Many regular members of CNN’s audience were no doubt surprised this week when the network’s senior writer and political analyst Harry Enten called the second Trump administration, which is only seven months old, “arguably the most influential of this century and probably dating back a good portion of the last century as well.”
Enten’s statement admiring Trump for the productivity of his second administration stands in sharp contrast to CNN’s long-standing and pervasive anti-Trump bias in its news coverage and analysis, going all the way back to Trump’s 2016 presidential candidacy and continuing throughout his first term as president, his first and second re-election campaigns, and the first months of his second term.
Enten justified his recognition of the unusual effectiveness of Trump’s second term as president so far by referring to a series of recent national opinion polls documenting the durability of Trump’s voter support. At the same time, those polls reported a continued sharp decline in voter approval for the Democrat party and the most prominent items on its elitist liberal policy agenda, that was first revealed by the results of last November’s presidential election.
Ever since the morning after Trump won a second term as president, Democrats have been struggling to find an effective way to respond to Trump’s aggressive implementation of his policy agenda, and to defend the liberal progressive policy agenda that was put in place by the last two Democrat presidents, Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
TRUMP IS QUICKLY DISMANTLING THE DEMOCRAT POLICY AGENDA
Trump and his like-minded conservative cabinet appointees, have been rapidly dismantling the Democrat initiatives which established “woke” Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies and “green energy” initiatives as the new standards across the federal government.
As he promised during the presidential campaign, Trump has ended the rapid forced transition to electric vehicles and renewable energy sources.
Trump also immediately reversed Biden’s open border policies, ending the mass illegal crossings of the southern border with Mexico throughout most of Biden’s term in office overnight, and he simultaneously launched a major effort to detain and then deport millions of illegal aliens, with an initial emphasis on removing immigrants who have been convicted of violent crimes.
Trump is drastically reducing the role of the federal Department of Education, while restoring merit-based rather than race-based DEI school admission, promotion and hiring policies. His Justice Department is also holding colleges across the country accountable for anti-Semitic acts against their Jewish students on campus.
As he promised, Trump’s second administration is safeguarding the integrity of women’s sports. Trump is also supporting parental rights to school choice and the right to opt out of the brainwashing of their children by “woke” school curriculums.
He has also reversed federal policies imposed by previous Democrat administrations that conflicted with an individual’s right to follow their religious beliefs.
REFORMING HEALTH CARE AND ENCOURAGING ECONOMIC GROWTH
Trump is reforming federal health care policies under the leadership of iconoclastic Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., while is launching a nationwide effort to “Make America Healthy Again (MAHA).
Trump has also imposed higher tariffs on foreign imports to level the international playing field for the benefit of American producers and provided financial incentives for several large new foreign investments in the manufacturing sector of the American economy that Trump has personally negotiated.
Contrary to the criticism and dire predictions from his political opponents, Trump’s tariff policies have not reignited inflation or slowed the growth of the American economy. Instead, since Trump took office again, American stock markets indexes have set new highs. In addition, many American businesses are now willing to absorb some or all of the cost of Trump’s tariffs in a fair exchange for a much better opportunity to compete in many formerly closed foreign markets, and the many benefits of Trump’s pro-growth investment incentives, and his anti-regulation domestic economic policies.
Trump’s director of the Environmental Protection Agency EPA, former New York GOP Congressman Lee Zeldin, has also started the process of revoking all of the EPA regulations on carbon emissions that were first put in place by the Obama administration, and which have been the basis of subsequent Democrat-supported attempts to ban the use of all fossil fuels by automobiles and common household appliances, including kitchen stoves, hot water heaters and clothes dryers.
By prompting congressional Republican majorities to pass his “One Big Beautiful Bill” into law, over the unanimous opposition of elected Democrats in the House and Senate, Trump kept his promise to provide new tax breaks for working class and older voters, buyers of new American-made cars, extending and making permanent all of Trump’s highly successful 2017 tax breaks. The bill also put in place new tax incentives for boosting investments in American businesses to create more jobs and raise the standard of living of working class families.
TRUMP IS KEEPING MANY PREVIOUSLY UNKEPT PROMISES
Unlike many previous Republican and Democrat presidents who campaigned on promises to reduce the federal budget deficit by cutting unnecessary government spending due to waste, fraud, incompetence or abuse, Trump was the first president in decades to take meaningful action to carry through on that promise, by empowering Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to ferret out and target for elimination the most egregious examples of wasteful spending and inefficiency across the federal government.
