We May Just Be This Screwed: Donald Trump Has an Easier Path to Victory Than You Think

As the 2016 presidential primaries got underway, there seemed to be several incontrovertible truths: Hillary Clinton’s nomination was inevitable, and Donald Trump stood no chance. Yet, here we are six months before the election, and Trump has seized the Republican nomination while Clinton is still working to box out Bernie Sanders’ insurgency (without losing his voters, who it turns out, may peel off after all).

Nonetheless, the prevailing narrative is that while there is now a chance that Trump could actually win in November, it’s basically Hillary Clinton’s election to lose. Pundits focus on “fundamentals,” like Hillary’s superior fundraising, analytics, or ground game; however, these haven’t proven terribly predictive this cycle. And by focusing on conventional elements, analysts seem to be overlooking novel dynamics which are likely more important—specifically, the public’s persistent and negative perception of Hillary Clinton, the incumbency handicap, and a phenomenon I call “negative intersectionality.”

Change You Can Believe In

Both Trump and Clinton hold historically unprecedented unfavorable ratings among likely voters. Of the two, Clinton has held a slight edge—however, the gap between them has been rapidly closing. And here’s the kicker: While it is true that the public is very familiar with both Trump and Clinton due to their decades-long careers in public life, Trump has been in the limelight primarily as a businessman and entertainer. People are just now discovering “Trump the politician”—and as a result, their views on Trump as a politician are malleable. The Clinton team views this as an opportunity, and are attempting to define him before he gets a chance to define himself. However, the flip side is that while Trump’s numbers are currently low, there is a real opportunity for him to radically change public perception for the better. And he has tasked Paul Manafort with this responsibility—a man who, after orchestrating Ronald Reagan’s landslide victories, went on to build a highly successful career rehabilitating the image of dictators and strongmen. He’s made for this job. Expect Trump’s numbers to rise.

Hillary’s numbers are unlikely to follow the same trajectory—because not only do people know her well, but they know her specifically as a politician. It is precisely her perceived cynicism and duplicityas a politician that drive her unfavorable rating. Public opinion of Clinton has been on a steady decline since December 2012, and a brutal, negative campaign is unlikely to shift the numbers in her favor. In other words, Clinton will have a much harder time turning around her bad image than Trump.

As an example, consider Trump’s “policy surrealism”: by the normal rules of the game, it should hurt him that he is constantly changing his mind, that he insists anything he says prior to the election should just be thought of as a “suggestion” rather than a position, etc. Why doesn’t this bother voters? Because his primary rival is Hillary Clinton.

Clinton has been known to “evolve” frequently and dramatically as well. But the difference between them is that Hillary has very successfully framed herself as a policy wonk, and with the assistance of her large team of professional advisors, each new position she strikes is accompanied by a host of highly polished (if often unrealistic) policy proposals. However, this professionalism often proves as much of a curse as an asset: When Trump flip-flops, it seems like he is genuinely trying to work through these issues—he straightforwardly tells you what he feels at the moment, and changes his mind as he learns more, thinks more, etc. Clinton, on the other hand, is a veteran politician—as she herself constantly underscores—with a tightly controlled message. As a result, her position shifts seem more like cynical pandering. That is, in a sense, Trump’s evolutions actually make him seem more honest, while Clinton’s have the opposite effect.

It’s somewhat unfair, because of course there is a clear element of pandering in Trump’s evolutions, and at least some of Clinton’s policy shifts may be the product of sincere changes in perspective, new information, more life-experience, changing circumstances, etc. But fair or not, this does seem to be the emerging dynamic of the race.

Worse still, this avowed expertise, when paired with her modest and highly technical proposals, positions her as the consummate insider in an election cycle where people across the political spectrum seem hungry for an anti-establishment revolutionary. And while the Clinton campaign is still trying to figure out how to best define Trump (most recently insisting that he is not a “normal” candidate, failing to understand that many voters will see this as a positive), her interlocutor has no such problems: “Crooked Hillary” is simple but effective, hitting her right where she’s weakest.

A Referendum on Obama’s Administration and Bill Clinton’s

Historically speaking, it is rare that a party that completed two terms in the Oval Office manages to win a third. Granted, Obama has been a transformational president, and his popularity remains high. However, the problem facing Hillary is that she’s not only going to be held to account for the failures and shortcomings of the Obama administration, but also of her husband’s tenure in office.

Consider: Despite Hillary Clinton’s unparalleled credentials, her historic potential as the first female POTUS, her early and nearly insurmountable delegate lead, and the near-unanimous and robust support from the Democratic Party establishment throughout—she is having trouble “closing the deal” for the nomination.

This is because, in many ways, the Democratic primary has been a referendum on Bill Clinton’s tenure—and many of his signature achievements, championed by Hillary Clinton at the time, don’t look so great in retrospect. From NAFTA, the repeal of Glass-Steagall, Wall Street deregulation, welfare reform, DOMA (the Defense of Marriage Act), “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”—and of course, the infamous crime bills—despite Bill Clinton’s success at restoring the Democratic Party to national prominence, primary voters have taken an increasingly critical view of his legacy. This effect will be even more pronounced among Independent and Republican voters.

Trump recognizes the opportunity here, and has already demonstrated an intention to hammer Hillary Clinton not only on her support of NAFTA—but to even undermine her feminist narratives by highlighting the genuinely disturbing sexual assault accusations against Bill Clinton, and the role that Hillary Clinton played in attempting to discredit and silence alleged victims. Again, in the current cultural and historical moment, voters seem unlikely to provide the same benefit of doubt that was afforded the Clintons in the ’90s.