If you reached this Balkingpoints article by direct external link, stop by the front page for a rotating satellite view of the earth at night
“As I predicted”, which she did. About Trump and tariffs.
VP Kamala Harris on April 30, 2025 made her first address since leaving office. Of course Media Inc gave it next to no coverage.
It does spend quite a bit of bandwidth on Dems In Disarray, critiquing response more than it critiques what Republicans are doing. The press, mostly owned now by mega-corporations, seeks to hold Democrats accountable and GOP’s entitled.
Entitled to their errors, inertia, benefactor allegiances & other corruptions. The oversight / watchdog role of Media Inc when Republicans are in power, has been AWOL since at least the Bush Jr. invasion of Iraq.
Responsibility is not on Democrats right now and they don’t need an elaborate counter-attack. Their best electoral power derives, from when Republicans are handed the keys and demonstrate yet again their incompetence at governing. Dems don’t have to do anything actually, except brace for impact when the bus crashes and GOP’s alienate independents, yet again.
The other day, that group which declares no party affiliation, polled Trump at 31% approval. Quite the falloff from 6 months ago. GOP’s have to win them back to stay in office, as they roll out the carpet for inflationary tariffs no less.
That’s the ballgame right now. Not much else.
Updating poll stats / May 30-June 10 ;
“A majority of independents said they feel dissatisfied, angry or furious with the actions of the administration. That’s reflected in independents’ approval rating of the president, with 65% saying they disapprove of his performance.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/06/15/poll-americans-disapprove-of-trumps-performance-as-republicans-manage-splits-over-spending-plans.html
There is an axiom from Politics 101 ; elections are won in the middle.
What that means is that each party has their base of supporters, about 1/3 of the voting electorate and the remaining 1/3 is not affiliated with either. If you win most of those voters, you will usually win. Stated in negative phrasing, if that voting bloc shifts against you significantly, you will have a very hard time winning in that cycle. In this case it would impact the midterm elections of 2026.
Independents obviously tilted to Trump in November, 2024. I believe that comprised mostly of independents whom rent, justifiably angry about what were steep rent increases during the Biden years. Democrats missed a chance to address that in the 2021 Covid relief bill, and it’s probably the last time they ignore renters as a bloc. If that is what happened it’s understandable discontent, yet also remarkable stupidity that any would believe Republicans will pass anything whatsoever to help them deal with rent increases.
So halfway into 2025, independents disapprove of Trump 2 to 1, and that is before tariffs inflation has hit the fan.
Ruh Roh. Trump hasn’t recovered with independents yet and in fact, it’s worse. Gallup from a few days ago: 37% overall approval (that’s his base voter + about 10% of the electorate who aren’t paying attention) and then whoops, 29% approval from independents.
As I mentioned above, if you are losing independents you are usually losing. It’s a long way to November 2026 (midterms), but yet a longer climb for Trump to win back that voter. He’d have to do a total reversal on tariffs nonsense and then see only a short recession from the damage already done because of it.
Job creation has fallen off a cliff because of it. Not just an anemic July jobs report, but a sharp downward revision for both May and June that now reflect a new, gigantic problem. Firms have stopped hiring.
Long climb to recover that voter. Trump will not be on the ballot in 2026. His rubberstamping party, will be.