OPINION:
Hillary Clinton is not very well-liked.
When the national public scores her on whether she “understands the needs and problems of people like themselves,” the Democratic presidential nominee rarely breaks 50 percent.
At the end of last month, Mrs. Clinton’s likability sunk to a new low with a Washington Post/ABC News poll showing her GOP rival Donald Trump and Mrs. Clinton were equal in unfavorable ratings among registered voters. Mrs. Clinton had a unfavorable rating of 59 percent, Mr. Trump 60 percent.
In May, respected pollster Peter Hart told The Washington Post that presidential contests typically come down to one thing, and that’s likability. The problem with Mrs. Clinton’s campaign? She’s lacking in that.
“I bring it down to one thing and one thing only, and that is likability,” Mr. Hart said. Mr. Hart said being seen as likable is “about the lowest bar” for a candidate, and yet Mrs. Clinton has lower likability numbers today than she did when the campaign began, The Post reported. That remains true.
This is why Mrs. Clinton’s remarks, that half of Mr. Trump’s supporters can be grouped in a “basket of deplorables” who are “irredeemable” may be damaging to her campaign. For it only reinforces the public’s perception that she’s an out-of-touch elitist who has a condescending view of about 25 percent of the electorate.
That it was delivered at a $10,000 a plate fundraiser in Manhattan, among stars and the nation’s wealthiest — where Barbra Streisand sang — didn’t help.
Mrs. Clinton’s team must have realized the damage, for on Saturday they issued an apology, saying the comment was a “gross generalization,” and Mrs. Clinton regretted labeling “half” of Mr. Trump’s supporters deplorable.
She didn’t, however, apologize for the second-half of her statement, which was equally out of touch.
Mrs. Clinton said Mr. Trump’s other supporters are “people who feel that the government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures, and they’re just desperate for change. It doesn’t really even matter where it comes from. They don’t buy everything he says, but he seems to hold out some hope that their lives will be different. They won’t wake up and see their jobs disappear, lose a kid to heroin, feel like they’re in a dead-end. Those are people we have to understand and empathize with as well.”
As the Wall Street Journal put it in an editorial on Monday: “So she thinks half of Mr. Trump’s voters are loathsome bigots and the other half are losers and dupes who deserve Democratic pity.”
Will Mrs. Clinton’s comments hurt her among her own supporters? No. They truly feel sorry for anyone in the Midwest who doesn’t live close to a Whole Foods or can’t buy organic. Who doesn’t get the chance to eat at farm-to-table restaurants, or drives a gas-guzzling SUV. Who wants the government to enforce our borders and protect our men in blue. Who thinks transgender bathrooms are a bad idea and values traditional marriage. Who seeks independence and strives for self-reliance, and who doesn’t think the government can provide the solutions to all of our problems.
So no, with that crowd, Mrs. Clinton’s remarks were right on.
It’s with the independents and undecideds where her “deplorables” remark may hurt her. And like I’ve said before in this column, they hold outsized sway in this election given their increased numbers. In terms of Mr. Trump’s supporters, the comments are only going to serve as motivation to go to the ballot box in November. Mr. Trump has already cut advertisements based on them.
President Obama was largely successful in his presidential re-election bid in 2012 because he was able to cast former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney as out of touch with the common man. Mr. Romney’s famous “47-percent” comment further perpetuated this narrative. According to exit polls of that election, 81 percent of Americans who said they voted based on whether a candidate cared for people like them cast their ballot for Mr. Obama.
In June, The Associated Press wrote an article depicting Mrs. Clinton’s Mitt Romney problem — that the American electorate was split whether she, too, identifies with the average U.S. citizen.
At the time, 49 percent said Mrs. Clinton “understands the problems of people like you” and 46 percent said she didn’t, according to an ABC/Washington Post poll. This week, that poll, among likely voters, had her at the same number – meaning she hasn’t swayed the electorate’s mind yet on this issue.
In that AP story, Dan Pfeiffer, a longtime adviser to Mr. Obama, was quoted it was “too early” for the numbers to cause Mrs. Clinton’s team any anxiety, but added: “If this trend doesn’t reverse itself over the next many months, it should be cause of concern.”
Perhaps it’s now time to be concerned.
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