However this squeaker finale to the race turns out, it's pretty clear that both Shy Trump and Weary Biden voters were potent forces in the election. It looks like they were almost perfectly matched against each other, thanks to mail-in ballots for the Weary Biden contingent.
You can't say that Biden's basement strategy was a flop, even if he ends up losing by a hair. It worked exactly the way it was supposed to. The election was an up-or-down referendum on Trump for a lot of voters, just as the Biden camp wanted.
You can't say that Trump's rhetorical excesses didn't hurt him. They obviously did. These last few weeks of momentum shifting and Biden corruption revelations didn't matter to people who punched out on Trump long ago. Many of them mailed their votes in long ago.
You can't say voters rejected Trump's policies. They obviously didn't. Republicans stunned the political world with their successes down-ballot. They won races they were supposed to have near-zero chance of winning.
Trump himself outperformed his polls by, what, 7 or 10 points nationally, and more in some states? He went into the election with solid job approval and a remarkable number of voters saying they were better off than four years ago. He was judged on what he SAID, not what he did.
Trump would have been well-advised to tighten up his rhetoric and focus on his achievements, his plans for Returning to Normal, informed criticism of Biden's plans. His second debate was so much more effective than the first - but how many were still left to be swayed by then?
Trump was bold enough to make some amazing inroads with various groups - ironically, just about everyone except white men, which the media claimed were the only group that WOULDN'T turn against him. The trick is to bold without becoming inaccessible or unacceptable.
Of course China's virus was the 800-pound gorilla in the election, most likely the only reason for the tight finish and possible Trump loss - and remarkably, Biden never articulated a single effective difference in policy on the pandemic. He just TALKED about it differently.
It matters how a president talks about things, how he uses the bully pulpit, whether he gives wavering voters an easy way to climb aboard his campaign bandwagon. Trump was great at thinking and talking outside the box, but you've got to remember there IS a box.
Trump spoke for a huge number of Americans, and very clearly a DIVERSE base of supporters. He could have used the discipline and political polish needed to speak TO more of the remaining electorate - which turned out to include a great many white males in key districts.
If Trump ends up winning, he can build on his remarkable realignment of the electorate. If he doesn't, he DID blaze a trail for other Republicans to follow, assuming they have the insight and humility to study it carefully, to see what he did differently from his predecessors.
Trump's Achilles heel was making it too easy for a critical number of voters to viscerally dislike him... and then the coronavirus made it easy for them to vote by mail against him, while it grew difficult for them to remember what he accomplished before March 2020.
Trump showed the GOP how to get its populist groove back. He went to battle on "social issues" they were terrorized out of touching by the media and foolish consultants. He rejected the conventional wisdom that no hill was the hill to die on. May his party remember. /end
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