For me Trump was very unlucky, Covid basically screwed the economy although he can blame it rather than anything he did wrong and point out it's a world wide thing. Also Covid itself is not a vote winner, you'd be hard pushed to believe the DNC would have coped better. There's always the culture wars, voters either for the progressive agenda or against cancel culture. The gun issue is now a vote winner with many more Americans buying them and all the NRA's rather dire predictions largely coming true. Joe Biden seems a nice enough guy but he comes across as doddery and the DNC have to overcome the enthusiasm gap, it's not enough for people to dislike Trump, they need a candidate who gets the vote out. Biden will struggle in the presidential debates and Pence can use a lot of Harris' past statements against her. But personally it's law and order, the silent majority has been shouted down for a long time, in the privacy of the voting booth they will make themselves heard, not in the same manner as Nixon/McGovern, I think Trump will just scrape home.
You had me until the last sentence. I also believe that the soaring gun sales and recent 9th Circus reversal of the California gun magazine limit both support your contention that law and order will be the key issue. The sole part I disagree with is "scrape." If the left still occupies the Burn Barrel Cities this November, "scrape" will be more like "comfortable margin." The public can't help but notice then how little the left can do to guarantee our safety.
I believe the POTUS should have the character that represents America. Trump is a sociopath who has destroyed America's place in the world.
The 'key issue'...? It will revolve around which political party promises to give away the most 'free stuff'. All the other crap is just fog! We are finally reaching the bottom as a nation. People no longer ASPIRE to anything -- except to be given subsistence welfare, and as many 'goodies' as possible, by the government. The sweet spot for most Americans today would be to be put on endless welfare programs and do absolutely NOTHING to actually EARN anything.... If I'm right, this situation greatly favors the Democrat Party -- the 'free stuff' party ever since their great socialist demi-god, Frankie Roosevelt!
Although I think "issues" should generally be the predominate motive to move the vote, I think it's pretty obvious now that the US has moved away from the time when you could move a lot of voters on issues. The vote seems mostly tribal now.
Right now it will be the riots and it is going to cost the democrats bigly if they continue for much longer.
Covid Response? Do you mean how Trump saved over 1,200,000 U.S. lives by banning travel from China and Europe? Maybe that will help Trump after all.
Trumps looking pretty good right now and it's true that it's not about swaying voters but convincing them to vote and who has more of that momentum. Right now it looks like Trump. He had the economy doing great until the virus so he has an out with that and this social violence being perpetuated by the left is really, really going to hurt them and they probably don't have time to back off now and change people's minds. Trumps response to the virus was overall fine, in terms of perception, and it's really only democrats that are having a problem with it. Trumps ground game is also way, way ahead of the democrats from what I've noticed which signals far more energy on his side. Biden has lots of issues and they are only going to become more prevalent as we get closer to the election. If he screws up during the debates then it's probably all over him as people will consider him too old. His long time in politics means he has a lot of flip flops which ultimately means that Trump can keep him defending himself the entire time which is never good for a political candidate. Harris is also the dumbest pick I think he could have made as she comes in with so much baggage I can't understand the thinking behind that choice. It's almost as if they want to lose to Trump or something. I mean, they don't need the black vote, the woman vote or the California vote, all of which is all she brings to the table. Trump also kept us out of wars and really the only thing the democrats have to hit him with are some of his statements or Tweets, none of which has any real impact behind it. Essentially Biden is going to have to run on not being Trump because issue wise he is probably going to lose.
Republicans are decades late to the party of getting out the vote. But no more, the party is finally actively engaging voters, signing up voters, making sure even those in blue states get out and vote. Democrats no longer own the get out and vote theme. Too bad for them.