Poll to Poll

I’ve seen some great poll numbers recently.

To start with was a YouGov/University of Massachusetts-Amherst poll. It’s not one of the top polls, but has a reasonably respectable rating from Nate Silver.  Still, I don’t take this as definitive of anything, just that it’s fitting in fairly well with other polls, although a bit more pronounced.

As a starting point, Trump’s approval was the lowest I’ve seen thus far for him – at just 33%.  Interestingly, MS NOW did not show Trump’s overall approval in this poll.  But when I went to go double-check these numbers, it turns out you’ll be very happy.  His approval is 33%.

Though that might seem like a bit of an outlier, their results have been pretty much in line with other polls for the past year.  Slightly lower than others, but not my much.  A 44% approval a year ago, in April, 2025.  Then 38% in June, 2025 when the last No Kings Rally was held.  And now this at 33%.  With any poll, what’s most important (to me) are two things:  how it compares to other polls, and how it compares to itself, what its direction is.  And the downward direction is pronounced, and deeply problematic for Trump.  And the MAGOP which follows him so loyally.

But very problematic, too, is that the poll focused on specific issues.  And the worst result of all was on Trump’s handling of inflation.  He’s support was a disastrous 24%.  That’s basically everyone except for the MAGA base.  The next worst was Trump’s handling of tariffs, which was 28%.  Then, Trump’s handling of jobs at 30%. 

Oddly, the inflation rate is not even close to as high as it was at its worse, and has only shifted a bit in recent months.  But I’m sure that Trump’s bottom-feeder result relates to prices being high and that they aren’t coming down.  And with the poll results also disastrously low on tariffs and jobs, it’s probably all tied to the national perception of the economy being very bad.

But that’s not the poll that caught my eye the most.  That would be a Fox News poll from last Thursday.

What leaped out was just one number, and a poll number that’s always under-reported because it’s a minor segment of the electorate.  However, the number is so meaningful because the segment is critical.  It was a poll of non-MAGA Republicans – Republicans who are not a part of the diehard, forever-loyal base – which remains near-unanimous at 97%.  Nor are they even basic MAGA (although that number had a notable drop, down from almost as high 92% down to 84%.)  But non-MAGA Republicans are more on the moderate edge with flexible opinions.  And their support of Trump dropped 11 points from 70% to only 59%.

That’s getting close to being under 50%.  And dangerously treading water there, since the trend is going downward, by 11 points.  Known as "in the wrong direction."  And although “non-MAGA Republicans” is a small demographic, any demographic within the MAGOP  that nears “under 50%” speaks loudly for the Mid-Terms.  It doesn’t mean they’ll vote Democratic, but it does mean that maybe some won’t vote.  After all, let’s put some perspective on this:

A 59% approval means, of course, there are 41% who don’t approve.  Simple.  But the thing is, this isn’t 41% of the party moving from “strongly approve” (the ones most motivated to vote who don’t need convincing) to merely “approve”.  No, this is 41% of “non-MAGA Republicans” saying they “don’t approve” of Trump.  Period.

Now, as I said, “non-MAGA Republicans” are a small segment of the party.  How small, though, that’s the question.  So, trying to figure out how many this represents, I’ll make a pure guess that “non-MAGA Republicans” is maybe just 20% of the party. 

We’re now going to dive into Math Land very briefly, which I know can be numbing, but bear with me because I think it’s important in order to understand how I get to the answer.  And brief.

What this means is that if 41% of “non-MAGA Republicans” disapprove of Trump, that’s over 8% of the party overall.  (Taking out your abacus, this is 41% of the aforementioned 20% who are non-MAGA.)  And if a party loses 8% of its own support, that’s massive.

But further, because Democrats, Independents and Republicans are each about a third of the electorate, losing over 8% of your party extrapolates to about 3% of all voters in the country.  And as I’ve long discussed here, losing 3% of all voters in a close election changes a razor-thin margin of 51-49 to a 54-46 landslide. 

And that’s the bigger problem.  Because the starting point here, right now, is that it’s not a “close election.”  Democrats have picked up an average of 16 points in every Special Election since Trump got elected.  Which is just one more reason why I’ve felt that gerrymandering risks backfiring into what’s called “dummymandering.”  And why we’re seeing those 16-point pick-ups on average in all Special Elections, and things like a Democrat flipping Trump’s own Mar-a-Lago district and picking up 22 points. Independents are a huge part of that, but losing support in your own party is, as well. 

And keep in mind, what we’re talking about here is 41% not approving.  It doesn’t even take into consideration all those MAGAs who still support Trump, but went from “strongly approve” to only “approve,” who are people who may not be motivated to vote, especially in a Mid-Term and more especially in an election where Trump isn’t on the ballot.  Nor does it take into consideration that the Fox News Poll showed only 84% of standard MAGA now approve of Trump – and that’s the biggest segment of the party.

Nor does it take consideration that Trump won’t be on the ballot in the Mid-Terms, and a great many of the diehard MAGA base don’t follow politics much and are purely loyal to Trump, and only come out to vote when they can vote for him.

And as I’ve repeatedly written – it’s not going to get better for Trump, because he’s not surrounded by people who can help him, but rather unqualified incompetents who are there just to say “Yes” to him, many of who are actually the cause of some of his problems, and also because Trump has dementia, which is degenerative.

Nothing is guaranteed.  And we know MAGOPs will try and are already trying to suppress the vote.  But we also know that Democrats and other organizers know this, too, and (like your union group) are already planning how to push back.  And at the very least, it’s a great starting point. 

As Sunday’s No Kings rallies across the country showed, over 8 million Americans took part protesting -- up from 7 million, which was up from 5 million.  And that is trending in the right direction.