Opinion: Paycheck-to-paycheck voters will ‘believe their lying eyes’ and vote against Harris

Presidential debates are often like Rorschach tests for partisans who see what they want to see in the performance. Instead of imagining the random ink stain to be a “beautiful butterfly,” they view it instead as a decisive win for their candidate.

Since the debate, many in the media and many Democrats have viewed Kamala Harris’s well-practiced non-answer answers as a decided victory for her. While they may see it that way, there’s a very good chance that most working-class Americans do not.

After the debate, I conducted my own snap poll of friends and family members living paycheck-to-paycheck while getting battered daily by the harsh realities of life — harsh realities that everyone I spoke with believed have gotten worse under the Biden-Harris administration.

While ABC News, David Muir, Linsey Davis and Kamala Harris were seemingly in lockstep that Jan. 6, the debate about Roe v. Wade, climate change, the racial divide and a “2025 transition plan” Trump has nothing to do with were winning issues, none of those I spoke with — including working-class Democrats — had any of those on their lists of things to worry about as they struggle to pay rising bills while navigating increasing crime, crumbling infrastructure and failing bureaucracies.

To that point, Reuters headlined its debate story “Some undecided voters not convinced by Harris after debate with Trump.”

As they reported: “Kamala Harris was widely seen as dominating Tuesday’s presidential debate against Republican former president Donald Trump, but a group of undecided voters remained unconvinced that the Democratic vice president was the better candidate.” The news service interviewed 10 undecided voters. After the debate, six said they would vote for Trump or lean toward him. Five said they found Harris vague on how she would improve the economy. Those who switched to Trump — the majority — said that while they may not like him personally, they trusted him more on the economy and that their personal financial situation was better when he was president.

Next, we come to the left-leaning CNN. Although its post-debate snap poll showed Harris the winner by a wide margin, there was some very bad news for the vice president folded into the report. Before the debate, Trump was leading Harris on the economy 53 to 37. After the debate, Trump jumped up two points to 55 while Harris fell to 35.

Next, we come to some less conventional so-called polls. First, at a small bakery in blue Montgomery County in swing-state Pennsylvania, we have the “cookie poll.” As reported by Fox News , 4,228 cookies were sold expressing support for Trump, whereas only 369 were sold expressing support for Harris.

Is this remotely scientific? Of course not. Does it have some real meaning? Yes. In a blue suburban county, a vast majority of cookie buyers “voted” for Trump with their cookie purchases. To be sure, one of the reasons they did so was because it was an anonymous vote. In some ways, that gives it more weight than an “official” poll.

Back in 2016, I came across a similar food “poll” at a restaurant in blue Boca Raton, Florida. Customers could “vote” by either ordering a “Hillary” burger or a “Trump” burger. Walking into that establishment in early October 2016, I was shocked to see the Trump vote dramatically ahead. To me, that silly, anonymous vote in a blue stronghold represented a “canary in the coal mine” warning for the Clinton campaign. That warning was proven correct when Trump shocked the world by winning the presidency one month later.

As we enter the homestretch of the 2024 election, Harris is trying to pull off the greatest magic trick in the history of American politics. She is attempting to make the Biden-Harris administration disappear. She wants to convince voters that she and President Biden had nothing to do with the last three-and-a-half years.

More than that, Harris seemingly wants to pretend that Trump is somehow the incumbent president, and that she is the upstart “change” candidate fighting against the failed policies of the last three-and-a-half years. It is surreal to say the least.

It is a slick sleight of hand doomed to fail, because people will believe their “lying eyes.” For tens of millions of voters, the number one failure of the Biden-Harris administration is the economy, quickly followed by immigration, crime and health care. These voters will tie the incumbent vice president to those failures.

Harris, elitist Democrats, academics, media personalities and celebrities existing in entitled bubbles of luxury and personal safety can embrace Jan. 6, Roe v. Wade, etc. all they want, but this election is still going to come down to the bread-and-butter issues of the economy, immigration, crime and affordable and reliable healthcare.

And on that score, it will be the Americans living paycheck-to-paycheck who will push Trump over the top to victory in November.

Douglas MacKinnon is a former White House and Pentagon official.

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