'Debilitating blow to Trumpism' as his favorability ratings 'nosedive': analysis

With President Donald Trump suffering low approval ratings in a long list of polls, New York Times columnist Thomas B. Edsall declares — in a column/essay published on January 27 — "The moment is ripe to deal a debilitating blow to Trumpism and the MAGA movement."

But Edsall goes on to stress that in the months ahead, Democrats will need to do a lot more than voice their disdain for Trump — they will also need to realize that they aren't popular either and articulate a winning vision of their own.

"President Trump's favorability ratings on both his job performance and the issues that propelled him into the White House have nosedived," Edsall explains. "The ICE and Border Patrol killings in Minnesota have focused public attention on the dangers of autocratic rule. His second term has been dominated by a bizarre combination of narcissism, corruption and a lurching foreign policy. But if Democrats are to succeed in excising the Trump malignancy from the body politic, their party faces a major hurdle: public distrust, if not downright animosity…. Put another way, Democrats — and their liberal allies — must persuade voters to have faith in the legitimacy, fairness and strength of the party, its institutional supporters and its network of advocacy groups."

In an interview, Yascha Mounk — a political scientist at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore — told Edsall that Democrats "would be extremely foolish to think that the temporary advantage given to them by Trump’s unpopularity amounts to a permanent fix of their deeply rooted image problem."

Edsall notes that "four studies conducted in the second half of 2025 reveal the depth of the predicament Democrats face."

"Even as support for Trump deteriorated," the Times columnist laments, "each analysis found that the public, including many Democratic voters, had a dismal view of the Democratic Party."

Edsall also fears that even if Democrats perform well in the 2026 midterms, they could run into problems in the presidential election two years later in 2028.

"The 2026 election is very likely to pose a problem for the Democrats," Edsall warns. "The better the party does in the midterm elections, the incentive to reform in preparation for the 2028 presidential contest will lose force — a win-lose proposition. Unfortunately, when they encounter a fork in the road, politicians and political parties almost invariably choose the easier path."

Thomas B. Edsall's full column/essay for The New York Times is available at this link (subscription required).