Floor collapses beneath Trump as MAGA implodes

The MAGA base that helped build Republican power in the U.S. for the past decade appears to be showing signs of rupture, according to new surveys from UMassAmherst.

The survey, conducted Aug. 21-26, has found a 9-percentage point drop among Republicans who identify with the MAGA movement since the last survey was conducted in March, reported the university, representing an extreme drop for such a short window of time. The most significant drop — 6 percentage points — was among those who reported only to be ‘somewhat’ identified as MAGA, but even those who ‘very much’ identified as MAGA fell 3 percentage points, according to surveys.

"We find a decline in the number of Republicans identifying as MAGA, suggesting cracks in the movement’s foundation," said Tatishe Nteta, director of UMass Poll.

MAGA is the name for President Donald Trump’s most loyal adherents who form the floor of approval keeping the president’s approval in the mid-thirties in national polls. So the polling revelation comes at an ill time amid the Republican Party's midterm convention underway this week in Dallas.

In any case, conservative analysts warn that the Republican Party is in trouble if they’re relying on Trump’s loyal MAGA cavalry to save them from angry voters this year.

“There’s no question the president is uniquely motivating for MAGA voters, but MAGA voters aren’t sufficient to win in swing districts or states,” Republican pollster Whit Ayres told the Wall Street Journal, adding that even “nationalizing an election does not make sense when the president is at 38 percent job approval.”

But Republican strategists are banking on the Dallas convention to “help the GOP by increasing turnout among Republican voters who have so far this cycle been less likely to say they’ll come out this November.” Only problem is, polling aggregates suggest a convention with Trump in it doesn’t appear to be stirring low-interest GOP voters to show up for the midterms.

Plus, if the high-interest MAGA contingent of the Republican Party is also shrinking, according to surveys, it could spell even more trouble for ailing Republicans this year.

The Amherst poll also found that the Republicans who were still most likely to identify as MAGA were those who attained a high school degree or less, or those making less than $40,000 a year. It was also liable to contain those over the age of 55. But among moderate Republicans, there was a nearly even split, with 51 percent identifying as MAGA and 49 percent not. Only 16 percent of moderates said they were “very much” MAGA, according to surveys.

In an additional twist, the same survey discovered that policies associated with democratic socialism have "considerably broader appeal than the DSA label itself."