Republicans are rethinking their fealty to Trump: Morning Joe

“Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough says Republicans on the Floor of the House and Senate are now reconsidering their dedication to President Donald Trump in the aftermath of recent elections and Trump’s collapsing poll numbers.

“The Trump coalition ends when Donald Trump is off the scene, and we see it with Republicans losing in 2017, 18, 19, 21, 22, 23, now 25,” said Scarborough. “When Trump's not on the ballot, that coalition stays home.”

“Think about it. We just talked about the election last week and the incredible victories by Democrats — I mean, historic. You look at Virginia, my gosh, county by county, by county, everything is sweeping away from Republicans,” said Scarborough. “Then you add on top of that … Trump's approval rating right now, I think the AP [poll] has him at 36 percent. Others have him at 37 percent but he's gotten down into the 30s lately.”

Scarborough also pointed out that only a third of Americans believe the nation is going in the right direction and two thirds think it's on the wrong track. Trump is trailing on his economic policies, his healthcare policies, and even immigration, which was once his strongest numbers.

“And for Democrats that are too stupid to realize you won the government shutdown, don't be stupid. You won the government shutdown,” Scarborough added, citing public surveys.

“I've been on the House floor,” said Scarborough, a former U.S. Congressman from Florida. “I know what it's like when everybody gets on the House floor and starts talking. When your party gets walloped, very quickly people are like, ‘okay, yeah, we got to take care of ourselves because the guy on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue is not going to do it.’ Well, that's exactly what the Republicans are starting to think right now on Capitol Hill.”

Show co-host Jonathan Lemire said the reemergence of the Epstein emails also “comes at the worst possible time for President Trump.”

“This is the weakest moment of his second term, by far,” said Lemire. “Republicans lose badly at the ballot box last week on Election Day. … We have, of course, the hubbub about the ballroom and everything else where Trump is slipping. And we seeing he's running into — and this is rare — the limits of his power with his own party.”