For nearly a decade, political observers have warned against prematurely predicting the downfall of President Donald Trump. His ability to survive scandals, legal peril, internal party revolts, and public backlash has repeatedly defied political gravity. But a growing chorus of analysts now argues that the forces converging around Trump in early 2026 represent something fundamentally different—an erosion of power that appears broader, deeper, and more structurally damaging than anything he has faced before.
A December analysis by columnist S.E. Cupp, published by The Fulcrum, captured the shift in tone, noting that Trump’s approval rating had plunged to –24 percent, a historic low surpassed only by Richard Nixon at a comparable point in his second term. Cupp wrote that Trump’s support had eroded not only among independents and younger voters but even within his once‑unyielding base.
Since This really may be the political end for Trump was published, new polling has reinforced the trend. A January composite of national surveys shows Trump’s approval continuing to slide, with notable declines among suburban voters and Hispanic men—two groups that helped fuel his 2024 reelection. While Trump has weathered poor polling before, strategists note that this downturn is occurring alongside a series of compounding crises that have left the administration struggling to regain control of its narrative.
The president’s economic agenda—once the centerpiece of his political identity—has become a growing liability. As Cupp reported, Trump’s promises to tame inflation and lower consumer costs have not materialized. Instead, inflation has ticked upward, unemployment has risen, and small businesses report higher operating costs driven by tariffs and regulatory volatility.
New data released in early January shows consumer confidence falling for the third consecutive month, with grocery prices and housing costs continuing to climb. Economists across the ideological spectrum warn that the administration’s tariff expansions, combined with aggressive spending and inconsistent policy signals, have created uncertainty that is rippling through markets.
The administration’s personnel challenges—already severe in December—have intensified. Cupp’s reporting highlighted allegations of misconduct and incompetence across multiple agencies, including the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services.
In the weeks since, two senior officials have resigned amid investigations, and congressional committees have opened new inquiries into the administration’s handling of classified information and procurement contracts. A senior GOP aide described the atmosphere as “chaotic even by Trump‑era standards,” noting that the White House has struggled to fill key vacancies as potential nominees fear reputational damage.
Perhaps the most significant shift is occurring inside the Republican Party itself. Cupp noted that several GOP lawmakers had already begun distancing themselves from Trump, ignoring his directives on issues ranging from redistricting to the filibuster.
Since then, three additional House Republicans have announced retirements, and several influential conservative donors have signaled they will withhold funding until the administration stabilizes. While Trump retains strong support among the party’s most loyal voters, the institutional GOP appears increasingly willing to challenge him—something that was unthinkable during his first term.
Trump’s own behavior has amplified concerns. In December, he posted more than 160 messages on Truth Social in a five‑hour span—an episode Cupp described as “an unhinged mix of high and low,” revealing a leader struggling to control his message.
In recent weeks, similar late‑night posting sprees have continued, often contradicting official statements from his administration. Advisers privately concede that the president’s unpredictability is complicating efforts to reassure lawmakers, donors, and foreign partners.
Analysts caution that Trump has repeatedly rebounded from moments that seemed politically fatal. But they also note that the current convergence of economic strain, administrative dysfunction, party fractures, and personal volatility is unprecedented even for him.
“This is the first time the structural supports of Trumpism—economic optimism, party unity, and the aura of invincibility—are all weakening at once,” said one longtime Republican strategist.
Whether this moment marks the true beginning of the end for Trump’s political dominance remains uncertain. But for the first time in years, even some of his allies acknowledge that the president is navigating the most precarious stretch of his presidency—and that the forces aligned against him may be too numerous to outrun.
Hugo Balta is the executive editor of the Fulcrum and the publisher of the Latino News Network
Eric Trump, the newly appointed ALT5 board director of World Liberty Financial, walks outside of the NASDAQ in Times Square as they mark the $1.5- billion partnership between World Liberty Financial and ALT5 Sigma with the ringing of the NASDAQ opening bell, on Aug. 13, 2025, in New York City.
