The numbers are brushed over, but they don’t bode well for Joe Biden — or the mainstream media that carried him into office.
A Washington Post-ABC News poll released Sunday shows Americans are largely in favor of the president’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, with roughly 6 in 10 saying they approve of his performance.
When it comes to the ongoing disaster on the southern border, however, it’s a different story entirely.
And naturally, that’s not apparent from the Post’s coverage.
The story published Sunday is pushed entirely through the prism of the pandemic (and politics), with the headline “Post-ABC poll: Biden earns high marks for handling the pandemic, but many Republicans resist vaccination.”
It’s made up of 25 paragraphs that essentially give Biden credit for the vaccination program that’s largely lifted the country out of the nightmare of a closed economy and an idled workforce. Naturally, it doesn’t mention that the very vaccines that are making recovery possible are the product of work accomplished in 202 during then-President Donald Trump’s Operation Warp Speed.
That might be sadly familiar in a country where a vaunted “free press” has reduced itself to the role of state-run media promoting propaganda for the powerful. But there are three crucial paragraphs included that get closer to the truth.
“One low mark for the president comes on the issue of immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border, where 33% of Americans say they approve of how he is handling the issue, amid a surge of migrants attempting to cross into the country,” the Post reported. “A slight majority (51%) say they disapprove, including 90% of Republicans. Sixteen percent overall say they have no opinion.
“Among fellow Democrats, a tepid 63 percent majority approve of Biden’s handling of immigration at the southern border, while 15 percent disapprove and the rest offer no opinion.
“Political independents split on Biden’s overall performance, with 45 percent approving and 43 percent disapproving. While 56 percent of independents approve of Biden’s handling of the pandemic, half as many approve of his handling of immigration at the southern border.”
So Americans aren’t all gushing with gratitude at Biden’s every move since January?
Fortunately for the American people, there are media outlets like the New York Post that can publicize the other angle under headline a bit more relevant to the real story here: “Majority of Americans disapprove of Biden’s handling of border, poll shows.”
And conservative Americans were paying attention.
POLL: Majority of Americans Disapprove of Biden’s Immigration Policy, Border Crisis https://t.co/Ykbm86RSKE
— Sean Hannity (@seanhannity) July 6, 2021
Is this the understatement of the century or what??? https://t.co/hxJ7aXI0ms
— Christopher G. Adamo (@CGAdamo) July 6, 2021
Catch and release—Illegal immigration is set for one of the worst years in American history—WaPo/ABC Poll: Majority of Americans Disapprove of Joe Biden’s Open Border | Informing America https://t.co/iMtyV6XNMf pic.twitter.com/aM5MiStKWq
— Vernon Davis (@VernonDavis) July 6, 2021
Joe (The Left) don’t care about what the majority thinks. They understand that illegal immigration = more Dem voters. https://t.co/OQ0kZiIuUD
— Terry Schaub (@tbird_goinggalt) July 5, 2021
Relegating the humanitarian and national security disgrace of the border to the status of “one low mark” for the Biden administration is an understatement of embarrassing proportions.
Pretending that the topic deserves a scant, begrudging mention — the poll asked a total of two questions about the crisis — is an insult to the intelligence of the American people.
Republicans, of course, overwhelmingly reject the Biden administration’s approach to immigration. But even independent voters are split, and among Democrats, the number of those who approve, according to the poll, is only 63 percent — a number even the Post called “tepid.”
The reality the Post story does its best to avoid is that the Biden administration is simply benefiting from the work done by its vilified predecessor.
When Biden came into office, there was not one but multiple vaccines ready to be distributed across the United States.
His “handling” of the crisis has amounted to being in the Oval Office while that distribution took place; giving out bucketloads of taxpayer money in wasteful relief programs; and engaging in the pandemic theater of wearing a mask long after he and his top officials had received vaccinations themselves.
Meanwhile, Biden’s “handling” of the immigration crisis has amounted to political malfeasance on a massive scale.
After inheriting a stable, arguably secure border from the Trump administration, Biden set about from his first day in office dismantling the physical, legal, and geopolitical constructions that had made it possible.
He stopped work on the border wall, leaving openings literally paved for illegal entry. He ended Trump’s “remain in Mexico” policy, a triumph of diplomacy that made the country less attractive to illegal immigrants faced with the reality that they would not be released into the American interior to await a day in court that would almost certainly never happen.
He sent the astonishingly inept Vice President Kamala Harris on a disastrous trip to Guatemala and Mexico to seek out the “root causes” of illegal immigration – causes painfully obvious to anyone with a passing knowledge of countries south of the border and a functioning frontal brain lobe.
Only a Democrat blinded by partisanship could even pretend to approve of that.
According to the Post, the poll was conducted from June 27-30, among 907 randomly chosen adults. The margin of error was 3 percent.
It’s questionable how much 900 interviews can actually reflect the reality of public opinion in a nation of more than 300 million, but it’s obvious how the interpretation of those interviews can be skewed.
Biden coasting on the work of the Trump administration is viewed with approval by the majority of those polled, and The Washington Post makes that its headline.
Biden being justifiably blamed for smashing the success his predecessor had built is relegated to three virtually unnoticeable paragraphs.
For the Biden White House, the Democratic Party, and mainstream media outlets that shamelessly shill for them — very much including The Washington Post and ABC — the story of the coronavirus success is what they want to peddle in the 2022 midterms.
But as even this poll shows, that’s not the whole story by a long shot. And for Biden, that could be a disaster in the making.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
