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Will the Trump attack shift GOP approach at the RNC?
Jon Lieber, Eurasia Group's head of research and managing director for the firm's coverage of United States political and policy developments, shares his perspective on US politics from Washington, DC.
What we're watching in US Politics this week: The Republican National Convention after an assassination attempt on Donald Trump.
Wild weekend with the first assassination attempt in over 40 years against President Donald Trump, former President Donald Trump, this weekend that barely missed lodging a bullet in the back of his brain by several inches. That could have been a history-altering shot if it hadn't missed. And Trump was lucky to get out alive. But he also was able to rally his supporters and the base of the Republican Party behind him. And we're seeing that online this weekend, which is great timing for President Trump as he begins the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Trump has already said that the assassination attempt is changing his approach towards the convention and the campaign, offering up that he's going to take a more moderate and unifying tone, as opposed to one that was attacking current President Joe Biden. Biden gave an Oval Office address last night to also ask for unity in American politics, which is something that has been lacking in recent years as the two parties have increasingly defined themselves in opposition to one another. Prolonged unity is probably too much to ask for both of these guys. There is too much at stake for both parties. Both bases believe that this election is an existential risk to their way of life, and they are willing to fight it out until the very, very end.
But you still might get a very different tone at the RNC than you would have otherwise, as Republicans attempt to capitalize on the momentum from Trump's assassination attempt. No big policy announcements coming this week; the Biden campaign is going to try to get his footing underneath them, once again, as he tries to recover from the terrible debate performance he had two weeks ago. The conventions typically give a small but fading bounce to the candidate that's holding them, and I wouldn't really expect anything different this time around, even as Donald Trump looks like he's starting to open up a reasonable lead in what still looks like a fairly close race.
Thanks for watching, and stay tuned for more this week on the RNC.
The Veepstakes: Who will Donald Trump pick as his running mate? Tim Scott, Elise Stefanik, Doug Burgum and Marco Rubio
The Veepstakes: Who will be Donald Trump's VP pick?
With Donald Trump set to announce his vice presidential running mate in the coming days, we explore the possible contenders — and their viability.
Tim Scott
![Tim Scott](https://www.gzeromedia.com/media-library/tim-scott.png?id=52524411&width=980)
Tim Scott
South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, who withdrew from the race for the Republican nomination last November, has been campaigning hard for Donald Trump – and he has his eye on becoming vice president. But will the GOP’s only Black senator get Trump’s VP nod?
Raised by a single mom in Charleston, South Carolina, Scott became the first Black Republican elected to any office in the Palmetto State since the 19th century when he won his 1995 Charleston city council race. In 2008, he won a seat in the statehouse and went on to the House of Representatives in 2010. After one term, then-South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley appointed him to fill a vacant Senate seat, and he has easily won reelection three times. He is arguably the most recognizable elected Black Republican in office today. (Could Tim Scott become Trump's No. 2? Continue to read here.)
Elise Stefanik
![Elise Stefanik](https://www.gzeromedia.com/media-library/elise-stefanik.png?id=52551255&width=980)
Elise Stefanik
Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, a rising star of the GOP, is one of the few women on former President Donald Trump’s vice president shortlist.
When Stefanik first entered the national political scene in 2014, she was considered the new face of the Republican Party. At the time, she was the youngest woman ever elected to Congress and widely considered a moderate. Fast-forward to 2024, and Stefanik has drastically shifted to the right. She’s a full-blown MAGA Republican, routinely defending Trump and echoing his talking points – including the white nationalist “great replacement” conspiracy theory. (Could Stefanik, now a full-blown MAGA Republican, become Trump's running mate? Continue to read here.)
JD Vance
![\u200bJD Vance](https://www.gzeromedia.com/media-library/u200bjd-vance.png?id=52553070&width=980)
JD Vance
CNP/INSTARimages.com via Reuters
From holler to white collar. That’s the unusual life arc of J.D. Vance, the 39-year-old junior senator from Ohio.
Born into extreme poverty in rural southern Ohio, he grew up in the holler – “the hollow” – surrounded by abuse, addiction, and despair. But he made it out: He joined the Marines, graduated from Yale Law School, and became a successful tech venture capitalist.
