2 Polling Trends Bode Well for Trump

Election Day is still 546 days away, meaning you can take the current polls with an extra-large grain of salt. Still, political stories are taking note of two clear trends of late, both of them positive for former President Trump. First, he's cementing his lead over Ron DeSantis and the rest of the GOP field. And second, President Biden looks increasingly vulnerable in a one-on-one rematch. Coverage:

• Biden trouble: Much of the chatter stems from a Washington Post/ABC poll showing Trump ahead of Biden by 6 points. "No single poll means all that much, especially so early in an election cycle, and the president's strategists as well as some independent analysts questioned its methodology," writes Peter Baker in a New York Times analysis. But other polls suggest the race is at least extremely close. "Taken together, they suggest that the president opens the 2024 campaign facing enormous challenges with no guarantee of victory over Mr. Trump."

• Trump surge: "For the first time in a long time, top Republicans and Democrats are telling us the same thing, in the same words—Trump looks impossible to beat for the Republican nomination," writes Mike Allen at Axios. The piece notes that Trump is surging, and picking up key House endorsements, despite a steady drumbeat of negative stories related to his legal fights.
• Trump surge, II: At Politico, an analysis suggests those negative stories are helping the former president, at least among rank-and-file Republicans. After he was indicted in the Stormy Daniels case, support for Trump among GOP county chairs across the country improved, writes Seth Masket, a professor of political science and director of the Center on American Politics at the University of Denver. "County chairs are figures who will play a key role in shaping the race," he notes, adding that this uptick came largely at the expense of DeSantis.
• Biden trouble, II: In breaking down the Post poll cited above, CNN's Kate Bolduan makes the case that Biden's approval rating of 36% is the lowest of any president at this point in the first term, per Mediaite. A post at FiveThirtyEight has a slightly different take on that. But Biden might take comfort in knowing that Ronald Reagan was only a smidge above him at this point in his presidency, and he went on to win reelection, per the Times.

(More President Biden stories.)