Since Trump left office, mortgage rates have also doubled from 3.1 per cent to about 7 per cent. So even though “Bidenomics” has helped reduce inflation and stave off a widely predicted recession, the president struggles to compete with memories from the Trump years of how cheap it used to be fill those gas-guzzling SUVs and how much easier it was to pay off the loan on the family home. What makes this Trump nostalgia all the more potent is that is based on hard data rather than alternative facts and vainglorious boasts.
At a time when America has been sucked into the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, Trump also benefits from the simple fact that he did not start any new wars. Despite the belligerence of his rhetoric, he avoided the kind of foreign entanglements and “forever wars” that have cost the United States so much blood and treasure in the two decades since the attacks of 9/11. Counterintuitive though it seems, the slogan “peace and prosperity” is available to Trump, a catchphrase that resonates with rational Republicans.
Even if his racist and xenophobic anti-immigration rhetoric can be a little shrill for their sensibilities, rule-abiding rational Republicans want to see order restored at the southern border with Mexico. Walls are seen as a logical solution for people who often live in gated communities. Trump is also seen as a barrier against what many sober-minded conservatives regard as the cultural radicalism of the left, a safeguard against wokeism.
Then there is that other Trumpian trump card, 81-year-old Joe Biden. His frailties have again been highlighted this week in a devastating report from the special prosecutor, Robert Hur, who decided not to prosecute the president for allegedly mishandling classified documents partly because “Mr Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview with him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory”. Seeking to repair the damage, Biden in his press conference then inflicted more self-harm by mixing up the Mexican and Egyptian presidents, a gargantuan gaffe.
To prevent a Trump restoration, Biden needs to reassemble what might be called “the coalition of the sensible” that helped him win in 2020. The rational Trump voter stands in his way.
Nick Bryant, a former BBC Washington correspondent, is the author of When America Stopped Being Great: A History of the Present.
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