Polls in battleground states show the same thing. Trump trails Biden in GOP-leaning — but senior citizen heavy — Florida by more than 3 points. He trails in two of the last three polls taken in purplish North Carolina, and he’s behind in the pivotal state of Arizona by more than 4 points. He’s also behind in the trio of states that propelled him to presidency — Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Every single piece of data aligns: Trump is behind and dropping.

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History is also not on Trump’s side. No president seeking a new term has won with poll standings as low as Trump’s since Harry Truman in 1948. Even presidents who have led in polls in late April or early May have lost if their share of the vote was at or slightly higher than 40 percent, and Trump is receiving only about 42 percent against Biden. The same sorry record applies to vice presidents seeking to succeed their bosses. George H.W. Bush recovered from getting only 38 percent in the May Gallup poll to beat Democrat Michael Dukakis, but Hubert Humphrey, Richard M. Nixon and Al Gore each lost when getting below 45 percent in the April or May Gallup poll.

It’s not hard to see why Trump is in this predicament. He has never received more than 48 percent job approval in the RCP polling average, the first president in polling history to do so poorly. While virtually every other world leader has seen their ratings rise in response to the coronavirus pandemic, Trump has not. It’s true that Trump has faced a critical press corps during this crisis, but it’s also true that his performances during the White House daily press briefings have been at best uneven. He might blame his staff, but he ultimately has no one to blame but himself.

Trump’s reelection hopes rest on his ability to change a quickly solidifying narrative that he’s not up to the job. History shows it can be done, but it will be hard.

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Truman turned his race around by going on the attack. He made a “do nothing” Republican-controlled Congress the object of his ire, going so far as to call them back into special session to force them to pass legislation. He called out the gap between conservatives who dominated the GOP congressional delegation and his moderate Republican foe, New York Gov. Thomas Dewey, asking voters if they thought Dewey could really control his party. He was also helped by two third-party candidates who, along with other fringe candidates, received more than 5 percent of the vote. Truman’s come-from-behind win shocked the political establishment and set the template for how underdogs close a gap.

George H.W. Bush employed a similar attacking strategy in his 1988 triumph. He surmounted a 17-point summertime deficit by alleging Dukakis was soft on crime, weak on defense and unpatriotic. Dukakis’s poor responses to these attacks, including the infamous “Dukakis in a tank” moment, simply reinforced Bush’s themes. Bush’s comfortable 7-point win is still one of the all-time political comebacks.

Trump will need to do something similar — and fast. He should call the Democratic-controlled House into special session soon to address the coronavirus crisis and rail against them if they cannot work with Republicans. He should make the fall campaign a referendum on his nationalism, focusing on how to punish China for its role in spreading the global pandemic. Biden’s past support for open trade with China makes it hard for him to be as tough as Trump, and his son Hunter’s sleazy and lucrative deal with Chinese investment entities makes it even harder for him to follow suit.

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Like the genie in the movie “Aladdin” who couldn’t believe he was “losing to a rug,” Trump apparently can’t believe he’s losing to someone he disdains as much as Biden. But he is. The faster he wakes up to the truth, the likelier he is to turn his fading chances around.