Aaron Zitner
Appearances
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
A meaningful share of people say, OK, I'll give him some grace there. There's still a number of people willing to give the president latitude. And so while the numbers for him are bad, I think a lot of Americans are in wait-and-see mode.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
Not well. Not well. That is one of the curious features of the first hundred days. Donald Trump won the 2024 election by expanding the Republican coalition in ways that were much more extensive than many people imagined. As you said, you know, young people, minorities voted for him in larger shares than we've seen in recent elections. He's forfeited a lot of that, at least for now.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
In fact, working class white voters, you know, a lot of union members, trade people, people who are not part of the professional class in America. He's sunk among that group, too. But that is the only group, working class white voters, white non-college voters, where he has a positive job approval rating.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
And he has sunk with all groups to where he's below, you know, disapprove is more than approve among every other group.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
Big turn there. They're significantly down. I mean, and one thing I watched, by the way, is a lot of polls tell you if you voted for Trump, what do you think now? If you voted for him in 2024, if you voted for Harris. So he's going to start with 100 percent of 2024 Trump voters because he won them all. We found in mid-March that he was like at 93 percent.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
Now he's in the mid-80s in a lot of polls. In other words, among people who voted for him, you're getting up to 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 percent who disapprove of what they're seeing now. So he's losing some of the people who voted for him.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
I think they reflect anxiety. Look, the polls of people who actually voted showed that people wanted change. Our exit poll called AP VoteCast – it's not exactly an exit poll, but it's a poll of people who voted – found that when we asked, how much change do you want in Washington – nothing, a little bit of change, substantial change, or complete and total upheaval –
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
About 93% of Trump voters wanted either substantial change or complete and total upheaval. 40% wanted complete and total upheaval, and they're getting it. But for a lot of people, you know, it's probably too much. I would caution this. Let's wait till August. In August, by then, Congress will have come in. They'll have either passed a big tax cut or not.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
The tariffs will either have an effect on inflation or not. And Republican members of Congress will go home and they'll hear what people are saying. And at that point, people's opinions can reflect taxes and tariffs and the economy in a more real way.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
And they're either going to be OK with what they see or they're going to freak out and they're going to worry about losing the midterm elections a year afterward. That's where I'm going to be really watching for what the mood of the country is.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
Look, we can ask, what are the consequences of this style of governance by having such an really governing for the base, not trying to be a president who brings America together. What do you give up? And one of those things is you can't put the president in a swing district, in a House district. He's going to not be welcome there. He's going to drive voters away. Let's go back to 2018.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
One of the senators up that year was John Tester of Montana. John Tester was a Democrat. And Donald Trump made it a priority to knock off Jon Tester and have a Republican win that Senate seat. He went to Montana four times. and he was a controversial president then, and he got a lot of attention, and he drove turnout, but he drove turnout among Democrats.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
In a lot of counties in Montana, turnout in the 2018 midterm was higher than in the presidential election in 2016, and Jon Tester held his seat. In other words, when you govern for the base, when you govern as a divisive president, you forfeit the ability to bring the country together, and that gives you certain advantages. You can excite the base,
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
But in a midterm situation, in an election situation, there are places where Donald Trump will risk pushing swing voters away where he goes. And that Montana election stands as a lesson to me of the consequence of governing for the base and not being a unifying figure.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
Well, thanks. Thanks for bringing your wisdom and light to these confusing times for the last 100 days.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
Hey there. Thanks for bringing me in to the final episode here. I'm glad to have made it by the skin of my teeth here.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
You know, if I had to do it in one word, it would be gamble. What a gamble. The president came in with a lot going for him. He had solid approval ratings. He had a good economy that he inherited from Joe Biden, no matter what he says. The economy hasn't changed all that much in its conventional metrics. And He had a public that wanted the border to be secured and seems to want the criminals out.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
And he took this giant gamble with the tariffs. And amid all the disruption we could point to in our foreign security alliances and Doge and the disruption he's brought to the federal government, these tariffs really stand out as a giant gamble. And they've created a lot of anxiety. And we're living in a moment now where a lot is being reorganized, disrupted, destroyed.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
And we don't know what's going to be built in its place, what's going to come from this, and what new gets built by this president. And that's where my head is right now, is looking for what new structures, alliances, benefits to the American people come into place from all of this.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
The first 100 days have really been marked by using executive power alone. And this has kind of been a two-pronged thing. One is he's asserted executive authority. Wherever there's gray area in the law, he's moved to fill it. When Congress passes a law, they sometimes say to themselves, we can't see around every corner. What if we're at war? What if there's an invasion?
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
And they put into many laws the ability of a president to invoke an emergency and unlock enhanced powers. Donald Trump has been unlocking these powers in all kinds of ways. A number of his tariffs are being imposed not under the regular way tariffs have been imposed in the past, but under a law called the International Economic Emergency Powers Act.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
That's the law he's invoked to put tariffs on China and Mexico. It's never been used before. for that purpose. He declared an emergency on the southern border saying we were having an invasion and that allowed him to unlock features of law that waved away humanitarian relief like asylum.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
The other part of this, besides asserting executive power, has been disempowering other institutions in Washington. So when he goes to cut USAID and all the doge cuts, he's disempowering Congress. Congress has the power of the purse under the Constitution, but he hasn't asked Congress for permission to redirect money and to cut the federal bureaucracy.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
The Constitution gives Congress the power to impose tariffs. That resides with the lawmakers. But they've given some of that power away through some of these laws, and he's made full effect of that. He's gone after the media by suing the media and changing the way the press covers him. He's gone after other institutions that he considers liberal, Ivy League universities, big law firms.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
So he's tried to disempower a number of the institutions around him while filling in all the gray areas that exist in the law that allow him to have more power flow from the Oval Office.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
Well, that's right. I mean, what power centers remain that could check him and put limits, put guardrails on? I only see really three out there. One is the judiciary, and you're starting to see a lot of adverse rulings to both what he's done through Doge and the federal cuts and his immigration policy and the deportations.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
Another might be the investors in the markets, and he's shown some sensitivity to whether investors are going to stick with him or whether they're going to walk away from American equities and bonds. The third is the Republican Party itself because if in the end he chooses not to fully obey the courts, what happens then?
