OAN’s Daniel Baldwin
6:20 AM –Thursday, August 31, 2023
New polls have shown former President Donald Trump overtaking President Joe Biden in a 2024 matchup following the release of Trump’s mugshot.
“[The mugshot] is a political gift,” Luke Ball, CEO of Masonboro Strategies, told One America News. “This mugshot is a humongous in-kind contribution from Fanni Willis and Fulton County.”
Trump has leapfrogged Biden into the lead, according to the new YouGov/Economist poll. The poll shows the 45th president beating Biden by one percent following a four-point jump from the end of July to the end of August. It was conducted after the public release of the mugshot.
“It’s almost as if [the mugshot’s] a rallying cry,” Ball said. “There’s nothing stronger than an image in a political campaign. And the image of Joe Biden going after Donald Trump on the federal level, and these weaponized district attorneys across the United States on state levels going after Donald Trump is the image that they’re going to take into the voting booth.”
The mugshot has resulted in a fundraising frenzy for the Trump campaign. The campaign announced it has raised more than $9.4 million since the mugshot was released, selling 36,000 t-shirts. Further, the team revealed it has raised more than $20 million in the month of August. Ball says the events in Fulton County, Georgia will only draw more possible voters to Trump’s side.
“I really believe that some people who don’t even normally tune into politics, like some of the urban areas of Atlanta, you saw they reacted to [Trump] when he was driving through their towns and their cities on his way to get indicted and all the way back from it,” Ball said. “They’re starting to look at this and get involved in politics a little bit and have opinions about it.”
Trump emphasized this in a newly released video, saying Biden’s entire campaign hinged on the indictments.
“Joe Biden’s only campaign strategy is indicting me,” Trump said. “That’s all they can do. Keep indicting me on nonsense, going on extended vacations, and sleep, sleep, sleep. That’s what he wants to do. He wants to sleep, and he wants to go to the beach and sleep. He thinks he looks good in a bathing suit. He doesn’t.”
The indictments appear to be backfiring, as Trump also leads Biden by 2% in the new Emerson College poll. Ball asserted that independent voters are backing the 45th president.
“Independents are going to have to look at the two options, presumably Donald Trump and Joe Biden and say, ‘Who do I want to command for the next four years,” Ball explained. “Joe Biden can’t command a sentence. How is he going to command four more years of this administration?”
Trump has seen his support swell in the Republican primary. Morning Consult shows Trump leading Florida Governor Ron DeSantis by 44%. An internal poll commissioned by the Trump Team also revealed that 54% of likely Republican voters viewed Trump as “very favorable.”
“The only chance that any of the other candidates have at getting the Republican presidential nomination is if Donald Trump drops out or goes away,” Ball said. “And I don’t foresee that happening.”
According to RealClearPolitics polling average, Trump was leading the GOP primary by slightly less than 15% in 2015. In 2023, he’s leading the pack by more than 40%.
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