Karl Rove: Conviction Hurting Trump in Polls

(Cal Sport Media via AP Images)

Donald Trump’s recent conviction in the New York criminal trial has hurt the former president in national polls, according to Republican strategist Karl Rove.

Late last month, Trump became the first former president to be convicted of felony crimes when a jury found him guilty of falsifying business records in a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election through payments meant to silence to an adult film actor.

While appearing Saturday on Fox News Channel, Rove was asked whether he agreed there was “movement toward” President Joe Biden in the polls since Trump’s the conviction.

“Take a look at the evidence,” said Rove, who then held up a whiteboard that appeared to list polls. “Here it is. These are the polls since June 1st. If they’re in red, Donald Trump won ’em, if they’re in blue, Joe Biden is leading and if they’re in green, it’s a tie.

“And take a look, from the first of the month, where it’s Trump up by 1, Trump up by 2, Trump up by 1, Biden up by 1, a tie, Trump up by 2, Biden up by 2, tie, Biden up by 2. So there’s been a trend since the … May 30 guilty verdict in the New York case.”

Trump and Biden are scheduled to debate Thursday.

“This will be the most important presidential debate, if it happens, since at least the 1980 presidential debate,” Rove said in April.

The latest RealClear Polling average of national polls on Sunday showed Trump clinging to a hair thin lead (46.1% to 45.2%) over Biden in this year’s presidential race.

About 20% of voters say they have not picked a candidate in this year’s presidential race, are leaning toward third-party options or might not vote at all for the Nov. 5 election, according to the most recent Reuters/Ipsos poll.

Rove last month said independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. could prevent Trump from winning back the White House.

“Mr. Trump veers back and forth from dismissing Mr. Kennedy as a ‘radical left lunatic’ to calling him ‘a nice guy,” Rove wrote in an opinion column for The Wall Street Journal. “But as one of the world’s pre-eminent antivaccine activists, Mr. Kennedy might also be a threat to Mr. Trump’s reelection hopes.”

Reuters contributed to this story.