What to Watch in the 2020 US Presidential Election?

Content marketing article published on Lynk Global

There’s only less than a month away until the US presidential election, and this year’s election has been coloured by different global and domestic factors such as the coronavirus epidemic and the economic hit from the pandemic, the racial justice movement in the US, and US President Donald Trump having tested positive for the coronavirus, just to name a few. 

In a recent Lynk Speaker Session, Kurt Tong, former US consul general to Hong Kong and Macau, said the 2020 presidential election is overlaid by an overwhelming sense of “a referendum on Donald Trump”. 

“This election has been from the very beginning a referendum on the president’s personality and his governing style. The dominant question of the day is: do people want four more years of President Trump with both his bombastic style and policy preferences? Or do they prefer a more traditional, less exciting but perhaps, steadier set of hands in the form of Joe Biden?” said Tong. 

Among the various topics discussed, Tong also shared insights on the policy agendas of the two presidential candidates, the recent presidential debate, and implications of different potential election outcomes: 

On the first presidential debate:

“The [first presidential] debate really didn’t change that much despite being a rather dramatic display of how that debate format no longer really fits the way that politics is happening in the United States now, with both candidates interrupting each other. President Trump, in particular, was trying to make the debate more about debate tactics than substance. In the end, it gave a little bit of a bump for Joe Biden but didn’t really impact the trajectory of the election that much, at least according to the polls that have come out subsequently to that.”

On President Trump contracting the coronavirus:

“There is a possibility that there would be a sympathy bump for the president where people feel sorry for him, or think that he’s being a good patient and trying hard to get better. On the other hand, a lot of people, I think, came to the conclusion that this shows that his approach to the coronavirus epidemic has been wrong, and it has been too cavalier and he’s personally suffering the consequences. So it looks likely that actually even this surprise won’t really change that many people’s minds that much although this one is probably a little bigger in its impact, and a little more of a wildcard.”

On China:

“[China has not been] responding to the technology restrictions that the US has been putting in place such as the additional Huawei-related measures, and all the noise around TikTok and WeChat, China’s responded a bit but not as much. I think that restraint that China has shown in this period in trying not to make themselves a central focus of US politics will be gone after November 3. And so, we could have a period of – if the US is doing hard things on technology – China will respond in kind to the extent that it can because it doesn’t have as much leverage as the US does in that area. So, that creates a bit of instability.”

On social media disinformation:

“The strongest disinformation campaign is the one saying that [the election] is not going to be fair, and that does have some resonance, and that could impact people’s turnouts in particular, because turnout is very, very important. 

So, if people become convinced that the voting itself is unfair then they shouldn’t vote, or if they think that if they go to the polling place, they’re going to be confronted by armed vigilantes…they might not go, or they might be more determined to vote.”

On potential headwinds for the global economy:

“I think that the confusion scenario is bad for markets. Certainly, people will feel a heightened risk if there’s no outcome a week after the election, and things are looking dicey about where the United States is going. That I think is a serious risk. Clearly, that’s not a good thing when we’ve already got the much, much larger headwind on the global economy from the coronavirus.”