Why does the Trump family always get a pass?
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche joined ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday to defend or explain a lot of controversies for the Trump administration: the Epstein files release, the events in Minneapolis, etc. He was also asked about possible conflicts of interest between President Trump’s family business and his job. Specifically, Blanche was asked about a very sketchy deal Trump’s son Eric signed with the UAE’s national security adviser, Sheikh Tahnoon.
Shortly before Trump was inaugurated in early 2025, Tahnoon invested $500 million in the Trump-owned World Liberty, a then newly launched cryptocurrency outfit. A few months later, UAE was granted permission to purchase sensitive American AI chips. According to the Wall Street Journal, which broke the story, “the deal marks something unprecedented in American politics: a foreign government official taking a major ownership stake in an incoming U.S. president’s company.”
“How do you respond to those who say this is a serious conflict of interest?” ABC host George Stephanopoulos asked.
“I love it when these papers talk about something being unprecedented or never happening before,” Blanche replied, “as if the Biden family and the Biden administration didn’t do exactly the same thing, and they were just in office.”
Blanche went on to boast about how the president is utterly transparent regarding his questionable business practices: “I don’t have a comment on it beyond Trump has been completely transparent when his family travels for business reasons. They don’t do so in secret. We don’t learn about it when we find a laptop a few years later. We learn about it when it’s happening.”
Sadly, Stephanopoulos didn’t offer the obvious response, which may have gone something like this: “OK, but the president and countless leading Republicans insisted that President Biden was the head of what they dubbed ‘the Biden Crime family’ and insisted his business dealings were corrupt, and indeed that his corruption merited impeachment. So how is being ‘transparent’ about similar corruption a defense?”
Now, I should be clear that I do think the Biden family’s business dealings were corrupt, whether or not laws were broken. Others disagree. I also think Trump’s business dealings appear to be worse in many ways than even what Biden was alleged to have done. But none of that is relevant. The standard set by Trump and Republicans is the relevant political standard, and by the deputy attorney general’s own account, the Trump administration is doing “exactly the same thing,” just more openly.
Since when is being more transparent about wrongdoing a defense? Try telling a cop or judge, “Yes, I robbed that bank. I’ve been completely transparent about that. So, what’s the big deal?”
This is just a small example of the broader dysfunction in the way we talk about politics.
Americans have a special hatred for hypocrisy. I think it goes back to the founding era. As Alexis de Tocqueville observed in “Democracy In America,” the old world had a different way of dealing with the moral shortcomings of leaders. Rank had its privileges. Nobles, never mind kings, were entitled to behave in ways that were forbidden to the little people.
In America, titles of nobility were banned in the Constitution and in our democratic culture. In a society built on notions of equality (the obvious exceptions of Black people, women, Native Americans notwithstanding) no one has access to special carve-outs or exemptions as to what is right and wrong. Claiming them, particularly in secret, feels like a betrayal against the whole idea of equality.
The problem in the modern era is that elites — of all ideological stripes — have violated that bargain. The result isn’t that we’ve abandoned any notion of right and wrong. Instead, by elevating hypocrisy to the greatest of sins, we end up weaponizing the principles, using them as a cudgel against the other side but not against our own.
Pick an issue: violent rhetoric by politicians, sexual misconduct, corruption and so on. With every revelation, almost immediately the debate becomes a riot of whataboutism. Team A says that Team B has no right to criticize because they did the same thing. Team B points out that Team A has switched positions. Everyone has a point. And everyone is missing the point.
Sure, hypocrisy is a moral failing, and partisan inconsistency is an intellectual one. But neither changes the objective facts. This is something you’re supposed to learn as a child: It doesn’t matter what everyone else is doing or saying, wrong is wrong. It’s also something lawyers like Mr. Blanche are supposed to know. Telling a judge that the hypocrisy of the prosecutor — or your client’s transparency — means your client did nothing wrong would earn you nothing but a laugh.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.