Why did Trump defeat Harris on November 5th? There are lots of reasons but there’s no question a primary one was the Gaza/Israel war. Or, to be more precise, it was the Biden Administration’s refusal to stop providing Israel the weapons used to devastate Gaza.
There’s little doubt in my mind that this position more than any other issue led to millions of eligible voters who were anti-Trump not voting at all. A Council on Foreign Relations story in December reported that “Kamala Harris won 75,999,166 votes or 48.3 percent of the votes cast. That was 6,285,500 fewer popular votes than Biden won in 2020.” If the Democratic turnout had been the same as for Biden, it is likely that Harris would have won.
It’s now two weeks since Trump called for the removal of all Palestinians from Gaza. It’s two days after he attacked Volodymyr Zelenskyy as a “dictator” with “4 percent” support among Ukrainians and blamed him for Putin’s military invasion three years ago. And yesterday, one month after Trump took office, three reputable polls — Quinnipiac, Gallup and Reuters — have Trump’s approval ratings at an average of 44.5% and his disapproval ratings at 50%. This should be setting off alarm bells among Republicans. This has to be one of the steepest and most rapid drops in support over the first month of a Presidency ever in US history.
Clearly, what Trump did to Zelenskyy and Ukraine two days ago in the interests of Putin had nothing to do with these three poll results, but what that means is that Trump is almost certain to keep going down in the polls in coming weeks. Between all of the other anti-democratic, heinous and damaging Trump/Musk actions on so many other fronts, which will continue, and the widespread outrage over Trump’s cozying up to Netanyahu/Israeli fascists and Putin/Russia and lies about Zelenskyy/Ukraine, I think it is it likely that Trump/MAGA’s ultimate downfall will be ascribed in part, probably a large part, to his outrageous positions on Gaza/Palestine and Ukraine.
Trump’s overt attacks two days ago on Ukraine’s elected president Zelenskky have stirred up a hornet’s nest of open criticism of Trump by Republican Senators and people like Mike Pence and Nikki Haley. Piled on top of the growing, national grassroots movement of progressive opposition and some Democratic Party criticism and actions, these are very significant political developments. And again: all just in Trump’s first month.
It is so important that the visible demonstrative actions in the streets keep happening and building. Without people coming out within the first two weeks of Trump taking office our situation would be much more dire than it is. It has been inspiring to take part in and experience this upsurge in the depths of winter, not a usual time for tens of thousands of people all over the country taking action, and again and again, on any issue. This is, indeed, a winter of our discontent on a massive scale, but we’re not being “summer soldiers.” We’re braving the elements, overcoming our deep dismay and expressing our anger in effective ways, and because that is happening Trump is hemorrhaging political support.
The spring is ordinarily the time when progressive activism manifests itself in outdoors actions. Let’s keep on building, organizing and outreaching to make this spring the time when the tens of thousands becomes hundreds of thousands and Trump’s poll numbers keep plummeting. This is the prerequisite to more and more victories over the MAGA’s as their destructive extremism leads growing numbers of Republican voters and elected officials to raise their voices and turn away from madman Trump.
Ted Glick has been a progressive activist and organizer since 1968. He is the author of the recently published books, Burglar for Peace and 21st Century Revolution, both available at https://pmpress.org . More info can be found at https://tedglick.com.
