If either side was looking for President Trump’s conviction 10 days ago to provide a boost to their election chances, they may be feeling a bit deflated.
The polling averages haven’t budged. At RealClearPolitics Trump led Biden in head-to-head matchups by 0.8 percent on May 30, the day of the guilty verdict. Now his lead is at 1.1 percent. In five-way surveys that include minor candidates, Trump’s lead at RCP has dropped from 2.2 percent on May 30 to 2.1 percent now. FiveThirtyEight’s average of polls that include Biden, Trump, and Kennedy show the Republican’s lead slipping marginally from 1.7 percent on May 30 to 1.4 percent now.
There’s also not much in the way of any discernible post-conviction trend in the results from any one pollster. Morning Consult’s tracking poll had Trump up by one point in mid-May, by two points in late May, and by one point as of June 2. Economist/YouGov’s five-way matchup had Trump up by one point as of May 28; its latest survey from June 2 through 4 has the race tied. In the former poll, Trump’s favorable/unfavorable ratio was 41 percent favorable to 55 percent unfavorable; in the latter, it was 41 percent favorable to 55 percent unfavorable. The latest Economist/YouGov survey also showed 92 percent of registered voters — rising to 95 percent among Trump supporters — saying the guilty verdict in Manhattan did not make them reconsider their 2024 voting preference. Whatever voters told pollsters about a hypothetical criminal conviction, the actual criminal conviction isn’t creating much movement, or even reconsideration.
Like 2020, this race has been remarkably static. If you’re a Biden supporter you can somewhat take a little bit of solace in some of the latest results. F.e. this morning’s CBS/YouGov poll shows a shift in Independent votes since March 1st.
However, Mr. Trump still leads in the same poll with overall voters (within MOE).
Add to this the fact that Trump overperformed his polling in both 2016 and 2020.
Basically, if the Biden campaign was banking on the conviction being the shot in the arm they needed to take the lead in the race with less than five months to go, they didn’t get their wish - so far.