Over the years, many Republican conservatives have called for the government defunding of liberal policy institutions, ranging from the scandalously unnecessary and wasteful foreign aid projects generously funded by the State Department’s agency known as USAID, as well as the liberal-dominated programming and commentary supported by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and National Public Radio. But President Trump is the first to actually eliminate that federal funding and formally remove it from the federal funding by getting Republican majorities in both chambers of Congress to pass a rescission measure saving almost $9 billion for federal taxpayers.
In addition, Trump has revoked, by issuing executive orders, a number of what he called “nuisance” federal regulations, such as a ban on the use of plastic drinking straws, and a “low water flow” requirement on shower heads, that Trump and his supporters have promoted as a long overdue return of “common sense” in government policy.
TODAY’S DEMOCRATS ARE ALMOST ALWAYS ON THE WRONG SIDE OF ISSUES
This is only a partial list of the broad range of Republican-supported policy changes that Trump has been implementing at an unprecedented rate. In addition, when Democrats invariably criticize Trump’s policy changes, they almost always find themselves on the wrong side of public opinion and trying to defend indefensible policy positions. On issue after issue, including border control, the mass deportation of illegal aliens, parental school choice, support for police, as well as the arrest, trial, conviction and imprisonment of criminals, and affirmative action school admission and hiring policies, Democrat party policy is being dictated by college-educated liberal elites. It is also being enforced by a self-appointed army of “woke” advocates on social media who have no tolerance for dissenting opinions, These enforcers also have no mercy in attacking and attempting to destroy the reputations and professional careers of anyone who dares to raise public objections to the tenets of their progressive (read: socialist) liberal beliefs.
These polls also document the complete failure of the typical reaction by Democrats expressing their opposition to President Trump, often by using foul language for emphasis. Regardless of the electoral consequences, Democrats continue to push the progressive “woke” agenda which has alienated the large number of white and non-white working class voters, especially males, who used to provide the core of the Democrat party’s voter base, and who, until recently, enabled moderate Democrat candidates to be competitive even in “swing states” and electoral districts in “flyover country” outside the “blue” cities and states located mostly in the Northeast and on the West Coast, as well as on college campuses where ideological discourse is dominated almost exclusively by liberal opinions.
IN SEARCH OF AN ALTERNATIVE DEMOCRAT POLICY PLATFORM
In an opinion pace published by the Wall Street Journal, by veteran public policy expert Ted Van Dyk, asks what is the alternative Democratic platform that can win national elections once again, and who are the Democrat leaders willing to risk being attacked by progressive activists by daring to support it? Van Dyk notes that during a comparable period of political ascendance at the height of GOP President Ronald Reagan’s popularity there were numerous Democrat proposals offering viable, relatively moderate policy alternatives, such as the proposed Bradley-Gephardt plan to reform the federal tax code.
Instead, Van Gyk notes, that after “having lost the 2024 presidential election decisively, and without control of either house of Congress, Democrats lack a credible alternative vision to present to American voters.”
“Not being Donald Trump isn’t enough. [If they are ever to become competitive in national elections again], Democratic congressional leaders, governors and prominent private citizens need, separately and together, to develop national-security, economic and social-welfare proposals that will appeal to a majority of citizens.”
Van Dyk asks these Democrats, “how do we propose to keep [these citizens] safe and prospering? What are our plans, beside our plan to replace Mr. Trump?”
SWING STATE DEMOCRATS ARE LOSING FAITH IN THEIR OWN PARTY
Conservative Washington Examiner commentator Michael Barone suggests that if Democrat candidates cannot come up with satisfactory answers to Van Dyk’s questions, “the off-year elections in November 2026 may not follow the conventional wisdom that suggests the president’s party almost always loses the House and, slightly less often, [a few] Senate seats.”
Barone also suggests that their belief that “the Democratic label has become electoral political poison” is the reason why Democrat senatorial “candidates in states such as South Dakota and Nebraska that have reelected Democrat senators in recent years,” are now shunning the party label and running as independents.
Another reason that Barone cites is the fact that “Democrats’ credibility [with voters] has been damaged as their arguments, one after another, have proven to be based on lies [including:] the Russia collusion hoax, Covid-19 school closings, ‘transitory’ inflation, the Hunter Biden laptop, and open borders immigration.”
As a result, Barone suggests that Republicans may not follow the historic pattern in next year’s midterm election “by losing their narrow 220-215 majority they won in the House of Representatives in 2020. In an era when voter ticket splitting between Republican and Democrat candidates has become rare due to the polarization of partisan discourse.
