The Democrat brand, according to CNN&#8217;s chief data analyst Harry Enten, is &#8220;in the basement&#8221; — with multiple polls showing that Americans in near record numbers have an unfavorable view of the party and that no clear leader has emerged to potentially carry the Democrats through the next presidential election.
Enten delivered the news during a Monday appearance on &#8220;CNN News Central,&#8221; where he spoke with anchor Kate Bolduan about the obvious issues plaguing the Democratic Party.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
🚨NEW: CNN&#8217;s Harry Enten says &#8220;DEMOCRATIC BRAND IS IN THE BASEMENT&#8221;🚨
&#8220;It is total and complete garbage in the mind of the American public.&#8221;<a href="https://twitter.com/DailyCaller?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@DailyCaller</a> <a href="https://t.co/7zV62UvT4x">pic.twitter.com/7zV62UvT4x</a>
— Jason Cohen 🇺🇸 (@JasonJournoDC) <a href="https://twitter.com/JasonJournoDC/status/1951286424210120773?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 1, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
&#8220;Democrats at this point are historically divided. It is a complete and utter mess. It is messier than a hoarder’s basement. What are we talking about here? The national early poll leader — 25% plus,&#8221; Enten began, noting that Democrats typically had a standout potential candidate at this point in a regular election cycle. &#8220;Normally, that’s where Democrats are. [Joe] Biden was at 25% plus in 2020. Hillary Clinton was in ’08 and ’16. [Al] Gore was in ’00 and ’04.&#8221;
&#8220;At this particular point, there is no one — no one — in the Democratic race for president who’s polling at 25% plus. The water is quite warm. If you’re a Democrat potentially thinking about running in 2028, jump right in — because at this point there is no front-runner,&#8221; Enten continued.
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Bolduan pressed him on that point, asking whether he thought the lack of a clear frontrunner had any connection to the fact that so many Americans saw the party in a negative light — and Enten agreed.
&#8220;I think that that is in large part what’s going on is one of the reasons why there is no front-runner, nobody wants to put anybody up at the top of their ballot list, is because at this particular point, the Democratic brand is in the basement. It is total and complete garbage in the mind of the American public,&#8221; he explained.
&#8220;The Democratic Party’s net favorable rating — record lows in all three. Wall Street Journal, 30 points underwater. CNN, 26 points underwater. Gallup, 26 points underwater. And that is being driven in large part by discontent within the Democratic base,&#8221; Enten explained. &#8220;The Democratic base wants something different.&#8221;

US-POLITICS-TRUMP-CONGRESS

‘Total And Complete Garbage’: CNN Pollster Says The Democrat Brand Is ‘In The Basement’

'Total And Complete Garbage': CNN Pollster Says The Democrat Brand Is 'In The Basement'

Democrats

Harry Enten

Media

Politics

Polls

CNN&#8217;s chief data analyst delivered bad news to climate alarmists all across the United States on Wednesday, saying that polling indicates very few Americans view the potential threat of climate change as a major issue going into the 2026 midterm elections.
Harry Enten discussed the topic with host John Berman, and he shared data showing that the percentage of Americans who were &#8220;greatly worried&#8221; about climate change had not changed drastically in nearly four decades — and had even dropped off somewhat in the last five years.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Re: Bill Gates &amp; climate change&#8230; He&#8217;s not alone in doubting a doomsday scenario.
Only 2% rank climate change as the top issue facing the USA. The % who are greatly worried has been steady since 1989.
Just 17% say climate change will make it harder to stay in their home area. <a href="https://t.co/T9rOtT2JqP">pic.twitter.com/T9rOtT2JqP</a>
— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) <a href="https://twitter.com/ForecasterEnten/status/1983546202692948354?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
On the heels of a comment from Berman about billionaire Bill Gates — who has been at the forefront of the climate conversation — Enten observed that even with prominent messengers, the climate alarmist narrative has not really resonated.
&#8220;Yeah, I think a lot of people will agree with Bill Gates that maybe this wouldn’t be the end of humanity,&#8221; he said of the Microsoft creator&#8217;s <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/bill-gates-walks-back-climate-doom-it-will-not-lead-to-humanitys-demise">recent pivot</a>.
&#8220;And I think, you know, we’ve been talking about climate change now for decades, upon decades, upon decades,&#8221; Enten continued. &#8220;And the worry in terms of climate change, simply put, hasn’t shifted; it has not reached the majority of Americans.&#8221;
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&#8220;What are we talking about? Greatly worried about climate change. You go all the way back to 1989, it was 35%. 2000, 40%.  2020, 46%. And in 2025, look at that, it’s 40%,&#8221; Enten added, noting the recent drop off. &#8220;The same number as we had 25 years ago, back in 2000, and then only just five points higher than we had back in 1989. Really, we’ve just seen consistency on this issue.&#8221;
&#8220;The bottom line is that the climate change message that folks who, of course, believe that climate change is real and is quite worrisome, simply put, has not really worked with the American people,&#8221; he concluded, noting that just two percent of Americans believed climate change was a &#8220;top issue&#8221; facing the United States.