He recounted all of this in his bestselling 2016 memoir “Hillbilly Elegy,” which became required reading after Trump’s shock victory over Hillary Clinton spurred interest in the disaffection of white working-class America. In the book, Vance criticized a culture of victimhood and dependency among poor whites while also blasting the establishment’s condescension and neglect. (Could Vance make it to the very top? Continue to read here.)
Marco Rubio
![Marco Rubio](https://www.gzeromedia.com/media-library/marco-rubio.png?id=52560497&width=980)
Marco Rubio
Mariana Robertson via Reuters
Florida’s senior senator earned the nickname “Lil’ Marco” for challenging Donald Trump during the 2016 primaries, but he has since forged a close alliance with the former president – so much so that some believe he could be tapped for No. 2.
Rubio was born in Miami to Cuban immigrants who arrived before the 1959 communist revolution — contrary to claims he had long made of them fleeing from Fidel Castro. He speaks fluent Spanish and got his start in politics in 1998 as a city commissioner in West Miami, where the 2000 census showed 87% of residents spoke Spanish as a first language. (Could Rubio stand a chance of becoming the first Latino VP? Find out more here.)
Doug Burgum
![\u200bDoug Burgum](https://www.gzeromedia.com/media-library/u200bdoug-burgum.png?id=52670861&width=980)
Doug Burgum
When Doug Burgum launched a campaign for the Republican presidential nomination focused on economic growth, energy production, and national security, few Americans outside of the Flickertail State had heard of the former software CEO turned governor of North Dakota. Just to get the 40,000 unique donors needed to make the debate stage, he had to give out $20 gift cards in return for $1 campaign donations. While he’s still far from a household name, he has emerged as a dark horse favorite to become Donald Trump’s vice presidential running mate.
Who is he? The67-year-old Burgum hails from Arthur, North Dakota — a town of roughly 300 residents — and worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Co before leveraging his family farm to start an accounting software company called Great Plains Software, which he sold to Microsoft for $1.1 billion in 2001. (Would Trump fancy a biz-savvy VP pick? Find out more here.)
Wildcards: Could Trump surprise us with his VP running mate?
![Wildcards: Could Trump surprise us with his VP running mate? Vivek Ramaswamy, Ivanka Trump, Nikki Haley, Kristi Noem, Tulsi Gabbard & Byron Donalds](https://www.gzeromedia.com/media-library/wildcards-could-trump-surprise-us-with-his-vp-running-mate-vivek-ramaswamy-ivanka-trump-nikki-haley-kristi-noem-tulsi-gabb.png?id=52675292&width=980)
Wildcards: Could Trump surprise us with his VP running mate? Vivek Ramaswamy, Ivanka Trump, Nikki Haley, Kristi Noem, Tulsi Gabbard & Byron Donalds
Luisa Vieira/GZERO Media
Donald Trump has been teasing his vice presidential pick for weeks, but with the Republican National Convention kicking off next week, he’s likely to make it official — and soon.
Right now, the front-runners appear to be Sens. Marco Rubio and JD Vance, along with North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum. But what about the contenders who aren’t grabbing headlines yet remain on Trump’s radar? Here is everything you need to know about the dark-horse candidates.
Nikki Haley: We know, we know, the former governor of South Carolina and Trump’s former ambassador to the UN fired shots at the former president as his main opponent in the primary. But just because she once challenged him doesn’t mean she wouldn’t be a valuable running mate. (Could Trump surprise us with his VP running mate? Find out more about his wildcard prospects here.)
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- JD Vance: Started from the bottom, now he’s here ›
- Trump gambles to woo Black voters ›
- Trump's VP pick remains a secret ›
- Wildcards: Could Trump surprise us with his VP running mate? ›
- Trump's VP pick: The short list ›
- Trump's pick for VP: JD Vance - GZERO Media ›
Biden isn't going anywhere for now
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: Hi, everybody. Ian Bremmer here and a Quick Take to kick off your week. The topic everyone is discussing, of course, is what is the state of play in the US election for President Biden's reelection campaign in particular? What's going to happen? What are the outcomes?
