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Donald Trump has seen the country turn against him and his policies at warp speed. Earlier in the week, a Fox News poll found that immigration was the last remaining issue where Trump had a positive approval rating.
According to the recent New York Times/Sienna College poll, that issue is gone too. A majority of Americans (51%) now disapprove of Trump’s handling of immigration.
Beyond immigration, Americans think that Trump has gone too far on a wide variety of issues in the latest New York Times poll:
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61 percent of voters, including 33 percent of Republicans, said a president should not be able to impose tariffs without authorization from Congress.
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54 percent, including 26 percent of Republicans, said a president should not be able to eliminate programs enacted by Congress.
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63 percent, including 40 percent of Republicans, said a president should not be able to deport legal immigrants who have protested Israel.
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73 percent of voters, including 56 percent of Republicans, said a president should not be able to send American citizens to prison in El Salvador, as Mr. Trump has threatened to do.
Americans don’t like what Trump is doing to the government, the economy, the immigration system, and virtually everything else.
The country has never seen its people turn on a president and his agenda so soon into his term.
All presidencies derive their power from the notion of the bully pulpit and the ability of a president to potentially rally the public to their cause.
Trump doesn’t have a bully pulpit, and the American people are rallying against him, which explains why he has chosen to act like a dictator by doing things like having judges arrested.
A president who doesn’t have a mandate and is facing real-time rejection from a majority of the people can’t use the normal channels of a democracy as their source of power, so Trump is trying to take what the American people do not want him to have.
What is happening is a tug of war between Trump and the American people. When Trump tries to use excessive and unconstitutional power, the people push back.
Polls like the NYT polls are warnings. Trump is being warned to change course. If he refuses to do so, the next step that the voters will take will be at the ballot box, where they will strip power from Trump by taking away all or part of his congressional majority.
Outside of his base, Trump literally doesn’t have an issue to stand on, which is why he is turning to authoritarian means to affirm his power.
What do you think about the relationship between Trump’s polling and his power grabs? Share your thoughts in the comments below.