Election day is just over sixty days away, and American voters are on track to elect their least favorable president in all of recorded history.
It’s no secret that American voters are frustrated. In fact, it’s been a running theme throughout the primary process. The popularity of candidates like Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders symbolized what we now know to be true – 71% of registered voters identify as somewhat or very angry.
Perhaps this is a result of the choices that they’ve been presented with. Both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are making history as highly unpopular nominees for each of their respective parties.
Hillary Clinton has been a household name in American politics for over twenty years. From her time as First Lady, to her time in the Senate, her presidential runs, and service as President Obama’s first Secretary of State, Clinton’s favorability has seldom risen.
Her metric for likability has consistently decreased from the moment it became clear that she was running for president in the spring of 2015. According to the Real Clear Politics average, only 40.9% of Americans find her to be favorable, with 54.9% expressing the opposite.
Her favorability could only be perceived as a positive when compared to her competitor, Donald Trump. The Republican nominee sits even farther down in the public’s good graces, with only 36% of Americans expressing a favorable opinion of him.
Clinton’s edge in favorability is mostly thanks to having a more unified party, a presidential endorsement from a popular president, and access to more funds to campaign with. However, her Achilles heel lies in an arguably more important statistic: her trustworthiness.
7 out of 10 Americans agree that Hillary Clinton is not an honest and trustworthy person. For a Clinton supporter, that is a terrifying statistic. The question of Clinton’s trustworthiness is one that can be answered through examination of her transparency. The two largest scandals which have plagued her campaign -- her mishandling of classified emails on a private server, and the leak of DNC emails which indicate early preferential treatment of Clinton by big players in the Democratic Party throughout the primary race -- are both issues which raise questions about how much the American people can trust her.
To add to this, Clinton always keeps herself at an arm’s length from the public by holding small rallies, almost never holding press conferences, and taking interviews which allow her to pre-screen the questions that she is asked. The result is a cold, disconnected public image which starkly contrasts the amount of public engagement that Donald Trump partakes in.
Republican Nominee Donald Trump reflects an exact foil to Clinton's cold, calculated appearance. He's messy, at times wild, and shoots from the hip. It's what some people seem to admire about him, but for most Americans, it gives pause. Voters tend to like projections of strength from their candidates, but Trump's particular brand brings along with it an air of unpredictability.
A candidate who is inherently more difficult to trust is less likable than a candidate with a more stable set of values and policy proposals, and the polling seems to agree. 53%--over half of Americans--say that Trump is not a trustworthy and honest candidate. This is more so than Clinton, however, Trump's favorability is an issue.
Although Donald Trump has managed to successfully secure the Republican nomination for himself, he does not have the full force of the Republican party behind him. Trump's nomination, and the primary season which led up to it was a jolt to establishment Republicans. The anti-Trump camp of the Republican party has even gone so far as to endorse Clinton in some cases. If Trump cannot mend the fractured party, it is likely that he could lose key battleground states in November.
What's interesting about the sentiment that Americans seem to be expressing at this point in the election is that nobody seems particularly enthusiastic about their candidates. In fact, the campaigns have realized this and have adjusted their strategies to accommodate for the voters who lack in excitement for their candidates. Democrats campaigning for Clinton have motivated people to vote for her in order to prevent a Trump presidency, and Republicans have done the same.
This seems to indicate that the parties are hoping to fall back on partisanship in order to win votes, but polling suggests that other factors are at play. For example, Clinton's meager 30 points in trustworthiness reveals that voters from across the spectrum cannot call her honest. Likewise, Trump's incredibly low favorability confirms that Republicans are not all toeing the party line.
When absorbing all of this information about American voters and their feelings about the two major candidates, it is important to remember that Clinton and Trump won their respective primaries. Theoretically speaking, the primary process is meant to produce the strongest candidates from each party to run for the highest office in the land.
This cannot be the case, however, unless the primary fields from both parties were incredibly weak. While it could be argued that a Democratic field without Biden and Warren was less competitive, few could deny that Trump won in a highly competitive field of candidates.
Instead, it seems more likely that the primary system is not effective at bringing forth the strongest candidates for the general election. The primary races that voters watched seemed to be more of a reality show than a debate on the future of the United States, with the winners being those who could misdirect and obfuscate best, instead of those who could properly address the concerns of Americans.
American voters have left themselves with two choices in November that they don't like. And one of them will be the leader of the free world.
