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The first big case in this vein was Treyvon Martin and it wasn't a factor in the 2012 election. The first big police killing case of the current era was in 2014, a midterm year, and it didn't have much impact on that election. There were a number of others and they made have made an impact on some local elections, but I don't recall any precedent for it becoming a national issue at the electoral level. If it's 2020 and you're trying to manufacture an issue so you can get votes, there's already precedent to suggest that George Floyd isn't it. And there's nothing to suggest that the whole controversy even helped the Democrats. It resulted in a lot of Democrats saying a lot of dumb things about defunding police, and Biden had to specifically go against these people while campaigning. For Trump it was easy because all he had to do was keep to the party line that Floy'd death was a tragedy but there was no systematic problem with the police and we needed to stop the riots. Biden had to navigate dangerous waters. It's hard to see how anyone in May of 2020 would have thought that making a big deal out of Floyd's death would result in an advantage for Democrats.
I agree Floyd killing himself was not used well politically he the left. It becoming a bigger issue than Trayvon Martin though is the puppet master thesis. The puppet master can be bad at his job which in this case I think they made a mistake.
Also I wholeheartedly disagree that Trump just had to call it a tragedy. The right doesn’t agree with that. That implies the police did something wrong. I do not believe that. Letting the left control the narrative is something I do not agree with. A reason I vote for Desantis or Trump is because they have the balls to call out bad narratives.
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