Today is day 362 of Trump’s second term. It is that time of year when public pollsters release data assessing his first year back in office. The news is not good.
While Trump’s overall approval rating is largely unchanged, his ratings on the economy and immigration, his two signature issues have plummeted.
As it pertains to the economy, the President is -15% underwater – 56% of Americans on average disapprove of his handling and 41% approve.
Likewise, on immigration 51% disapprove while 47% approve – and this is largely before the killing of Renee Good by an ICE agent in Minneapolis.
It is not just the public polls, Axios reports the administration’s private polling is showing much the same. The two most concerning aspects of this data are (a) he is underwater on issues (i.e., the economy and immigration) that helped usher him back into the White House and (b) the president is losing support, not among those on the right (who remain largely supportive) or the left (who were never supportive) but the all-important moderates and independents in the middle who were critical to his 2024 victory.
All of this, on top of the fact that the GOP cannot count on “Trump voters” to get out to vote when Trump is not on the ballot, puts the President and his agenda at risk in the upcoming midterm.
No one knows this better than Trump. Over the last few weeks he has made this clear. Speaking to Republicans in Washington DC last week, he warned that if the GOP loses the House in November, he will likely be impeached.
“You got to win the midterms, because if we don’t win the midterms, it’s just going to be — I mean, they’ll find a reason to impeach me. I’ll get impeached. We don’t impeach them. You know why? Because they’re meaner than we are.”
Days later, he told reporters from the New York Times that in 2020 he should have ordered the National Guard to take the machines to find evidence of fraud. Later, speaking to Reuters, he mused about canceling the midterm election. Something that White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt later dismissed as “simply” a joke.
The comments should be concerning because one thing we know about Trump is that he tends to say the quiet part out-loud and his musings often become reality.
The comments are also a sign that Trump is well aware of his party’s predicament this Fall. But with ten months to go before the election, Democrats should also be keenly aware that he can still turn these numbers around.
Trump knows what has turned off independent/Moderate/’24-Trump voters and that is chaos. The fact that every where they turn from foreign policy (i.e.,Venezuela, Nigeria, Iran, Greenland, etc.) to domestic politics (i.e., DOGE, Liberation Day, ICE agents roaming the streets of middle America in masks and demanding papers, etc.) - all they see is chaos. This, coupled with the fact that the president seems more intent on bulldozing the White House, creating a ballroom, hanging out with elites in Davos, and so on, has left them asking – what does any of this have to do with my ability to buy groceries, pay for health care, own a home, and insure I have a job going forward (and my child can get one), particularly in the era of AI.
It is not unusual for an administration to overread their mandate, it is a classic problem and one this White House is guilty of. Voters wanted the president to secure the border, not inflict chaos on the streets of Minneapolis. They wanted him to grow the economy and make their lives more affordable, not to raise taxes in the form of tariffs, tell them to restrict the number of dolls they buy for their children, or to recommend eating $3 Depression meals.
Trump will work hard to remake how moderates and independents see the party he leads going into the Midterm, he has already started by trying to co-opt big components of the Democratic left’s populist economic agenda.
Democrats must counter this by remaining hyper-focused on the economy, lowering costs, and making life more affordable for all Americans. No matter what the president and GOP say going forward, they must counter with the reality that moderates and independents are feeling - despite all the hot air, Trump’s primary contribution to American life this last year has not been security or affordability, but rather chaos.
