The USA does not want its own candidates for president

With the official presentation of the candidacy v Joe Biden In the 2024 election, America’s two major political parties face the same problem: voters are tired of their candidate. and yet Donald Trump is the favorite of the Republicans with 46% (NBC) and Biden is the favorite of the Democrats with 49%, the reality is that A majority of Americans would prefer the candidates to be neither a former president (60%) nor a current president (70%).

According to FiveThirtyEight, Biden’s approval rating is not only at one of the lowest levels since he became president, it’s also low for a sitting president. If his presidency in 2021 was met with an approval rating of 53%, it has currently fallen to 42.5%, behind other recent presidents who ran for re-election, such as Trump, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton or Ronald Reagan.

When it comes to his administration, Biden is still approved by the majority of Americans. According to AP-NORC, 58% view his performance favorably, but the president’s results have steadily declined since he was sworn in in 2021. Even so, a large majority of voters (74%) believe the country is moving in the wrong direction, and only 30 % believes that the country’s economy is in good shape.

In the current hypothetical conflict, Biden would receive, according to these data, more support than Trump. In polls in recent weeks, the president maintains a slight lead over the millionaire between 1 and 4%. In confrontations with Trump’s main Republican rival, Ron DeSantis, the president is worse: the man from Florida could beat Biden today by margins that vary between 2 and 6%.

The difference in performance between the two main Republicans matches what is likely as well the biggest handicap by Biden: his age. Given Biden’s 80 years, Donald Trump’s 76 doesn’t seem like much of an improvement. On the other hand, DeSantis’ 44 years puts him in the prime possible age range for a presidential candidate in a country where the legal minimum for candidacy is 40.

All in all, given the characteristics of the American political system and the current reality in the country, both Trump and Biden could secure the nomination of their parties. In that case, at least for the time being, Biden seems to have a better chance of reasserting his status as President-in-Chief of the United States than Trump does to return to office.