U.S. President Donald Trump on June 25, 2026. REUTERS/Evan Vucci
When swing voters and independents who favored Donald Trump in 2024 were asked why they decided to vote for him, many of them expressed a desire for greater stability in their lives. They wanted lower prices and border security. But Trump's second presidency, critics argue, is even more chaotic than his first. Writing for The Atlantic, journalists Jonathan Lemire and Russell Berman point to Wednesday, June 24 as a prime example of how Trump has gone from "chaos" to "flailing."
"A desultory, grievance-filled speech on what should have been a joyous occasion," Lemire (a former Associated Press reporter who often appears on MS NOW's "Morning Joe") and Berman observe. "The last-minute cancellation of a rare bipartisan bill signing in favor of yet another push for doomed, unpopular legislation. A loud confrontation with members of his own party followed by sneering remarks about some of the nation’s oldest allies. And a nonsensical accusation that, if we have it right, blames the algae-filled Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool not on his rushed renovations but on knife-wielding vandals — and maybe Barack Obama. And that was just yesterday."
Lemire, on X, described June 24 as an example of Trump's ongoing "meltdown" and a day "that captures" how he is much worse than merely "unpredictable" now.
June 24, Lemire and Berman emphasize, was hardly an anomaly in Trump's second term — it was typical of the instability he is creating.
"For President Trump," the journalists argue in The Atlantic, "things aren't going great. He normally thrives in chaos, reveling in unpredictability to keep his opponents off-balance. But right now, he's just flailing. Despite his long-standing superpower of knowing how to control the national conversation and quickly change it, he has been unable to shake the consequences of a war with Iran that increased prices for Americans and weakened the country's standing in the world."
Lemire and Berman add, "Trump's poll numbers have plummeted. Republicans fear a November wipeout. Members of a panicked, fed-up GOP are beginning to defy their president. Trump, whose political image revolves around strength, finds himself diminished."
When Trump, on June 24, "lashed out at" GOP senators "who have faithfully served him," it showed — according to Lemire and Berman — how unstable his second presidency is.
"Senate Republicans gave Trump much of what he wanted last year," the Atlantic writers note, "but he now faces some resistance as the GOP's prospects in this year's midterms worsen. Egged on by loyalists such as Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, Trump has tried to jawbone Republicans into scrapping or circumventing the filibuster’s 60-vote threshold to pass legislation known as the SAVE America Act, which would require people to provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote and photo identification when casting their ballot…. In the face of these struggles, Trump has continued to try to create his own reality."