Beating Donald Trump won't be as easy as many people think

Simple math might suggest that it will be hard for Donald Trump to be re-elected as president.

He barely won the election in 2016, losing the popular vote to a flawed opponent. And with approval rating still low, the easy conclusion for many observers is that if only a small percentage of Trump voters from 2016 abandon him in 2020, he’ll lose the election. But current polls are only hypothetical.

In 2020, Trump won’t be judged against the ideal president, but the one candidate running against him. If the Democrats choose an establishment candidate like Joe Biden, that will play right into Trump’s populist agenda. Either way, Trump and his team will do everything they can to scare voters from voting Democrat, demonizing their opponent with attack ads and innuendo.

Remember, George W. Bush lost the popular vote and was unpopular in his first term. He won re-election not by becoming everyone’s favourite candidate, but simply by convincing enough people he was better than John Kerry. In 2020, Trump won’t have to convince all Americans that he’s a great president, only half of them that he’s better than his opponent.

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