President Joe Biden is trailing former President Donald Trump by more than 20 points on the issue of which candidate would better handle the economy, according to a new poll.
The leading Republican front-runner, Trump, holds a 22-point lead over Biden on the question of which candidate would better handle the economy, with 55% picking Trump and 33% selecting Biden, according to an NBC News poll conducted Jan. 26-30. The dismal outlook for Biden comes despite his recent boasting that “jobs are growing,” with more than 300,000 created just last month.
When the same question was proposed to voters in October 2020, a month before Biden defeated Trump, the then-president held just a seven-point advantage over Biden, 48% to 41%.
The economy beat expectations in January and added 353,000 jobs, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday morning, while the unemployment rate remained at 3.7%, a low number by historic standards. Last week, Biden used the reports to champion the “great news” for working-class families, saying, “Jobs are higher now than before the pandemic.”
Notably, the poll shows Trump leading Biden by 5 points altogether when weighing all the issues, revealing a hypothetical 2024 general election matchup to be 47% to 42%, within the margin of error.
Trump’s five-point lead on all the issues combined was spurred by his edge on securing the border, which was 35 points above Biden, and having the necessary mental and physical health to be president, 23 points above the president, among other facts.
The poll was conducted by Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt of Hart Research Associates and Republican pollster Bill McInturff with his team at Public Opinion Strategies. Horwitt said the results of the poll reveal “a presidency in peril.”
“What is most concerning is the erosion of Biden’s standing against Trump compared to four years ago,” Horwitt said. “On every measure compared to 2020, Biden has declined. Most damning, the belief that Biden is more likely to be up to the job — the chief tenet of the Biden candidacy — has evaporated.”
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However, Biden retains several advantages over the former president, including 12 points above Trump on dealing with abortion and 17 points above him for protecting the rights of immigrants.
Biden also pulled ahead of Trump when voters were asked about their ballot choice if Trump is convicted of a felony, as he battles 91 charges across four criminal cases. That margin is just two points in Biden’s favor, also within the margin of error.
