The Democrats began their quadrennial convention buoyed by polls that show the Biden-Harris ticket with a significant lead over President Donald Trump. But some of the polls also point up a key problem: Voters are less for former Vice President Joe Biden than they are against Trump.
All elections are about turnout in the toss-up states, as Hillary Clinton and the Democrats learned four years ago. Former First Lady Michelle Obama reinforced that lesson during her convention speech Monday night after noting that President Trump and his supporters, "who know they cannot win fair and square at the ballot box, are doing everything they can to stop us from voting."
"This is not the time to withhold our votes in protest or play games with candidates who have no chance of winning," Obama said. "We have got to vote like we did in 2008 and 2012. We've got to show up with the same level of passion and hope for Joe Biden."
But with balloting beginning in six weeks in some states, is there enough time to create passion? Or will the passion against Trump be sufficient to drive him from power?
A Pew Research Center poll released last week found high levels of engagement among voters — unusual for a presidential election with an incumbent — but also high levels of concern by people about whether they will actually be able to vote in the face of the pandemic.
The poll was taken before news reports about the U.S. Postal Service warning state election officials that it might not be able to deliver mail-in ballots on time, adding to perceptions that the Trump administration is trying to undermine the election itself.
The worrisome part of the poll, though, is what it revealed about relative passion among Biden supporters.
"For Biden supporters, opposition to Trump is by far the most frequently mentioned reason why they support him," Pew said. "Asked an open-ended question about the main reason they support or lean toward Biden, a 56% majority of his supporters cite their opposition to Trump; far fewer mention Biden's leadership or performance as a candidate (19%) or his personality (13%)."