Well, what's going to happen at least for the near term, is that Biden isn't going anywhere. He would have to decide, to stand down. He certainly is not prepared to do that. His team would have to tell him strongly that they feel like he's making a mistake. They're not prepared to do that, either. And this is something we've seen on a few occasions. Remember, Biden has been serving at high levels in Foreign Office for decades as vice president for eight years, in addition to president for almost four and senator including running the Foreign Relations Committee for decades and decades. And so the people around him, they are very loyal. They have a lot of experience. And they've been on and committed to Team Biden for a very long time. They absolutely are willing to give him advice. And they execute as well as they can, on his directives. But they are very unwilling to challenge him, particularly when he feels strongly about an outcome.
And we've seen this play out on Russia-Ukraine, Biden was unwilling to talk about moving towards a negotiated settlement as the Ukrainians were doing better and better. They were kicking it down the road. They weren't having the difficult decision because no one was willing to really challenge it. And then the situation for the Ukrainians started getting worse, and it was “they'll manage reasonably well,” the tactical on the day to day. And you have a strong coalition that the Americans are leading. But at no point are you making the big sudden change. It's very cautious. It's very conservative. and it tends to kick the can on big, controversial potential decisions.
I've seen the same thing in the war in the Middle East. A lot of people feeling like Biden should have been tougher and stronger against Prime Minister Netanyahu much earlier, especially as he was taking his own whacks against Biden. Biden unwilling to do that. They kept kicking the can. And so you got incremental decision making, very cautious, very risk averse, very conservative. Every one of the tactical decisions were pretty well executed.
But willingness to take big bets and risks, much much less so. And now we see the same thing playing out on the election. For the last year, it's been very clear to anyone that has met with Biden. And I've said this, certainly publicly, and I've heard it from all sorts of leaders, whether it's CEOs or leaders of the G7 or the G20 or the big multilateral organizations, that Biden is not someone that is capable of strongly leading the country for another four years through 86. The age of 86, too frail, too slow, losing a number of steps, since he was running back in 2020. But at no point was someone around Biden willing to have the tough conversation. And Biden himself, wasn't willing to hear it. And so you kick the can, you kick the can, you continue to manage it until it becomes a bigger problem. And that's where we are, right now. And it is certainly true that the leadership of the Democratic Party, and the top leaders of the House and Senate and the top governors, none of them are straying from the party line.
They are rallying around the president and saying, “yeah, he had a bad debate, but he can still do this.” But there are a lot of people, that certainly matter, for the president, in terms of the mainstream media, as well as in terms of senior leaders in the former Obama camp that are saying that this guy needs to step down. And I do think it matters when the paper of record for the center left, The New York Times, has not just their individual columnist, but the editorial board writing that he needs to stand down. And I think it matters when respected advisers to Obama, like Axelrod, Favreau and a number of others are saying you need to step down. Now, Biden doesn't trust those people. In terms of the Obama folks, he thinks that they're the ones that gave it to Clinton as an opportunity, when it should have been his, passed him over. If Obama said that to him personally and strongly directly, it would be taken differently. But certainly, Biden and his senior team won't accept a recommendation for them, and they won't accept a recommendation from the mainstream media.
I mean, if you look at the seven stages of grief, they are through shock. They're through denial. They're roughly in the anger phase. But they're not yet in depression. And they certainly aren't engaging in bargaining. So, I think we're very far from Biden actually stepping down. Now, having said that, there's still five months before the election, and that's a long time for an 81-year-old that has bad days. And, you know, the fact that you now do have, for the first time, some damaging information from inside the administration, for example, the Axios piece that said that he's pretty strong, and being able to engage from 10 am to 4 pm. That's an indictment for someone at 81 that would need to govern until he's 86. And that's the kind of thing that would not have been shared with the media six months ago. And now it is. And when you see members of the family and senior friends and formal advisers to Biden blaming the senior team of staffers for not prepping him well during the debate, that again, we haven't seen that kind of internal animosity.
And if you start to see senior members of the team turning out against either anonymously or not, Biden sticking around because they think he can't win, that becomes much more dangerous. So I think this gets harder to manage. It's easy to manage right after the debate when everyone recognizes that he's not prepared to step down. But as this story continues to play, and yes, they can try to manage him and limit the time that he spends with the public. But this is going to be the focus for all of the media going forward over the coming months, and of course, is a very easy thing for the Trump team to run on running against Biden, as opposed to running on Trump's deficiencies, is a much better place for them to be. We are in a horrible place in terms of the state of this US election.
