‘Trump Has Lost the Country’
2/4/20264 min
I want to say something that few conservatives will admit right now: Donald Trump has lost the country. The coalition he assembled to defeat Kamala Harris has evaporated, and his aggressive agenda — never mind his legacy — won’t survive if Republicans can’t win the next election.
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Transcript preview
First 90 secondsRoss Douthat· Host0:02
[upbeat music] From New York Times Opinion, I'm Ross Douthat. This is Interesting Times, and today I'm gonna tell you something that too few conservatives are willing to admit. A year into his second presidency, Donald Trump has lost the country.
Speaker 1· Soundbite0:18
The majority of voters believe the country's worse off today than- President Trump's approval rating at thirty-seven percent, the lowest of his second term.
Ross Douthat· Host0:25
And the grand coalition that he assembled to defeat Kamala Harris has evaporated, and all of this was predictable. From the first days of DOGE through the debacle in Minneapolis, the Trump administration has consistently governed as though swing voters and moderates aren't important to its coalition, and now, sure enough, they aren't.
Speaker 3· Soundbite0:47
So I work on my family's farm, and we've lost our best hands 'cause of Trump's deportations.
Speaker 4· Soundbite0:51
I regret voting for Donald Trump.
Ross Douthat· Host0:53
But here's the thing, it's not moderates and swing voters who lose out when a right-wing administration loses popularity. It's people on the right, people like me, certainly people further to my right, who support some of the big things the administration has tried to do, who like having a secure border, who like seeing universities pressured to become more ideologically diverse, who want to see DEI reset and rolled back. All of that, all of that agenda will just disappear if the Republican Party can't win elections.