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
And I think at that point it takes Republicans saying to him, hey, you need to obey the courts. And so the Republicans are with him very solidly. But in the future, they could be one of the institutions in Washington that puts a check on the president.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
You know, Molly, your observation about him retreating points to another big feature of this first 100 days. And that is everything Trump has done has put him in a position to be a decider on key things. When you put tariffs on the whole world, Now, all of a sudden, Trump is the decider. Everyone has to come to him. Hey, 70 countries have come and they're looking for deals.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
All these different parts of the U.S. economy, the auto industry, individual companies are looking for waivers from these tariffs. He gets to be the decider. When he disempowers law firms and strips them of their security clearance, they now have to come and negotiate individual deals with Trump.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
When he goes after the universities, they have to come to the president and negotiate individual deals with Trump. He's caused everyone around the world to react to him and then come to him. And he gets to be the decider on all these things. And we'll see over the long run, is that a good way to run the government?
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
I would say he has put America on edge. You look at the last nine, nine polls conducted by media in recent days, he is underwater on job approval by double digits, meaning by 10 points or more, more people disapprove than approve of what they're seeing from the president. That said, there are a lot of signs in the numbers also that people are in wait-and-see mode. They're on edge.
The Journal.
Trump 2.0: The First 100 Days
People fear disruption from the tariffs. They fear higher prices. But when we ask, are you feeling the effects of inflation, meaningful numbers of people say, I don't feel it now, but I worry about feeling it in the future. When you ask, hey, President Trump has said, let's put up with a little bit of disruption now for a long-term restructuring of the economy that's going to bring this golden age.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
Well, that's right. Democrats have a very restive liberal base. We've seen people showing up at town hall meetings. In fact, so many That House Republican leaders said, hey, we don't want to have any more town hall meetings. Too many angry people are showing up. Whether that's organic or driven by Democratic groups seems irrelevant.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
People are getting out of their houses and going to these town meetings. And they've been flooding the hill, the members of Congress, with phone calls. But there are centrists in the party who say, wait a second.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
Our path back to winning the House of Representatives and having any hope in the Senate depends on moving to the center and winning those swing voters who swung toward President Trump in 2024. And they don't like this performative stuff. They don't like partisan politics. In our last poll in January, Democrats had the worst image ratings.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
that we have ever found in Wall Street Journal polling in three decades. This is a party that voters do not trust, and it's not enough to protest. This is what the centrists say. Democrats have to make sure that voters understand what they would do with power if they got it back. And the way to do that, they say, is not through protest.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
Instead, focus on how you would handle power differently than President Trump if voters gave power back to you.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
Well, that's right. The confrontation crowd, they think they're having an effect. They think that by showing up at all these town meetings and by showing that they have some fight, they've spooked Republican lawmakers. And now you're seeing Republican lawmakers push back in some ways against President Trump and saying, look, you got to rein in Elon Musk.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
You made us nominate all these cabinet members and we can't even go to these cabinet members to ask what's going on in our home districts and home states with these layoffs. because you've created an alternative power center with Elon Musk. And maybe these tariffs aren't such a good idea.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
You're seeing Republicans speak up a little more, and the confrontational Democrats say that's partly their doing. And also, when you get someone to make a phone call, when you get them to show up at a meeting, they've taken an action. They've become engaged. And if they're going to show up at a meeting, they're also likely to vote when it's time to vote and to get their friends to vote.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
So it's engagement. One problem for Democrats is that Trump is doing so much stuff. And Democrats risk putting out a kind of diffuse and unfocused message if they react to everything. Rahm Emanuel was most recently ambassador to Japan, which has a big USAID installation. And he says, I would not die on the hill of USAID.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
If you're going to protest something, go out and get the governors, Democratic governors, to hold a meeting about why eighth grade reading test scores are so low. Protest that. Make it a contrast with Trump. You're not going to build housing in Gaza. We're going to build housing right here. So make sure that whatever you do comes back to pocketbook issues.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
Democrats are going to be a cacophony of voices for a few years. The party will not really have a single voice guiding it until the next presidential election. But the question is, what should the party do in the interim? And we are seeing different points of view out there.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
Gavin Newsom very prominently said he thought that trans athletes should be barred from women's sports, breaking with the liberal wing of the party on that. And he criticized the use of terms like Latinx and defunding the police. That's part of the effort among some Democrats to show that they understand that voters don't want that liberal point of view and they want it to be more centrist.
WSJ What’s News
Democrats Can’t Agree How to Fight Back
Alyssa Slotkin gave the Democratic response to the State of the Union and gave a very centrist, Midwestern-focused kind of meat and potatoes speech that was immigration, national security, basic economics. It was an unfancy statement of core values. Nations should be secure, the border should be secure, and we should focus on your pocketbook. That's what the centrists think is the way forward.