We’ve all heard it, in fact you can’t turn on the TV or radio without every story about HRC talking about the record smashing, asteroid impacting unfavorable poll number of Clinton. Here’s the latest numbers from Pollster.com.
Unfavorable 54.7%
Favorable 41.2%
Net -13.5%
Why would anyone even continue in a race with their favorability at -13%?
Hmmm, I wonder how other candidates have done in the past?
Here’s Mitt Romney’s numbers on Feb 13 2012.
Unfavorable 46.1%
Favorable 33.0%
Net -13.1%
And here’s George HW Bush Gallup numbers for Oct 10-12 1992
Unfavorable 56%
Favorable 40%
Net -16%
Well now, these numbers don’t look nearly as historically bad as I thought they were.
So lets take a stroll down memory lane and see how other candidates did right before the election rolled around.
1992
Clinton
Unfavorable 43%
Favorable 51%
Net +8%
Bush
Unfavorable 52%
Favorable 43%
Net -9%
1996
Clinton
Unfavorable 39%
Favorable 56%
Net +17%
Dole
Unfavorable 42%
Favorable 50%
Net + 6%
2000
Gore
Unfavorable 42%
Favorable 53%
Net +11%
Bush
Unfavorable 39%
Favorable 55%
Net + 16%
2004
Kerry
Unfavorable 43%
Favorable 52%
Net +9%
Bush
Unfavorable 46%
Favorable 51%
Net + 5%
2008
Obama
Unfavorable 34%
Favorable 62%
Net +28%
McCain
Unfavorable 44%
Favorable 50%
Net + 6%
2012
Obama
Unfavorable 42%
Favorable 55%
Net +13%
Romney
Unfavorable 47%
Favorable 46%
Net -1%
Well that’s a lot of numbers! So what do all these numbers mean?
I looked at the numbers for May of the election year, and there was little, if any correlation between who had the best favorable numbers and who won the election.
As far as the numbers right before the election? The only 2 candidate to have higher net favorable numbers and lose the election, was John Kerry in 2004 in a squeaker, and George Bush in 2000 when the Supreme Court appointed him President.
As far as Clinton’s horrific numbers? Well they’re bad for sure, but there’s been worse, and there’s been others nearly as bad, and just over a year ago even Obama was about -6%. Also, keep in mind she is still battling 2 opponents who are attacking her from both sides. On June 7 when the primary race is over, her favorable numbers will start slowly rising, and after the convention she should get another bump.
Oh! I almost forgot, what about the most pathological lying, con man ever to run for President?
Trump
Unfavorable 60%
Favorable 33%
Net - 27%
Clinton has had everything thrown at her for 25 years and I doubt that even the right wing propaganda machine can come up with anything new. But Trump pretty much got a free policy ride during the primaries because he really did reflect much of the GOP positions and certainly the GOP’s base positions. And Trump has created more material to be used against him than probably every GOP candidate for the last couple of decades combined. It’s one thing to get your party to reluctantly support you, but we’ll see if he can boost his positives and drop his negatives under the Tsunami of fact filled, in his own words, attacks that are about to descend on him.
So in the May before the election, a candidates favorable numbers aren’t so much indicative of what will happen on election day. But as the election gets closer, whoever can hold the lead in the favorable numbers, has the best chance of winning the election. Sadly, elections tend to boil down to likability rather than policy.
According to Gallup, Clinton has a +12 favorable advantage over Trump. Watch this trend for a clue of what could happen in Nov.