PATRICK CASEY: The Tide Is Turning

The 2020 election didn’t end well for the Right. After President Trump’s lawful attempts to contest the results failed, Joe Biden claimed what many still view as a bogus victory. Conservatives were understandably forlorn. Many wondered if the Trump revolution had been defeated for good.

But fret not! The tide is turning. Although the past two years have been rough for conservatives, there’s ample evidence that Americans are moving rightward.

First, and most obvious, is America’s growing dissatisfaction with the Biden Administration. We were promised a return to “normalcy”; instead, we got escalating race hysteria, surges in crime, and rapidly rising inflation. You needn’t be a political scientist to recognize that things are a mess.

As such, it’s no wonder that Biden’s approval rating continues to plummet. A New York Times/Siena College poll released this week revealed that a mere 33 percent of Americans approve of the president’s job performance. Indeed, the situation is so grim that only 13 percent of respondents felt the country is headed in the right direction.

And it isn’t just Republicans who are dissatisfied. The Biden Administration has proven so disastrous that 64 percent of Democrats would prefer a different Democratic candidate in 2024. His approval rating among his own party is only 70 percent—embarrassingly low for a sitting president.

In light of rising gas prices and inflation generally—the top-two issues for voters—it’s obvious why Biden is becoming increasingly unpopular. Is his administration truly capable of solving these problems? Begging gas station owners to lower prices, which Biden actually did, would suggest not.

Yet economic concerns, while important, don’t tell the full story. On a whole host of other issues, Americans are taking the conservative side.

Take cancel culture. This issue has grown in salience in recent years, particularly for Republicans, as the Left has leveraged its institutional power to obliterate those who voice controversial views. Fortunately, a Hill-HarrisX poll from last November revealed that “69 percent of registered voters . . . said cancel culture unfairly punishes people for their past actions or statements.” While many are still under the illusion that cancel culture is merely about holding people “accountable,” rather than ruining the lives of conservatives, it would appear that a greater number of Americans see things our way.

Conservatives are gaining ground on the gender battle as well. As we all know, a central tenet of the leftist ideology is that biology and gender are unrelated. But according to polling data released June 28 by Pew Research Center, 60 percent of respondents believe “a person’s gender is determined by their sex assigned at birth.” This, as the study notes, is “up from 56% in 2021 and 54% in 2017.” Americans clearly aren’t buying into the Left’s gender insanity.

Fortunately, this is a policy area where the GOP hasn’t totally let down its constituents. Across the country, governors and state legislatures continue to enact policies to counter the transgender agenda. Florida’s Governor Ron DeSantis generated national controversy in April upon signing the Parental Rights in Education bill, which limits classroom discussions on sexual orientation and gender identity. Even better, it allows parents to sue school districts if they fail to comply.

Immigration is another issue on which Americans are increasingly leaning right. A Gallup poll released in April found that 41 percnet of respondents worry a great deal about illegal immigration. Nineteen percent worry a fair amount. This means that 60 percent of those surveyed had at least some concerns in this regard.

They’re wise to worry. The Biden Administration has made it abundantly clear that mass immigration must continue, consequences be damned. So far, Biden has halted construction of Trump’s border well, ended the successful “remain in Mexico” policy, and pushed for amnesty, among other things. As a result, we’ve suffered a gigantic uptick in migrants at the border. In May alone, more than 220,000 migrants illegally crossed the southern border—the highest ever for the month of May. And from March to May, there were a staggering 633,137 apprehensions.

Critical race theory, a policy issue gaining salience in recent years, is also increasingly being rejected by Americans. A number of polls in the past year reveal that a majority of respondents view CRT unfavorably. This, no doubt, is thanks to the likes of Donald Trump, Tucker Carlson, Christopher Rufo, and others who have helped galvanize grassroots opposition to its evils. One need only look at the battles being waged in school boards across the country to realize that many Americans are fed up with curricula specifically crafted to vilify white people.

It certainly appears a significant shift is occurring in American politics. But if the above has failed to convince you, all you have to do is take a look at voter registrations. Over the last year, more than 1 million voters have changed their party affiliation to become Republicans, particularly in the suburbs. While Trump was in office, Democrats boasted a lead in this metric, but not anymore.

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