Could Bernie Sanders Have Defeated Trump?

Donald Trump is the most unpopular candidate in the history of modern polling, with about 60 percent of voters rating him unfavorably, putting him roughly 23 points under water. (Hillary Clinton, currently being battered by yet another round of potentially damaging email revelations, is only a pinch less unpopular.)

In fact, Trump has turned out to be such a surprisingly weak candidate, it seems possible or even plausible that Bernie Sanders, had he won the Democratic nomination, might at this very minute be mentally measuring the drapes for the Oval Office — if Sanders cared about such things. After all, as Sanderistas liked to point out during the primary, Bernie consistently beat Trump in hypothetical matchups by wider margins than Clinton.

So in the parallel world where Sanders beat Clinton and Trump still won the GOP nomination, would Bernie be crushing Trump? If the presidential race were a likability contest, almost certainly. But if it were just a geniality pageant, Sanders would probably have won the Democratic nomination.

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