When even CNN and Chris Cillizza are saying that Joe Biden has a problem, you know that the Democrats have to be having a meltdown behind the scenes.

Independents will be critical to the race in 2022 and 2024.

Right now, even Cillizza is seeing the big, flashing neon lights that spell trouble for Biden in that regard.

From CNN:

The evidence of Biden’s erosion with independents is legion:

* Just 32% of independents approved of how Biden is handling his job while 60% disapprove in a new Quinnipiac University national poll.
* An Associated Press/NORC national poll at the end of September showed Biden at just 38% approval among independents — down a whopping 24 percentage points since just July.
* Just 39% of independents approved of the job Biden is doing as president in a NPR/PBS/Marist College poll released last month.

Cillizza makes the further point, looking back on recent history, how important having independents is. He notes that when Democrats won in 2018, with 40 seats and retook the majority, they won independents 54% to 42%. In 2014, Republicans won 13 House seats, winning independents by a 54% to 42% margin. In 2010, the Republicans picked up 63 seat, with being up 19 points among independents.

Now, Cillizza is very rarely ever right, and I virtually never agree with him on anything. But he’s definitely on target here that Biden has a big problem, and it’s not just because he’s agreeing with me. It’s hard to get around how deadly these numbers are for the Democratic hopes, when the opinion of Biden is so in the basement. As we saw, in the case with even one of his great friends, Terry McAuliffe who is running for governor in Virginia, McAuliffe acknowledged they had an issue because of Biden’s unpopularity in the state.

2) These numbers should have Terry McAuliffe shaking in his boots. Biden’s approval rating with Independents in Quinnipiac’s national poll was 32%. His approval rating with Independents in Virginia according to the most recent Fox News poll is 31%.https://t.co/GF2FwBBReV

— Tom Bevan (@TomBevanRCP) October 6, 2021

The problem for Biden is that it isn’t just them not liking him on one issue. He’s getting bad numbers across the board on all the major issues — the border, Afghanistan, foreign policy, and the economy. Perhaps most importantly of all, he’s in the basement on whether people even think he’s competent. That’s a hard thing to get around.