by Ken Grossberger, PhD

“The critical point in a situation, process, or system beyond which a significant and often unstoppable effect or change takes place” (Miriam-Webster Dictionary).

Donald Trump has been the focal point of the American political discussion since he first walked down the escalator in Trump Tower in 2015 when he announced his candidacy for president. Since then much has happened. A good economy, a lousy economy, a pandemic, 2 wars, 3 new Supreme Court justices, elections, court cases, and more political fights than anyone can count. Trump has been at the center of it all.

Thus the political world has divided into 3 camps: those who love Trump, those who hate Trump, and a lot of people in the middle. The current presidential polls show Trump and Biden within the margin of error nationally but Trump with a lead in most swing states. Biden’s approval ratings have been negative for quite some time, and Trump’s aren’t much better. Most polls show that much of the voting public, in general, would prefer 2 other candidates.

Trump has been living on the political edge since he first ran for president. That’s because he put himself there, and the not-so-mainstream media, hardly his fan club, has attached him to almost every story. They just can’t stop talking about him, and they hurl the most bitter, vindictive accusations at him at every chance they get, proving once again there is a dark lining in the silver cloud of public service.

Trump gets forgiven his ranting and personal attacks by his supporters, as his administration had a good record in many ways. Certainly, his time in office compares well against the seriously challenged Biden record of high inflation, the border crisis, the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, the mismanagement of 2 wars and the deal with Iran that almost guarantees this terrorist state a path to deliverable nuclear weapons.

But even with all that, there remains the issue of Trump fatigue – have too many people heard Trump stories too many times. This has been analyzed and discussed, but his lead in the polls show no evidence of that. There is also the New York hush money trial, with a biased judge who precluded defense witnesses and manipulated the jury instructions so that any 4 jurors could find Trump guilty of any of 3 underlying crimes and did not have to be unanimous in doing so. Any objective reading of the presiding judge’s obvious attempt to manufacture a guilty verdict would lead a reasonable person to conclude that the trial was skewed in favor of conviction.

But is this one issue too many, in a political career jammed with issues? Even if one concedes that Trump had a good record in office, and that this latest trial was a sham, have we just reached the point where some likely voters have reached the Trumpian saturation point and will begin to finally peel away from the Trump-is-better-than Biden logic? Trump is setting fundraising records off his guilty verdict, but will millions of dollars be enough to hold the soft Trump voters, and to persuade the undecideds? Does Robert Kennedy Jr. edge more into the weaker part of the Trump base?

Polls give us trends, not necessarily predictions, and we will see in the coming weeks which direction the political needles point, but let’s not be surprised if there begins a new attrition in Trump support, and perhaps correspondingly in Biden’s as well.