In addition, Barone notes, “the Democrats’ problem is that Republicans are defending only three [congressional] districts carried by former Vice President Kamala Harris, while Democrats are defending 13 [House] seats [in districts] won by Donald Trump.
REPUBLICANS ARE NOW MORE POPULAR THAN DEMOCRATS
A survey by the Pew Research Center found that after four years of the Biden administration, the presidential electorate moved from +6 Democratic in 2020 to +1 Republican in 2024.
“For months now,” Republican pollster Patrick Ruffini observes, “We’ve observed a new trend in polling: the Democratic party’s favorability ratings have fallen below the GOP’s. That’s hardly ever happened before.”
In a shocking finding confirming this trend, The Wall Street Journal’s July 16-20 poll shows that 63% of voters have negative feelings about the Democrats, the highest level since 1990, as opposed to only 33 percent of voters who say they have a favorable view of the party. The same poll showed Republicans maintaining their significant 2024 lead over Democrats in party registration, and that pluralities of voters favor Republicans even on issues on which majorities disapproved of Donald Trump’s most recent actions, including the economic policy, tariffs, immigration, foreign policy, and support for Ukraine in its war against Russia.
Even though, over time, this poll shows net Democratic favorability with voters declining since the end of the Obama administration, the sharpest drop occurred started just after Biden won the 2020 election with a 3-point net unfavorable rating, which then fell to the 30-point net unfavorable rating where it stands today.
THE LINGERING POLITICAL DAMAGE FROM BIDEN’S PRESIDENCY
According to an analysis by John Halpin, the executive editor of the Liberal Patriot, “Democrat [party] leaders are perceived to be old and out of touch, and no new party figurehead has yet emerged. One obvious answer as to why Democrats are doing so poorly with voters is that nothing has really changed since the collapse of the [credibility of the] Biden-Harris administration” following Biden’s disastrous cognitive meltdown during his debate against Donald Trump last summer.
Halpin suggests that, “President Biden’s age and declining capacities, and the lengths to which party leaders went to ignore or downplay it, left a permanently sour taste in the mouths of many Americans. Six months into a second Trump term, nothing appears to have dislodged these beliefs. Democrats are increasingly viewed as a washed-up party with uninspiring leadership. . .
Halpin also observes that, “‘Anti-Trumpism’ hasn’t improved the party’s image. Democrats have once again gone all-in on ‘resistance’ politics and ‘anti-Trumpism.’ Yet none of this anger and frustration with Trump has blossomed into rising [voter] sentiments for the [Democrats]. . .
Halpin also asks the crucial question: “What issue have Democrats moderated on since the election? Immigration? Crime? Climate change? Answer: none of the above.”
While some of the more savvy Democrat party leaders, such as California governor Gavin Newsom, have been cautiously trying to distance themselves from these unpopular [party] positions, Halpin writes, “Voters aren’t dumb, though; they know when you’re fibbing or dodging the issue.”
Halpin also notes that ‘Bidenomics’ was a colossal failure in the eyes of many voters. Considerable amounts of new government spending, new EV regulations, student debt elimination, and other expensive steps left no lasting impression with voters other than wasted money and high inflation.”
Halpin predicts that “Until Democrats come up with a coherent approach to growing the economy, improving workers’ take-home pay, and reducing their household costs, voters will continue to favor Republicans on the economy.”
In addition, high Democrat expectation for winning back majority control of the House in next year’s midterm elections should be tempered by a New York Times analysis showing that over the past 3 presidential elections, Trump steadily gained votes in 1,433 counties across the country, with a total population of 42 million people, while his Democrat opponents made consistent gains in only 57 counties, with a population of 8 million people. That finding prompted Fox News and Axios political commentator and Jewish Insider editor-in-chief, Josh Kraushaar to tweet, “For years, the belief was Democrats have had demographic destiny on our side. Now, the inverse is true.”
A MAJOR NATIONAL POLITICAL REALIGNMENT IN PROGRESS
Similarly, veteran New York Times reporter Thomas Edsall suggests “the real possibility that discontent with the Democratic party—its perceived failure to value work, its political correctness, the extremity of its social and cultural liberalism—might have become deeply embedded in the electorate,” and fears that it may trigger a national political “a realignment with staying power.”
Former MSNBC political commentator and talk show host Chris Matthews, who was an outspoken critic of Trump during his first term as president, now admits that, “the country is moving toward Trump. They want a president who is a strong figure. And he’s got it. And half the country buys it.”
