President Joe Biden had his work cut out for him from day one. After all, the economy was in shambles, we were still dealing with a pandemic, racial relations in this country were and are a powder keg, and violent crime was surging. It was a tall order for any president to address, but especially for Biden.

Unsurprisingly, he focused on guns pretty much from the start. He was convinced that was a winning strategy, even when addressing the violent crime surge.

It wasn’t.

President Joe Biden’s focus on gun control and law enforcement reform amid a violent crime surge could hurt Democrat prospects in the 2022 midterms.

Biden’s policies also embolden his opponents, and might cause problems within his own party, Fox News reported Monday.

Republican lawmakers have blamed the current crime wave on progressives’ calls to “defund the police,” and Second Amendment advocates have accused Biden of attacking legal gun ownership.

Biden, though, also risks alienating progressives who are concerned the president’s tactics will undercut their push for law enforcement reform. He has encouraged cities to use COVID-19 stimulus funds to hire more officers, while members of his party have called for sweeping budget cuts for police.

Whit Ayres, a prominent Republican political consultant and founder of North Star Opinion Research, said an expected increase in summer crime combines with the current political landscape to create a “major vulnerability” for Biden and Democrats heading into the midterms.

“One of the most potent criticisms over the last 40 years of Democrats is that they’re soft on crime and reluctant to crack down on crime,” Ayres told Fox News. “This surge and the forces on the far-left talking about defunding the police feed into the suspicious that Democrats are simply not serious about combating crime.”

Of course, we’ve also covered Biden’s insistence that otherwise legal gun sales were somehow at the root of this violence surge, which is complete and utter nonsense.

Support for gun control is down, and Biden is treading an interesting line with regard to policing. His talk of hiring more police officers isn’t likely to help him all that much with his base, a base that actually believes police departments should be defunded. The people more likely to approve that call, though? Republicans.

Those would be the same Republicans who disagree with pretty much everything else that’s come out of his mouth, thus negating any potential advantage from that. I mean, there aren’t too many Republicans that will vote for Biden just because he suggested local governments hire more cops. That’s not nearly enough.

Especially as part of his approach to criminal activity has been to treat law-abiding citizens as potential criminals simply because they want a firearm.

Politics is often about walking a tightrope. You have to be very careful to hit all the right points so your base is happy while also appealing to those in the middle of the political spectrum. Ideally, you also can be as unobjectionable as possible to the other side so they’re not overly motivated to come out and support your opposition.

Biden has missed on all of this, which may well spell disaster for him in next year’s midterm elections.