Ron Brownstein: “Reality counts. That may be the biggest message of the 2020 presidential campaign so far.”
“While President Donald Trump shuffles his campaign staff and more Republicans grumble that he has failed to formulate a clear message and stick to it, a wide array of public and private polls signal that he is facing a much more fundamental problem: A preponderant majority of Americans believe he has failed on the country’s biggest challenges, primarily the coronavirus outbreak.”
“And history underscores the risks for Trump if he cannot shake the negative judgments. While relatively few first-term US presidents have not been reelected, every elected incumbent who has lost since the 20th century began — a list that includes William Howard Taft, Herbert Hoover, Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush — lost big. And their resounding defeats were rooted in voters’ convictions that those presidents had failed on the biggest challenges facing America at the time.”