In one of his final interviews, Barack Obama boasted he would have defeated Donald Trump in a third term.
He claimed a majority of Americans would have rallied around his messaged of diversity and progressive values.
But a new poll has revealed some startling conclusions.
According to a Politico/Morning Consult poll, Trump would have defeated Obama by a 45-44% margin.
During an interview with CNN’s David Axelrod, Obama embellished on his boast.
The Hill reports:
“Speaking with his former senior adviser and current CNN contributor David Axelrod, Obama said the vision of “one America” he first vocalized in a famous 2004 speech at the Democratic National Convention still holds true.
“The problem is, it doesn’t always manifest itself in politics, right?” the president said. “You know, I am confident in this vision because I’m confident that if I — if I had run again and articulated it, I think I could’ve mobilized a majority of the American people to rally behind it.”
Trump responded that there was “no way” Obama would have bested him.
President Obama said that he thinks he would have won against me. He should say that but I say NO WAY! – jobs leaving, ISIS, OCare, etc.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 26, 2016
The poll also sampled all voters.
Likely voter models almost certainly would have given Trump a larger lead.
Even Democrats agreed with Trump that he would have defeated Obama.
Writing in Politico, Bill Scher cited Obamacare, his increasingly racially polarized Presidency, and his trade policies as reasons he likely would have come up short.
Republicans won massive landslides in 2010 and 2014 when they campaigned on repealing Obamacare.
But when the party establishment handpicked Mitt Romney – the law’s actual inventor – as their candidate in 2012, they removed their most potent political weapon from their arsenal.
Trump would not have been similarly restrained.
Scher also notes Obama may not have been able to count on his previous 2008 or 2012 levels of enthusiasm from black voters:
“But wouldn’t Obama have seen a similar tick downward in turnout and enthusiasm? A New York Times canvass of African-Americans in Milwaukee picked up disenchantment with the president on the economic front. “We’re worse off than before,” said one who wrote in Sen. Bernie Sanders. “Ain’t none of this been working,” said another, who did not vote at all. Some Black Lives Matter activists criticized him for not siding with them enough, and Dr. Cornell West hounded Obama for years as a dreaded “neoliberal.”
Trump won the election because he flipped 200 counties that had voted for Barack Obama in the last two elections.
He won those areas by campaigning against Obama’s agenda on Obamacare, trade, his embrace of Black Lives Matter and open borders.
The Politico/Morning Consult Poll proves Obama is living in a dream world.