I'm sure many of you have seen the CBS YouGov poll over the weekend that shows that over 70% of registered voters believe that Biden is not cognitively capable to stand, and run the country for four years. They think he should stand down. 50% of registered voters believe the same about Trump. That number is way too high. It's too high for Biden. It's too high for Trump. We have never been in an environment where the American people feel so badly about both candidates. And yes, of course, there is an enthusiasm gap and Trump supporters are much more willing to forgive Trump's unfitness or even to paint Trump's unfitness as a positive, than team, than the people around Biden.
And that is a problem. You're more likely to see a bumper sticker, or a cap for Trump among his supporters than for Biden among his supporters. And in an election where turnout matters, the fact that large numbers of Democrats are now questioning the fitness for office of their own candidate, I think does make it more likely that Trump is going to win. I had very, very low confidence going into the debate about what the outcome of the election would be. I still have low confidence, but it is higher than it was before the debate. This is a major inflection point in my view. And it makes it more likely that Trump is going to win. And it would put more pressure on the Biden team to consider alternatives.
I do believe that if they wanted to go the alternative route, alternatives exist. First of all, at this stage, given Biden's age and given the way he is likely to appear over the coming five months, I don't think that Kamala Harris is a worse choice, is less likely to win than Biden. So simply stepping back, continuing to campaign. But Kamala becomes the candidate, I would say at this point, and I wouldn't have said that six months ago, she is likely to take the election as Biden would be, both in my view, on balance, likely to lose. But I also think that the potential of bringing in somebody else in the convention, and there are a lot of strong candidates out there.
Gina Raimondo would be certainly towards the top, especially because she is actively a very trusted part of the Biden cabinet. So it's less of a transition. Pete Buttigieg, outside, Gretchen Whitmer, Gavin Newsom, Jared Polis, there are a number, that are strong that is also, of course, a big risk because here, not only are you pushing aside Kamala Harris, which will antagonize a lot of her supporters, and there are many, but also would be putting up someone who does not have a significant track record in national politics. And that reminds me of Ron DeSantis. So many anti-Trump Republicans were all in for DeSantis. This guy was going to be the golden child for the Republican Party, take out Trump. And he was an absolute nothing lightweight on the national stage and got pasted by Trump. And that, of course, is a danger. So I understand that tactically, when you have a team that is oriented towards consensus around Biden, that on any given day, putting your head up and saying, “I think it's time for you to go, sir,” is not a great strategy.
And of course, that leads to many, many, many, many days of kicking the can until the point when it is a lot harder and the dangers are a lot greater than they were if you had had that conversation, say, a year ago. Also keep in mind that when Biden first won the election in 2020, became president 2021, literally no one around him thought he was going to run again. So, I mean, they did think this is a one term president. He trounced Trump. there'll be somebody else on the Republican side, probably because he's too old too, Trump is unfit. And Biden will have one term and then it'll go on to somebody else. But of course, if you're unwilling to make those plans on any given day, you end up in a non-optimal place.
And that is where the Democrats are right now. The Republicans are in a non-optimal place for very different reasons. They're also facing someone who they certainly would much rather be running with someone else because they'd have a much higher chance of winning if this were Biden at this age versus Nikki Haley, the likelihood Haley would win would be, I think, a layup or a slam dunk. It's not where we are, even now with Trump, because so many people think that Trump is problematic and for very good reason, to run. But the likelihood that Trump, of course, will be removed, zero. Despite all of that, and he does control the Republican Party to a much greater degree than Biden controls the Democratic Party. And you can say, well, that's unfair. And they aren't the same standards, but, you know, what you would like to happen is not where we are. Where we are, is that Biden is the one that has to make this decision. And it's going to get harder for him over the course of the coming months.
That's it for me. And I'll talk to you all real soon.
Ian Bremmer on debate: A big loss for Biden
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: Hi, everybody. Ian Bremmer here. It is late, and we have just seen the first, maybe the last presidential debate of 2024. I was skeptical about the strategy from day one of Biden getting on stage with Trump. Biden has never been a great campaigner, doesn't have a lot of discipline, and isn't enormously entertaining. But they decided they needed to do it. And the rules benefited a normal politician. The microphones shut off, except for the person who was allowed to speak, and there was no live audience, and it was CNN. So the questions are going to be, at the very least, balance between the two. And, if there's going to be a slant, it'll be towards Biden and not towards Trump. And despite all of that, Biden got absolutely pasted.
