Swing voters are not viewing former President Donald Trump favorably following the Republican nominee’s Madison Square Garden rally, according to new polling.
An analysis for Newsweek compiled by Impact Social of US social media discussions from October 25 to 31 of 240,000 posts found that Trump has lost six points in “swing,” or independent voters, sentiment due to “Madison Square Garden racism row.” During the six-day period, Trump experienced 34 percent negative sentiment, 15 percent positive and 51 percent neutral.
Newsweek reached out to Trump’s campaign for comment.
Impact Social’s experts read statistically representative samples of posts to produce an analysis. Each post is read from the perspective of a candidate and whether it is seen as “positive” or “negative” depending on who the post is in favor of. The analysis shows Trump is “around the same position he was four years ago.” Most of the negative discussion he faced recently is around anti-Trump (32 percent), racism (19 percent), the “Trump agenda” (14 percent) and anti-GOP (9 percent).
Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Madison Square Garden, Sunday, Oct. 27, 2024, in New York. Trump’s favorability has taken a hit since the rally.
AP Photo/Evan Vucci
Impact Social noted in the report that “this time last week Kamala Harris‘ campaign was at best treading water due to an inability to shake the incumbent tag and populate her ‘new chapter’ in the minds of swing voters.”This has changed after the campaign “dusted off the old Biden playbook and sort to demonize Trump.”
“Unfortunately for Harris, independents have heard it all before. The court cases, danger to democracy, lies, infidelities etc have become white noise. Harris therefore needed something spectacular to bring Trump’s behavior back into the spotlight,” Impact Social wrote. “Enter stage left ‘comedian’ Tony Hinchcliffe whose racist jokes at Trump’s Madison Square Garden (MSG) rally were so off color as to make Trump seem bland.”
Comedian Tony Hinchliffe opened at Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden and during his monologue called Puerto Rico a “floating island of garbage.”
The Republican nominee responded to Hinchcliffe’s Puerto Rico remarks on Tuesday, according to ABC. Trump distanced himself from the comedian but did not denounce the comments made.
“I don’t know him, someone put him up there. I don’t know who he is,” Trump said.
When asked about the comments and his work to gain back Puerto Rican voters, Trump’s campaign deputy Hispanic communications director, Viana Rodriguez, told Newsweek about Harris’ alleged “lack of urgency” to find missing children and fix Puerto Rico’s infrastructure as well as Trump’s plans to cut taxes and “stop the surge of illegal immigrants at the southern border.”
Gustavo Torres, the executive director of CASA the largest Latino and immigrant organization in the mid-Atlantic, told Newsweek in a press call on October 29 that Trump needs to apologize, and the Puerto Rican and Latino communities are “never going to forget what he did.”
“I believe that was the October surprise for the Latino community,” Torres said. “We are going to communicate that every day now until November 5 to our members.”
Harris’ campaign also told reporters that this was a breaking point.
“It really broke through,” a senior campaign official said. “It’s helped gel their feeling about this race.”
As a consequence of the rhetoric against Puerto Ricans, Impact Social found Trump’s standing among independent voters dropped by five points to -19.
“This time swing voter reaction was no longer indifferent,” the organization wrote. “Independents seem to have been ignited by the racism which preceded Trump’s speech and become more receptive to the dangers of a new Trump presidency highlighted by Harris.”
Even still, Impact Social found Independents still “seem reluctant to offer further support” to Harris “despite well-timed set piece efforts such as her Ellipse speech.” With a -13 point standing, Harris still leads by a six-point margin.
The Democratic nominee is 11 points worse off than where President Joe Biden was at this point in the campaign cycle in 2020, according to Impact Social. Between October 25 and 31, Harris saw 23 percent of positive, 36 percent negative and 41 percent neutral sentiment toward her. Negative discussions around Harris include anti-Harris (40 percent), her record in office (12 percent), immigration (10 percent) and Israel (7 percent).
“Independents are now more receptive to the perils of a Trump administration than at any time since the TV debate,” Impact Social wrote. “They must seize this opportunity, as they are unlikely to get another.”
