Most second-term presidents hit their lame-duck era right after the midterm election, but Atlantic staff writer Jonathan Lemire said President Donald Trump ushered in his lame-duck phase early.
“… [M]any presidents have been at least able to delay their diminishment until after the midterm elections, at which point — political capital largely exhausted, the political world turning to the race to pick a successor — they tend to focus on things over which they still have control, such as foreign policy and legacy building. Remarkably, [President Donald] Trump, not even a full year into his second term, seems to have already gotten there.”
Lemire argued this marked a significant change from Trump’s 100th day in office, when he was seemingly unstoppable.
“After taking four years out of office to prepare, he and his team returned to power with a blitz of more than 140 executive orders. He bent the Republican-controlled Congress to his will and dismantled much of the federal bureaucracy. He brought powerful institutions, including prestigious universities and law firms, to heel, demanding that his ring be kissed and his wallet fattened,” Lemire said.
But as 2025 draws to a close, Lemire said Trump “seems a whole lot smaller,” with his party slammed in recent elections, and his poll numbers on signature issues like the economy and immigration sliding into the gutter.
“He’s seemingly lost touch with what got him elected, instead focusing on projects both petty and self-aggrandizing. As Americans worry about affordability, Trump and his family have profited wildly from his time in office,” Lemire said. “… Republicans have begun to openly and repeatedly defy him. Democrats have started to outmaneuver him.”
And on Tuesday, a new slate of Jeffrey Epstein material emerged with embarrassing revelations. Meanwhile, Lemire says Trump increasingly has “a hard time even staying awake.”
Trump’s distraction and myopia are worrying Republicans, who Lemire said are “beginning to eye the midterms with dread.”
As Trump’s poll numbers continue to dip some in the GOP are already considering life after Trump. The MAGA base, similarly, appears divided as enclaves and MAGA war parties pair off at Turning Point USA’s conference this week and slash at one another.
“No Republican had dared even breathing the word 2028 for fear of triggering Trump,” an anonymous advisor told Lemire. “But that’s changing. And the quickest way to become a lame duck is to lose your own party.”
Read Lemire's Atlantic essay at this link (subscription required).
