G. Elliot Morris on Trump's dire polling

As a weekend bonus for subscribers, we checked in with data journalist G. Elliot Morris, author of the highly recommended Strength In Numbers newsletter, to discuss the dire state of Trump’s polling.

“Trump has the unique problem that he started off a lot lower than other presidents,” Morris told us. “So as he loses ground — and he has lost ground at about the normal historical clip — he just continues to be worse and worse than every other president before him.”

We asked Morris about the specific issues driving Trump’s unpopularity, how Democrats are faring nearly a year out from Kamala Harris’s heartbreaking loss, the political terrain heading into next year’s midterms, and much more.

A full transcript of the conversation, lightly edited for clarity, follows. If you’d like to read the whole thing but aren’t yet a paid subscriber, please consider clicking the button and becoming one. Paid subscribers make Public Notice possible and keep the vast majority of our work free for everyone.

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Thor Benson

Since Trump took office, his poll numbers have gone down. What do you make of the trajectory?

G. Elliott Morris

There is a general tendency, historically, for presidents to lose ground after they take office. This happens because every action that a president or the party in control of Congress takes marginalizes some people, especially if you’re pushing policy consistently in the same partisan direction.

This was true for Joe Biden with infrastructure legislation and the Inflation Reduction Act. It’s true for Donald Trump with his increasingly expanding deportation agenda in particular, but also because lots of the other stuff he’s doing on healthcare and entitlements are pushing policy toward the right.

As you do that, your approval rating naturally goes down. That’s to be expected. But Trump has the unique problem that he started off a lot lower than other presidents.

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