anxious over Harris’ fate” and “there is a growing sense that her campaign is stuck in the mud.” Several other reports offered variations on that theme.

Amid all this, Trump’s top campaign management released a memo Sunday morning. Chris LaCivita, Susie Wiles and Tony Fabrizio argued that Harris experienced a “joy ride” of rising acceptance and support in late July after a secretive group of Democratic power brokers pushed President Joe Biden out of the race and Harris quickly replaced him. But after the joy ride, they said, nothing much has happened.

“According to our internal data, from the end of July through Labor Day, Harris largely treaded water,” the trio wrote. “She made no real gains in her image or her ballot standing against President Trump.” And then, after Labor Day, Harris actually slipped a bit against Trump despite spending $241 million in advertising in that period – more than twice what Trump spent. “When you compare the state of the race on the day after Labor Day to now, what you see will be eye-opening and likely the reason many smart operatives on the other side are wringing their hands over the current state of the race,” LaCivita, Wiles and Fabrizio concluded.

The bottom line, the three argued, is that despite talk about Harris’ momentum at various times in the race, she really hasn’t had any momentum after that period in July when everything was going her way. And now, with the election three weeks away, she’s struggling.

Of course, there has been Democratic pushback, both against the party’s in-house worriers, known as “bed-wetters,” and against the Trump team. But the Trump memo’s framing of what has happened since the big Biden-Harris switch suggests we need a closer look at what has happened in the race so far.

So here is a theory: The normal resting state of the race is for Trump to be a little ahead. But Harris has enjoyed three big bumps since becoming the Democratic candidate, and each of them has made the race trend her way before fading. The first bump, and biggest by far, was when Biden pulled out of the race. The second, and second biggest, was the Democratic convention. And the third was the Sept. 10 debate between Harris and Trump.

When Biden dropped out on July 21, Democrats were elated and Harris enjoyed the sugar high to end all sugar highs – or the joy ride, as the Trump people say. Her standing went up in the polls, her personal favorability ratings went up, and the race, in which Trump had long led Biden, seemed to be turned upside down. All this was encouraged by celebratory media coverage, of course.

Then, just when it seemed the sugar high might finally be wearing off, came the Democratic National Convention, beginning on Aug. 19. Harris got another week of celebratory coverage, and the joy ride started back up. And then it seemed the joy ride was slowing down once again just before the debate took place on Sept. 10. The short version is that Trump had a bad debate. Harris did not have a particularly good debate, but it was better than Trump’s, giving her a net benefit. The joy ride started up again.

Now, though, it is slowing down one more time. And this time, there are no scheduled events in the future – no convention, no debates, no nothing – which might start the Harris joy ride rolling one last time. Of course, some unforeseen thing could happen that gives Harris a new bump. But it might not. And if there is no new bump and the race is in its normal resting state on Election Day, then there is a good chance Trump will win.

All this might be wrong. Remember that. A new trend could be starting at this very moment that we don’t recognize. But right now, at least, the race appears to have shifted a bit in Trump’s direction, raising the possibility that without some new development to restart the joy ride, Harris could be in deepening trouble for the next three weeks.