The Trump Train Is Losing Steam And Slowing Down

For the first few months of his second term, Trump looked unstoppable. But as the problems continue to mount for his administration, that is no longer true. Here's how Heather Digby Parton puts it at Salon.com:

Like the president himself, the Trump train, which looked like high-speed rail during the first few months of his second term, is slowing down. And it’s a much more rickety machine than it first appeared.

Over the past few weeks the Republicans have lost the argument — if not the process — on the government shutdown. Despite the best efforts of Trump, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., Congress voted almost unanimously for the Justice Department to release the Epstein files. Trump failed to persuade the Senate to eliminate the filibuster and his “health care plan” has been rejected by the House’s MAGA caucus. Now, a contingent of congressional Republicans are rebelling against his proposed sell-out to Russia and his staunch ally, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., defied him and then announced her resignation, prompting whispers that she’s just the first of many House Republicans who are considering leaving Congress before the 2026 midterms — and possibly even prompting a shift in the majority. 

Despite his extravagant campaign promises, Trump’s economy is still in the doldrums, largely because he choked off the crisp recovery that was underway when he took office with his tariff agenda. His anti-immigrant policies, Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and warmongering in the Caribbean are cruel; his corruption is flagrant and his obsession with renovating and decorating the White House is downright bizarre. His personal vengeance project is an embarrassment to all involved. 

For months, the media was mesmerized by Trump’s theatricality. Democrats in Washington, obsessed as they were with their compulsive navel gazing, were paralyzed. But that seems to be over now — and it’s largely due to ordinary Americans seeing the threats posed by Trump more clearly than the party’s leadership and successfully pushing back. 

The latest polling breaks down along typical lines, with Republicans mostly backing Trump and Democrats pretty much unanimously rejecting him. But instead of the similar breakdown you usually find among Independents, who generally lean 50-50, a substantial majority of them are now siding with the Democrats. A recent CBS/YouGov poll found that a whopping 76% disapprove of Trump’s handling of the economy, while 24% approve. 

Those numbers reflect a very serious erosion in support for Trump and Republicans, and it’s doubtless contributed to his approval rating sinking below 40%. This decline has occurred despite a massive propaganda effort by the White House to present the president’s first year as successful on every front — including this week’s ludicrous claim that he has the highest poll numbers of his career. He is actually at the weakest point in his presidency.

Americans are rejecting Trump’s policies across the board. He’s drastically underwateron the economy, immigration, inflation and trade, all supposedly his strong suits, and people are blaming him — and not former President Joe Biden — for all of it. While most Republicans love the cruel ICE raids in Democratic-led cities, large majorities of Democrats and Independents disapprove, and it’s personal to many of them. Most people, too, are well aware that Trump is using law enforcement to target his political enemies. . . .

Finally, there were the overwhelming victories of Democrats in the recent elections. In a normal political environment, off-year elections have limited value in predicting the following year’s midterms. But this year, in this abnormal time, something interesting happened.  Young people and Latinos who had voted for Trump in 2024 swung back to Democrats in droves, from the big marquee races to local school boards.