TWO INDICTMENTS LATER, DONALD TRUMP'S APPROVAL RATING IS UP

Often I'm told that it will simply be impossible for Donald Trump to win the general election next year -- he was never popular when he was president, and surely he must be less popular now. A civil jury said he sexually assaulted E. Jean Carroll. He's been indicted in New York. He's been indicted in Florida. He's likely to be indicted in Georgia soon. The public must hate him now.

But Gallup says he's more popular than he was when he left office:

John F. Kennedy remains the most highly rated former president when Gallup asks Americans whether, in retrospect, they approve or disapprove of the job each did as president. Ninety percent of U.S. adults now approve of the job Kennedy did....

Seven of the nine past presidents included in the poll receive majority retrospective approval ratings. The two exceptions are Donald Trump, with 46% of Americans approving of the job he did in his initial retrospective approval rating, and Richard Nixon, at 32%.

An approval rating of 46% doesn't seem particularly impressive, but to paraphrase President Biden, we shouldn't compare Trump to the Almighty (JFK in this case), we should compare him to the alternative. Biden is the alternative. Last month Gallup said Biden's job approval rating was 43%. Advantage Trump.

Trump's numbers have improved. Gallup says his polling average while he was president was 41%; in his final poll while he was in office, he was at 34%. In other words, he's 12 points more popular than he was in the immediate aftermath of January 6. Presidents' poll numbers tend to rise after they leave office -- but other presidents haven't been repeatedly indicted on felony charges. Trump's legal woes haven't hurt his polling at all -- just the opposite, in fact. Two indictments haven't hurt him. A third one probably won't either. Even if he's convicted somewhere, he'll appeal and tell everyone that the conviction wasn't the last word. His poll numbers suggest that half the country will accept that argument.

I want everyone to understand that all the things we find repulsive about Donald Trump are shrugged off by nearly half the public -- while Joe Biden's poll numbers are mediocre at best. As a result, Trump is polling better against Biden than he did in 2020, and he's polling better than he ever did against Hillary Clinton in 2016. Remember that he doesn't need to win the popular vote to win the Electoral College -- Republicans have a built-in advatange in the Electoral College now, primarily because Democrats' popular vote totals include millions of excess votes in California, and millions of votes in states where they're all but guaranteed to fall short (Florida, Ohio, Texas). And next year Biden will lose votes to whoever runs on the No Labels line, as well as to Cornel West on the Green Party line (who's getting campaign help from Jill Stein).

I know I'm repeating myself, but Biden is facing a much more difficult lift than most people realize. The evidence is in plain sight.