Biden’s economy pushing Arizona voters to jump ship for Trump

President Joe Biden’s handling of the economy is pushing voters in key battleground states to consider alternate candidates in 2024, with every vote the president loses likely to help former President Donald Trump.

In Arizona, one of a handful of battleground states that propelled Biden to the White House in 2020, surveys and interviews with voters found that they are not impressed with the state of the economy despite a steady job growth rate in the state.

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A recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed Trump beating Biden in five out of six battleground states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, and Pennsylvania. In Arizona, 49% of respondents said they would vote for Trump over the 44% who would vote for Biden. Among Arizonans, 53% of respondents said they would rate today’s economic conditions as “poor,” and only 3% would rate them as “excellent.”

The numbers play into a larger problem, as Democrats are growing increasingly concerned that the Biden administration is not gaining momentum or earning credit for the work it is doing for labor and business.

In Arizona, the Biden administration rolled out new companies that will produce lithium-ion batteries, electric vehicles, and computer chips — a major component of the administration’s green energy and manufacturing agenda. Arizona also added 280,000 jobs since Biden took office compared with 150,000 during Trump’s term, according to the Department of Labor.

However, some Arizonans who voted for Biden in 2020 did so because they were anti-Trump, not because they were pro-Biden. Now, after feeling the effects of inflation and COVID-19’s toll on the economy, several told the New York Times they are switching sides to vote for Trump in 2024.

“At first I was really happy with Biden,” said Alex Jumah, a conservative who immigrated from Iraq. He voted for Biden because he could not stand Trump’s anti-Muslim views, he said.

“We got rid of Trump, rid of the racism. And then I regretted it. We need a strong president to keep this country first,” Jumah continued.

A recent survey of 1,000 Arizonans from Noble Predictive Insights, a firm based in Phoenix, found that Trump had an 8-point lead over Biden. Mike Noble, the polling firm’s chief executive, attributed Trump’s growing popularity in Arizona to his ability to garner support from Republicans and win back some independents. Respondents in Noble’s poll cited immigration and inflation as their top concerns.

“Economists say, ‘Look at these indicators’ — people don’t care about that,” Noble said. “They care about their day-to-day lives.”

Still, political strategists believe Biden can win in Arizona if Democrats can mobilize centrist Republicans and the coalition of 10,000 voters who rejected Trump in 2020: suburban women, Latinos, and young voters.

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Several national Democrats and their aides have expressed concerns about the state of Biden’s reelection campaign, particularly in the swing states that continue to trend toward Trump. Some Democratic allies have expressed warnings to the party that they “misunderstood” the voices of several key voting blocs, such as black and Muslim voters, groups that were largely anti-Trump votes.

Lawmakers such as Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) have recently expressed doubt about Biden’s electability, with the Connecticut senator saying Democrats “have our work cut out for us.”