And it's not about his speaking points per se; there were some points that he made, if you just look at the transcript, that clearly was in his favor, I would say, on balance, on the economy, his command of the facts was stronger than that of Trump. I saw that, in terms of talk of inflation and jobs. I saw that in terms of China and the trade deficit with China, that's actually narrowed as opposed to increased. Certainly, on abortion, I think that Biden would have landed more punches if you were only looking at the transcript. But no one is looking at the transcript. They're looking at the performance. And the performance, Biden was abysmal.
It wasn't just like a little bit on Trump's side. Trump looked vibrant. He actually, largely played by the rules. He sounded strong. He stuck to his time limit. And Biden looked and occasionally sounded incoherent. And the reality is that, I mean, Trump, in my view, shouldn't be running because he's unfit for being president. Biden shouldn't be running because he is too old to stand. And of the two challenges, the latter looks a lot worse on the debate stage that 50 plus percent of Americans just watched. The inbound that I've been receiving over the last two hours from people all over the world is overwhelmingly: "Is Biden now going to stand down? What is going to happen?" Because this is the worst evening, certainly of his campaign, and the level of pressure to find someone, anyone else other than Biden, to run is going to be strong.
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Debate Bingo: Welcome to the 2024 Biden-Trump showdown
Here we are with the first of two presidential debates of the 2024 US election campaign. Thursday night’s debate will mark the first time a sitting US President debates a former one, and it will be the first debate for both in this campaign season.
Trump comes into this debate as a convicted felon in his hush money trial, with more cases on deck. Biden will have the chance to score points, face-to-face, but we can't promise that any slobbing or slurring won't lead to some "poor old Joe" jibes. Trump won't shy away from hitting below the belt, and that’s another reason why the policy of muting candidates' mics remains in place. This will make for an exciting duel... or brawl?
And to make the most of the experience, we've brought it back: DEBATE BINGO! Yes, you can make it a competition with your fellow politics nerd pals by printing out GZERO Media's debate bingo cards. Or just screenshot them and share with your friends to compare online. There are four different cards so that each player can have a unique board. Every time one of the candidates says one of these words or terms, X it on your card. The first player to get five across wins. And if you really want to jazz it up, you can mark each of your words by taking a swig of your favorite beverage, doing five burpees, or donating to your favorite charity or political candidate. Whatever your game is, you can play it with our bingo cards while you watch the debate on CNN at 9 p.m. EDT on Thursday, June 27.
Enjoy! Follow our coverage of the debate with us on social media too - we'll be on X @gzeromedia.
Remember, there's more going on in the world than just the US election, so subscribe to GZERO Daily, our newsletter on global politics, and watch our weekly show GZERO World with Ian Bremmer right here and on public television.
US presidential debate: More risk for Biden than Trump
Ian Bremmer shares his insights on global politics this week on World In :60.
What do you expect from the first Trump-Biden debate?
Well, I'm going to be watching it. I am a little surprised it's happening, that they agreed on the rules which are more favorable to Biden and to so-called normal politicians. But, you know, we'll see. I think there's a lot more downside for Biden precisely because his age is perceived to be so much more of a problem. The State of the Union, he did very well. But this is a live-fire exercise. It's not a set piece. And so in that regard, there's more ways you can go badly. Having said that, if he's able to stand his ground, and if Trump seems like he's slobbing more, this is a lot more about how they appear than what they actually say. You hate to say that something is important as US presidential race, but of course, that is a lot of what American politics, especially the elections, are about.
With formal EU membership talks beginning, is Ukraine closer to accession?
Yeah. I mean, every step you can take, it's a long process. It is absolutely making it easier for the Ukrainians to actually get in. But let's keep in mind there's a lot of uncertainty out there. First of all, with French elections coming up soon, if it turns out that Le Pen's National Rally party gets a majority. Hung parliaments more likely, but if it gets a majority, she could shut down, lots of components of EU accession talks, which would include Ukraine. The Parliament would no longer support additional movement and that's a problem. You need all 27 states to allow this to go through. And France is in a position where that might be the case. Also if Trump wins in the US, keep in mind Trump does not support a strong united EU. He wants further exits. He wants a weak EU to the extent that that gives space for people like Orbán and other European members that are more skeptic to oppose accession, it could get more challenging. So, I don't think this is a done deal by any means.
