It’s almost like Democrats believed that the 2024 presidential election was going to be just like 2020, minus, at least for now, a global pandemic. They would use all of the same tactics, and they would sweep an increasingly confused and addled Joe Biden back into office. Never mind his beyond dismal record, and the fact that he is one of the most unpopular presidents in recent history because of it. A healthy dose of ignoring that record and some good old-fashioned gas-lighting by members of his administration and the media of the American people, and sleepy Joe is right back in the Oval Office. But Democrat lawmakers are starting to realize just how bad things might be for them on election night, and they are beginning to visibly sweat.
The problem is the pro-Hamas protests erupting on college campuses around the country. In a recent statement to Axios, one Democrat lawmaker said aloud what a whole bunch of other Democrats are no doubt thinking:
“The longer they continue, and the worse that they get, the worse it’s going to be for the election overall.” The demonstrations are “bringing out [the public’s] most conservative side.”
Videos and other accounts of the antics of the pro-Hamas protesters are on full display on television and the internet. Scenes of pro-Hamas encampments and students occupying buildings on campus at Columbia University and, at UCLA, Jewish students being blocked from entering campus just to go to class. And in one of the most appalling instances, at the University of Washington in Seattle, one Jewish student, a great-grandaughter of Holocaust survivors, was told to “go back to the gas chambers.”
More than a few Democrats see the writing on the wall and are well aware of the fact that the protests are a massive gift to Republicans. The GOP has wasted no time creating campaign ads out of video footage of the protests. The ad campaign rightly ties the protests to Democrat policies, like student loan forgiveness, with verbiage like Democrats “think hardworking taxpayers should cover pro-Hamas students’ tuition” and that they “cower to the whims of dangerous Antisemites in their party.”