But the most compelling recent analysis of the root problems with the Democrat political message has been offered by Ruy Teixeira, who was one of the authors of the theory proposed 20 years ago that the steady rise of minority group and immigrant voters in the American electorate would lead to permanent Democrat electoral majorities for the foreseeable future.
Texeira’s analysis begins with the observation that historically, previous liberal and progressive American candidates succeeded because they “sought to make life better for ordinary people by emphasizing their universal interests across racial, ethnic and cultural divisions, ensuring universal fair treatment in daily life and throughout society, promoting universal standards of merit, achievement and truth and providing universal access to the bounty from scientific achievement and economic growth.
“Making progress along these lines was what being a progressive was all about.”
According to Texeira, the underlying political problem facing today’s progressives is that they no longer support those universal values. “They have rejected the universal approach. Instead they now stand in the way of progress as progressives used to define it—and progress as most ordinary voters would [still] recognize it.
The core commitment of previous generations of progressives “was to make American society truly colorblind.” Texeira writes that those progressives believed that it was fundamentally unfair “that racial discrimination could truncate the life chances of black people and visit misery upon them. Therefore, progressives advocated and marched for ending discrimination and unequal opportunity. They won the argument. Americans today believe, with Martin Luther King Jr., that people should “not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”
TODAY’S PROGRESSIVES HAVE LOST FAITH IN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY
A 2023 Public Agenda Hidden Common Ground survey found that the vast majority (91 percent) of Americans still agree with the statement: “All people deserve an equal opportunity to succeed, no matter their race or ethnicity.”
Texeira laments the fact that today’ progressives have lost faith in that ideal. Instead, they now favor color-conscious remedies like affirmative action and oppose the adoption of colorblind policies which were the goal of Dr. King’s generation of progressives.
Instead, Texeira notes, today’s leading progressives such as Ibram X. Kendi believe that, “There is no such thing as a non-racist or race-neutral policy…The only remedy to racist discrimination is anti-racist discrimination…The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.”
Texeira then asks, “If they no longer support progress toward a colorblind society, in what sense do [today’s liberal, college-educated Democrat elites] still qualify as “progressive”?
“Can today’s progressives be considered ‘progressive’ when they don’t really support free speech, cultural pluralism and the open society?”
Texeira’s answer is that “they cannot and voters, especially working class voters, are unlikely to consider them so.
“Progressives used to believe that discrimination should be opposed [but that resources should be] provided to the disadvantaged so that everyone can fairly compete and achieve. Rewards—job opportunities, promotions, commissions, appointments, publications, school slots, and much else—would then be allocated. . . on the basis of merit. No more would people be rewarded because of who they were instead of what they accomplished.
“Today’s progressives view merit and objective measures of achievement. . . with suspicion as the outcomes of a hopelessly corrupt system. [But] ordinary voters [still] believe in the idea of merit and. . . in their ability to [earn merit-based] rewards if given the opportunity to do so.
Texeira’s conclusion is that “anti-merit ‘progressives’ are no longer progressive because, in essence, they no longer believe in fairness. . .
He notes that, “Progressives used to err on the side of free speech, not its suppression. . They believed their ideas would freely prevail over the long haul because they were better. . .
[But today’s] progressives consider ideas they disagree with hateful or ‘misinformation/disinformation’ and therefore not part of legitimate discourse.”
“[In addition,] instead of judging ideas by their truth content. . . [many] progressives now judge ideas by who is putting them forward.”
CAN YOU STILL BE CALLED A PROGRESSIVE IF YOU HATE PROGRESS?
Most critically, Texeira recalls, “no goal was more important to progressives back in the day than promoting prosperity for the working class and disadvantaged. Progressives believed in the future and the possibilities for dramatic improvement. . . to be fully realized among the working class. . .
“No longer. Progressives now prize goals like fighting climate change, procedural justice, and protecting identity groups above prosperity. But the working class is not especially interested in this issue and has predictably material priorities: more stuff, more growth, more opportunity, cheaper prices, more comfortable lives.”
In addition, Texeira observes, progressives have lost their former belief that the benefits of technology and growth can be realized by members of the working class. Instead, many of today’s progressives view technology “as a dark force to be contained rather than a force for good to be celebrated. . . They now tend to regard technological change with dread rather than hope.”
As a result, Texeira predicts that Democrats will continue to lose the critical support of working class voters, until they recommit themselves to the former goals of universal uplift based on universal values and aspirations that they have abandoned.