China just brought back rocks from the far side of the moon. The first time that's happened. Are we in a new Space Race?
Well, we are in the sense that the Chinese care a lot about having more capacity in space for scientific achievement, for national pride and also for national security. But still, if you look at the number of satellites that are up there, I mean, you know, the United States is nine times, so 900% greater. That's a pretty big deal. And that is not NASA. That is the private sector in the US. It is Elon and SpaceX. It is Jeff Bezos. It's other companies. And the fact that the entrepreneurship in the U.S has allowed American space exploration to grow, which NASA can fund and the Pentagon can fund and take advantage of, has been a huge advantage for the US.
Doesn't mean they're all and always aligned with American national security, but it's certainly not a space race versus the Chinese.
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Former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden.
The one good reason to watch the Biden-Trump debates
Well, if they want a geriatric cockfight then we, as a nation, shall have one.
After months of circling each other, Joe Biden and Donald Trump abruptly agreed this week to face off in not one, but two televised presidential debates. The first will be in late June, the second in mid-September.
Trump had been taunting low-profile Joe for weeks, holding rallies with an empty podium at his side, accusing the gaffe-prone commander in chief of ducking him.
But Biden suddenly flipped the script, coming out swinging on social media with the Dirty Harry dare (“make my day, pal”) and a “sick burn” about hearing Trump was “available on Wednesdays” — the one weekday when the former president’s hush money criminal trial isn’t in session.
It’s a lot of “come at me, bro” energy from two guys who are each almost as old as Mike Tyson and Jake Paul combined.
But this is 2024, and just about every political exchange is designed for audiences to yell “ohhhhh sh$&!” from the cheap seats. There will, of course, not be audiences at these debates. Biden, knowing that Trump thrives uniquely in a crowd, managed to corner his rival into accepting a debate without them.
Why — WHY — are they even doing this? Biden, down in the polls again, wants a fresh chance to draw a contrast between himself as a self-styled safe — if only occasionally unsteady — pair of hands to defend democracy against the 91-time-indicted, election-denying, abortion-threatening chaos agent at the other podium.
Trump, meanwhile, is looking to roast a very vulnerable Joe over immigration, inflation, and Israel. But even more than that, he’s hoping that either he himself, or the lights and cameras around him, can elicit a signature, campaign-defining Biden-really-is-too-old-for-this type of gaffe from the president. To be fair, it’s not a bad gamble if you’re Trump and you’ve got a free Wednesday to prepare.
Do either of these guys hope to change a large number of minds? Probably not. But with the election likely to come down to a few million voters in a handful of swing states, each sees it as a gig worth taking.
But what about us? Do we really want this debate? Do we need it?
On the one hand, no, absolutely not. We aren’t likely to learn much about either of these men that we don’t already know. This isn’t, say, 2020 when, at the very least, there was some intrigue about seeing them face off directly for the first time against the backdrop of a worldwide pandemic and nationwide protests.
But by now we know who these guys are. We’ve seen enough of each of them. As candidates. As presidents. As the aging, raging, defining poles of political possibility in America today.
In a country where 70% of voters say they wish we had new faces atop the tickets, these debates will simply remind us even more acutely of what we dislike about one candidate or the other.
You’re better off watching grass grow.
But before you go looking for a good lawn, here’s one reason why watching this awful Statler and Waldorf remix might actually be worth it — not only for you, but for America more generally: It will bring us together.
That may sound strange. What about a political cagematch between rivals who despise each other could possibly be unifying?
Well, at a time when Americans are hyperpolarized and deeply worried that the media will be biased, hoodwinked by misinformation, or out of touch with their concerns, a live debate like this will be the only time that we are all in the same room, together, with the two candidates. It will be the only chance we get to see and hear them, unmediated, unspun, at length, and in direct contrast to each other.
This is particularly true of the candidate from the “other side” (whoever that is for you). Be honest, you probably know his views almost exclusively as a patchwork of quips and clips curated by an algorithm that caters to your biases.
To get beyond that, even in some small measure, it’s worth tuning into the smackdown as it’s happening.
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Can Donald Trump rescue Trudeau?
