The fortnightly Essential Research poll has Labor bouncing back three points on the primary vote after a four-point slump last time, to 31%, with the Coalition down a point to 34%, the Greens steady on 12% and One Nation up two to 9%, with the undecided component down a point to 5%. Labor’s improvement does not flow through to the 2PP+ measure, on which the Coalition’s lead shifts from 48-46 to 49-47. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Sunday from a sample of 1131.
Further results offer particularly interesting results on the US election, finding a distinctly narrow lead for Kamala Harris of 41% to 33% for Donald Trump when respondents were asked how they would vote if they could. Even more strikingly, respondents were uniformly positive in relation to four of Trump’s key talking points: 60% agreed that “Globalisation has gone too far, we need to protect local workers with tariffs on foreign goods”, with only 11% disagreeing; 59% that “government is fundamentally corrupt and politics has been taken over by vested interests”, with 15% disagreeing; 59% that “a deep state of unelected officials has too much control”, with 10% disagreeing; and 59% agreeing that “illegal immigrants should be deported”, with 19% disagreeing. Conversely, 41% felt abortion should be legal in all cases, 38% in most, 14% illegal in most cases, and only 7% illegal in all cases.
Substantial majorities also rated that politicians should not accept complimentary flight upgrades and access to airline lounges, sporting events and concerts. Essential Research executive director Peter Lewis connects the dots in an analysis piece for The Guardian:
Caught between casting Trump as weird and fascist while he bros out with Joe Rogan, the Democrats have allowed themselves to occupy a lonely centre ground and defend a system that few voters find appealing. It’s easy, entertaining and much more fun to dump on Trump’s foppery than explaining, and then addressing, the power imbalances of US technology, the military industrial complex and the economic model that supports them.
Regardless of the US result, what does all this mean for Albanese’s Labor? Winning power at a time when people have lost faith in government is a poisoned chalice; in your success you become the problem. This is why the Qantas Chairman’s Lounge allegations against the prime minister have had such salience; the idea that those in control have special access and special privileges feeds this populist backlash.
Losers always need a target to blame – that’s why Trump does so well with the disenfranchised working white men in America. They’ve gone from an era when every single aspect of society was tailored to making their lives easy, to an era where now women, minorities and migrants can – shock, horror – compete on somewhat level footing. So they lash out and vote Trump. Well, that’s the price we pay for progress.
Twinstudy – you do realise the biggest shift by race was a 30% swing towards trump by Latino men.
Things didn’t change much among whites from 2020, and in some states Kamala actually did better among whites than Biden did.
This kind of dialogue is just counterproductive for us on the left. In a US context, the Democrats have lost against Trump twice and nearly did in 2020 as well, their strategies do not work well with the broader electorate. Talking about actions and policies are far more productive than identity politics as we are brutally learning again and again.
If you want to talk specifically about the appeal of the right to the men, masculinity is important, particularly it seems among Gen z. Steven Miles presented as very masculine which I think was part of the secret to his social media success among young men, and young women liked him too for his progressive policies. I was really struck by the hypothetical polling here in Australia about the US election, where trump was ahead among young men (despite 18-29 voting very left here), and I think it comes back to masculinity. We can deride this and talk about how it is shallow and wrong all day, but we aren’t changing it, so we need to take it onboard as the broader left.