U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a swearing-in ceremony for the interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, Jeanine Pirro, at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 28, 2025.
President Donald Trump is officially becoming a “big failure,” according to a conservative intellectual who wrote speeches for one of the Republican Party’s most beloved leaders, President Ronald Reagan.
“His position in the political cosmos is changing,” Peggy Noonan wrote for The Wall Street Journal on Thursday. “In some new way good fortune is not on Mr. Trump’s side. There is a new precarity there.”
She added, “All this is connected, obviously, to the dangerous mess of Iran, widespread economic anxiety and a rise in the energy and electoral success of the left, which hates him and, in its political bloodlust, apes him.”
Describing Trump’s approval ratings, which are consistently in the 30-percentage range, she pointed out that he is especially suffering because of his mishandling of the Iran war and the ongoing failing economy.
“Not so long ago, all the energy was with MAGA, the insurgents who went up against the establishment in the big rebellion, the big rebuke,” Noonan said. “But it’s the progressive left trying to claim that role now, and with a similar ideological chestiness. We’ll see how many they speak for, but it matters in politics where the energy and fervor are, where the hunger is.”
She added, “An insurgency that becomes a government is eventually responsible for conditions. MAGA as a force has been around more than a decade. You can’t blame everything that doesn’t work on the bad governance of the past when the past is fast receding and your candidates have been controlling Washington for a while.”
Noonan listed Trump’s problems as including “ICE excesses, Epstein, Ukraine, Iran, inflation, tariffs; lame duck,” as well as his seeming tendency to constantly create drama.
“That is a real weakness in life, needing drama,” Noonan concluded. “It will find you on its own. When you need it you’re always generating new stakes, and in a presidency they’re often high, and when you fail that is some big failure.”
Noonan has been a frequent critic of Trump, despite identifying herself as a conservative Republican. In April she wrote for the Journal that “it was strange that Mr. Trump didn’t prepare the country for any possible repercussions. A somber admission that U.S. actions in Iran might be followed by serious counteraggression was needed, and is part of the president’s responsibility.”
Describing his prosecution of the Iran war, Noona said that “a lot seems to depend on matters of personal choice, will and mood. In Iran for instance, maybe he’ll bomb the rubble until it jumps, maybe he’ll declare victory and withdraw by May, maybe he’ll send in troops. But it will be his choice, no consultation needed with that pesky branch, the legislative.”
In 2025, Noonan further observed that Trump was in seeming trouble. Back in 2021, shortly after his failed coup attempt following his loss in the 2020 presidential election, Noonan proclaimed that “the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump has been a rout for the pro-impeachment side. They made the case through time-stamped videos and close argumentation, and their timeline linked in an undeniable way the statements of the president on 1/6 and the actions of the rioters who stormed the Capitol. Democratic floor managers were at their best when they were direct, unadorned, and dealt crisply with information and data, as they did most of the time."
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