GOP struggling as Trump undermines attempts to make him ‘palatable’ to voters: report

All the time and money that the Republican National Committee put into re-packaging Donald Trump as a kindler gentler president during their national convention last week is going for naught because of his subsequent inflammatory public comments and his Twitter outbursts on street violence and protesters, reports Politico.

According to the report, laudatory speeches by his daughter Ivanka Trump, among others, were designed to put a more human face on the president, making it easier for the Republican party and the Trump 2020 campaign to reach out to undecided voters, including the white suburban moms the president needs if he hopes to have a second term.

However, street protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin and Portland, Oregon have caught the president’s eye, leading to him to tweet out inflammatory comments while also sharing videos that seem to glorify the violence.

This has Republicans worried as they try to boost the president’s approval numbers and election prospects.

“At the Republican National Convention, everyone from little-known Americans to first lady Melania Trump insisted the Trump seen lashing out on social media and in news conferences is not the compassionate man they see ‘when the cameras are off,’ as Vice President Mike Pence put it,” the report states before adding that Trump has since returned to form including “[dishing] out numerous incendiary claims over nearly 30 minutes that was mostly a monologue about violence in ‘Democrat-run cities.'”

“The dichotomy highlights the challenge facing the GOP with nine weeks left in the campaign: How to make Trump seem more palatable to voters who may largely agree with his policies but are turned off by his tactics, while still letting Trump rile up his base,” the report continues.

While campaign consultants claim they aren’t trying to “rebrand” the president, they are trying to provide some wavering voters with a reason to stick with.

According to Bryan Lanza, a lobbyist who worked on Trump’s 2016 campaign, “It’s not that they’re trying to cast the president in a different light. I think they’re looking to expand the lens. There has been a lot of noise in the past 3½ years from Twitter and cable news, and if that didn’t exist you’d be hearing more of these individual stories.”

According to pollster Frank Luntz, Trump needs to expand outside of his base if he has any hope of winning in November.

“That’s what swing voters want to see,” Luntz said. “Trump’s policies are acceptable to them. Biden’s persona is acceptable to them. And they have to choose one or the other.”