The struggling government of Justin Trudeau tried Tuesday to cast itself as the group to handle the vital relationship with the United States — announcing a "Team Canada engagement strategy” at the end of a cabinet retreat — but observers are dubious about the government’s ability to pivot its way out of trouble by invoking the specter of Donald Trump.
Trudeau, who has been trailing his Conservative rival Pierre Poilievre in the polls by double digits since August, reminded voters that his government did a good job salvaging the trade relationship the last time Trump was in the White House, when Trump threatened to tear up NAFTA, and Trudeau managed to save the furniture and negotiate USMCA.
“We made it through the challenges represented by the Trump administration seven years ago, for four years, where we put forward the fact that Canada and the US do best when we do it together,” he said. “Obviously, Mr. Trump represents a certain amount of unpredictability.”
As they did last time, the Liberals are putting together a new Team Canada — drawing on representatives of other levels of government, business, labor, and academia. The team will be led by Industry Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne, International Trade Minister Mary Ng, and Kirsten Hillman, Canada's ambassador to the U.S., who gave a presentation at the cabinet retreat.
Who best to handle Trump?
This is a good move, says Christopher Sands, director of the Wilson Center’s Canada Institute. “Team Canada works when it puts Canadians on a focused, common message as was the case during the USMCA negotiations. Champagne, Ng, and Hillman are a good group to have as the face of the effort.”
But the government should be thinking about practical and serious steps to improve the relationship. “If Canada has no plan to increase defense spending, support the EV transition, export food and natural gas to allies in Asia and Europe, then all the feel-good rhetoric Canada can muster won't be enough,” says Sands.
Trudeau’s team signaled at the summit that the Liberals will try to connect Poilievre to Trump in the minds of voters, and get them thinking about who would be better off dealing with Trump.
It is not clear to Sands that this issue will give Trudeau the political boost he is looking for. Trump, after all, did not get along with Trudeau. “All that water under the bridge is going to be clouding Trudeau's relationship with Trump if he gets elected.”
When Canada hosts the G7 in 2025, would it really be good to have a replay of the 2018 G7 meeting in rural Quebec, which ended with Trump denouncing Trudeau from Air Force One as he left for North Korea?
“If it's Trudeau hosting Trump back for a second time, I just couldn't imagine what the sherpa will have to go through to be preparing that one,” says Sands.
Liberals look desperate
Graeme Thompson, a senior analyst with Eurasia Group's Global Macro-Geopolitics practice, doesn’t think this will work: “It does suggest that the government is somewhat desperate,” he says. Conservatives can argue that since Trump and Trudeau don’t get on, they might be better placed to manage the relationship, and what if Trump isn’t elected? “If Biden wins, that argument is dead.”
And Biden has better electoral prospects than Trudeau, according to pollster David Coletto, who concluded this week that Trudeau has little chance of winning another election. Trudeau seems out of touch with the top-of-mind concern of Canadian voters: the high cost of living. His firm, Abacus Data, recently found that the rising cost of fuel and food is the most important issue for three out of four Canadians — an unusually dominant concern.
Biden looks better
The bad news for Trudeau is that only one in four Canadians believe he “understands what life is like for people like you,” while two in four believe Poilievre does.
Inflation is brutal for incumbent governments — in the United Kingdom, United States and France the leaders are all facing stiff headwinds — but Coletto thinks Trudeau’s brand leaves him ill-suited to respond to a public dealing with scarcity.
Biden, on the other hand, could still pull off a win. “Biden is, I still think, better than 50-50. The odds are still in his favor, although not greatly. I think Trudeau has got a 10% chance of winning the next election.” Polling agrees. The horse race numbers for Trump-Biden show a tight race, while Trudeau has been far behind of his opponent for six months.
On Wednesday, a backbench MP in Trudeau’s party called for a leadership review, saying “there’s almost a hatred out there right now for [him].”
Unlike Trudeau, Biden has put an economic plan at the heart of his presidency, and the economy may be turning around. The Dow Jones and S&P 500 both hit record highs on Monday, and consumer confidence reached its highest point since 1991. Economists who study the relationship between the economy and politics think the signs augur well for Biden.
Trudeau does not look poised to benefit in the same way, says Coletto.
“At some point voters just say, ‘I'm done with you.’”