Republicans are in deep crap heading into this November’s midterm elections. 2025’s off-year elections were a warning sign for Republicans in the first year of President Donald Trump’s term, while special elections in the last month have turned into a flashing red alarm for the GOP.
As such, you wouldn’t blame them for hoping that Trump would use Tuesday’s State of the Union address to refocus their party’s message around issues that voters actually care about.
Americans are saying in no uncertain terms that the economy tops their list of concerns, and they’re angry at Trump’s broken promise to lower prices “on Day 1.” His polling is beyond abysmal. A CNN poll earlier this week had his disapproval rating at 63%—his lowest ever. He never hit 60% disapproval in that same poll during his entire first term.
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But worse than that, 68% of respondents said Trump “Hasn't paid enough attention to the country’s most important problems.” Just 32% think he did.
Trump used his latest State of the Union Address to claim “this is the golden age of America.” Few Americans agree.
Republicans certainly aren’t feeling so golden right now. During the record-long speech, Trump bragged about record stock market gains, as if those have in any way trickled down to the very people that elected him. Bragging about economic gains accruing for the nation’s wealthy didn’t work for former President Joe Biden, and there’s even less reason it will work for Trump. Mark Halperin reported that senior Republican campaign officials recently told their own party officials that “Trying to argue about wages being up will not help; voters have to feel it.”
And they don’t.
President Donald Trump delivers the State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress on Feb. 24 as Vice President JD Vance and House Speaker Mike Johnson listen.
Instead of connecting with that voter anxiety, Trump bragged about tax cuts for billionaires, claimed “no inflation” and said “prices are plummeting downward,” bragged about how all his job creation was in the private sector (conveniently ignoring that the country only created 181,000 jobs in all of 2025), and claimed he secured $18 trillion in new investment—a number so ludicrous that the libertarian CATO Institute called it “mostly fake,” “wildly exaggerated,” and “ridiculous.”
He defended tariffs, which poll poorly, and he attacked the Supreme Court for its decision striking down those tariffs, even though people overwhelmingly approve of the ruling by a 57-23 margin, according to YouGov.
And Trump leaned heavily into his most racist and bigoted anti-immigrant rhetoric, trying to cling to a once-winning issue that has turned sharply against Republicans. During the GOP briefing Halperin reported on, Republican campaign officials, including Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio, admitted that “Taking credit for closing the border does not resonate much.”
But Trump didn’t just fail to connect with voters’ economic anxiety. He was nasty, rude, divisive, and as always, full of lies. At a time when the nation is still basking in the warm sportsmanship of American athletes at the Olympic Games in Italy, Trump lashed out at his perceived enemies, taking repeated and nasty shots at the Democrats, blue states and cities, and various ethnic groups.
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At one point he screamed, “They are crazy!” while pointing at the Democrats in the chamber. He couldn’t handle Democrats not standing and cheering for his every utterance, when he’s so used to being surrounded by obsequiousness.
This might get the rabid MAGA base hyped, but it’s not going to pay any electoral dividends for the GOP.
If anything, Trump’s overall message was, “The country has never been better, but WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!”
As Halperin reported from that GOP campaign strategy briefing, “[Fabrizio] acknowledged that Donald Trump will do what he wants to do, say what he wants to say, not be data driven. Everyone else has to stay on message and be driven by the data.”
In an endless speech, Trump barely gave lip service to the economy, the one issue driving the election, preferring to spend the bulk of his time on his culture war favorites.
Trump’s Tuesday night performance proved, more than ever, that Republican candidates are on their own.