TOPSHOT-KENYA-CLIMATE-DEMO

CNN Pollster Has Bad News For Climate Doomsday Cult

CNN Pollster Has Bad News For Climate Doomsday Cult: No One Cares

CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten voiced his own surprise on Tuesday as polls indicate that Republicans are not seeing a drop in popularity due to the ongoing government shutdown.
Enten joined CNN host John Berman to discuss the shutdown and how it might eventually come to an end — and Berman predicted that &#8220;political pain,&#8221; for one party or the other, would be what ultimately brought people to the table. Enten pushed back, noting that Democrats might be the ones feeling the pain.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/BREAKING?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#BREAKING</a>: Republicans&#8217; polling has improved during Democrat government shutdown
CNN: &#8220;The Republican brand in Congress has actually improved&#8221; incl. with Independents 📈
Plus alarm bells for Democrats: &#8220;The worst position Democrats have been…in the last 20 years&#8221; 🚩 <a href="https://t.co/g0hWYhsChM">pic.twitter.com/g0hWYhsChM</a>
— Ben Petersen (@bennpetersen) <a href="https://twitter.com/bennpetersen/status/1983171790601105409?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 28, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
&#8220;One thing that might end a shutdown is political pain, if parties start to feel that it’s hurting them. So let’s talk about that, starting with Republicans. How has the shutdown seemed to have affected their political standing?&#8221; Berman prompted.
&#8220;Yeah, you might think, given that the Republicans are in charge of both the House and the Senate, that a government shutdown might actually hurt the Republican brand. But in fact, it hasn’t!&#8221; Enten replied. &#8220;If anything, it’s been helped a little bit! Take a look here, the shift in net popularity versus pre-shutdown. When we’re looking at the Republican Party overall, that brand, actually up two points. That’s within the margin of error, but clearly it hasn’t dropped. Come over to this side of the screen, look at the net approval ratings for Republicans in Congress. It’s actually up five points since pre-shutdown! So what we’re seeing here is the Republican brand in Congress has actually improved somewhat compared to where we were pre-shutdown, despite the fact that Republicans control. And that’s the math that John Thune and Mike Johnson are looking at is, &#8216;Hey, why should we give in, electorally speaking, when our brand has actually improved a little bit?'&#8221;
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Berman pressed for details, asking whether Republicans were only getting more popular with die-hards or were they making gains across other demographics: &#8220;Now we say their position is getting better, with whom?&#8221;
&#8220;It’s rallying the base for sure. Look at this, the net approval rating up 12 points versus pre-shutdown,&#8221; Enten began — but he did not stop there. &#8220;But it’s not just with the base, it’s also with the middle of the electorate. Look at this among independents, it’s up eight points as well! So we’ve got a situation here where Republicans with the shutdown are actually rallying their base, but it’s also something that’s not hurting them with the folks in the middle. If anything, it’s helping them with folks in the middle, and this is the type of math that if you’re Republicans, you like to see, right? Because something could rally the base, but alienate those in the middle, or something could rally those in the middle, but alienate the base.&#8221;
&#8220;But the truth is, we’re not seeing that. What we’re seeing is the Republican brand has actually gotten better among independents and it’s also gotten better among Republicans as well, that Republican brand when it comes to those in Congress,&#8221; Enten added. &#8220;So again, what’s the electoral reason that Republicans would give in at this point?&#8221;
&#8220;And Democrats, of course, they have their eyes on the midterm elections. Yeah, we have elections one week from today, but what Democrats in Congress are mostly focused on are one year and one week from today, from the midterms. So how do Democrats, how are they positioned right now?&#8221; Berman asked.
Enten broke out the worst news, noting that Democrats were actually losing ground as the midterms crept closer. &#8220;You look at this point back when Trump was president the first time around, Democrats were up 11 points. Look at where it is now. Democrats are ahead, but they’re actually only up three points. This is, in fact, the worst position Democrats have been on in a generic ballot at this time in a midterm when there was a Republican president in the last 20 years. And this is no different from pre-shutdown. So Republicans aren’t losing on this metric either. They’ve become more popular, and they’re in a pretty good position for them historically when it comes to the generic congressional ballot.&#8221;
&#8220;This is a concerning number for Democrats, are you saying?&#8221; Berman tried one more time.
&#8220;This is a concerning number for Democrats, because it’s considerably worse than they traditionally do in midterm elections when there’s a Republican president,&#8221; Enten confirmed the worst.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson

‘They’ve Become More Popular!’: CNN Pollster Shocked As GOP Gets Shutdown ‘Bump’

'They've Become More Popular!': CNN Pollster Shocked As GOP Gets Shutdown 'Bump'

Government Shutdown

Republicans

Democrats have some major problems.
We are about one year away from the midterm elections. It is worthwhile to note that in the RealClearPolitics polling average, Democrats right now are leading by roughly 1.6 points in the generic congressional vote, within the margin of error.
Every single poll over the course of the last month has the margin between Democrats up three points and Republicans up one point.
There are no polls showing Democrats with a significant advantage on the 2026 generic congressional ballot.
Just so you understand how these things stack up, in 2018, when Democrats had a great election, Democrats netted 40 seats in the House and took the House by a significant majority. The RealClearPolitics polling average had Democrats on Election Day in the generic congressional average up by 8.4 points.
Today, it&#8217;s more like 2022, when Republicans won nine seats, which was a very narrow victory. The RealClearPolitics polling average had Republicans up 2.8 points, and there are significantly fewer competitive battleground districts this time around, thanks to both redistricting and population movement.
According to Cook Political, there are effectively eight seats that are toss-up seats held by Republicans, but could theoretically move Democrat. There are ten Democrat toss-up seats, including seats in California, Maine, New York, Ohio and Texas.
This means it could be an unbelievably close election — at best — for Democrats. And there is the significant possibility that if redistricting occurs in Texas, the Republicans will retain the House.
<div class="image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-974957 aligncenter" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp" alt="DailyWire+" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1024x171.webp 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-300x50.webp 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-768x128.webp 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-1536x256.webp 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/511983dad25841c8b1ec058d75769bbe-2048x341.webp 2048w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></div>
Democrat chances right now are plummeting. Part of that is because they have no narrative whatsoever. They have major problems.
They trotted out their “No Kings” protest over the weekend. They got roughly seven million people to show up. But the salient point about gigantic mass protests like this is if they have no crossover appeal, it makes no difference at all.
If you look at the popular vote in 2024, you’ll notice that Kamala Harris won 75 million votes. Getting seven million Kamala Harris voters out into the streets to be angry at President Trump doesn&#8217;t mean anything. It&#8217;s less than 1/10 of the number of people who actually voted for Kamala Harris.
How many registered independents or Republicans were at the “No Kings” protest? The answer is: close to zero.
Thus, it&#8217;s just all performative outrage for the Democrats. They are hoping in the end that they have higher voter enthusiasm in 2026 than Republicans do. Evidence of that exists, but it is starting to wane.
There is some evidence that Democrats are animated to vote. In excess of 70% of Democrats are saying they are animated to vote in 2026; for Republicans the numbers are in the mid-50s, but those numbers are likely to close before the election.
The more performative Democrats look, the more they seem tired and gray and old and with nothing in the tank.
For example, there’s Nancy Pelosi, who&#8217;s now 176 years-old and remembers the Battle of Antietam in the Civil War. Well, she made a little video for social media where she broke a crown in order to show there were no kings. This is a lady who has been in Congress longer than most kings reign on their thrones and is worth over $100 million. And she is going to be talking about the oligarchs and the kings, dentures a-clacking?
MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace, from the fan network for the “No Kings” rallies, said the thing about this opposition is that it&#8217;s “led by the people.” 
No, it&#8217;s not. It&#8217;s an opposition led by a bunch of grassroots astroturf organizations like labor unions and the Communist Party USA.
If you can find me ten people — we&#8217;re now doing the biblical story of Sodom and Gomorrah here — if you can find me ten people in the crowds who were registered Republicans and voted for Donald Trump in the last election cycle, I will be very, very surprised.
Rep. Jamie Raskin also tried to make all of this into some sort of gigantic popular uprising, saying, “This is right now the largest set of demonstrations that&#8217;s ever occurred in American history. I don&#8217;t know that there&#8217;s ever been seven million people who have assembled in unity against an administration that has been so determined to violate the civil rights and civil liberties of the people, usurp the powers of Congress, and trampled the Constitution as well as shut down the U.S. government.” 
The idea that this is a gigantic popular uprising is betrayed by the polls. There is no evidence that President Trump is in any serious trouble here. He seems to be absolutely Teflon right now.
Trump knows this, and he&#8217;s enjoying it. President Trump put out a viral video via Truth Social of him flying his poop jet over the rallies.
Meanwhile, Democrats legitimately can&#8217;t take a joke. Bernie Sanders — the only male “The View” will invite on their show — was outraged over President Trump&#8217;s fake AI poop bomb. He declared, “Trump may be crazy, and he may be a liar. &#8230; I don&#8217;t know what world these guys are living in; the president of the United States dropping feces on an American city.”
Hello? He didn&#8217;t literally drop feces on an American city. He put out an AI video that is legitimately hilarious.
The performative outrage is really something to watch.
Democrats are trying to create havoc with the government shutdown, and people are not panicked. They&#8217;re not feeling the havoc. It isn’t having much of an impact, as Harry Enten on CNN admitted, saying, “The bottom line is this: The first shutdown during Trump&#8217;s first term, 2018/2019, was hurting Donald Trump. This one is not hurting him at all.”
The reason it’s not hurting Trump is because Americans recognize that eventually the shutdown will come to an end, people will get their back pay, and that will be it.
The polls show that Democrats are not gaining any momentum from the shutdown. That’s because until five minutes ago, Democrats always opposed government shutdowns. They wanted the government to continue functioning and running no matter what.
So that’s a losing issue for them, too.
President Trump is having a great time.
And it looks as though it will continue for a while.
* * *
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TOPSHOT-US-POLITICS

The Democrats Have Big Problems. No Wonder Trump Is Smiling.

2026 Midterms

Ben Shapiro

Donald Trump

Elections

Opinion

Real Clear Politics

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Politics

CNN’s chief data analyst warned on Wednesday that the Democrats were quickly losing ground — and a lot of it — in their battle to retake control of the House of Representatives after the 2026 midterm elections.
Harry Enten joined anchor Kate Bolduan on CNN News Central, where he broke down the latest polls and addressed the possibility that Republicans — who currently have the slimmest of majorities in the House — could remain in control of the lower chamber after 2026.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Democrats&#8217; chance of taking the House in 2026 have plummeted, while GOP chances have skyrocketed over the last 6 months&#8230;
Why?
1. Dems aren&#8217;t keeping up with the pace they set in 2017 on the generic ballot.
2. GOP may be looking at big gains from mid-decade redistricting. <a href="https://t.co/iauGwkTmp2">pic.twitter.com/iauGwkTmp2</a>
— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) <a href="https://twitter.com/ForecasterEnten/status/1978469463415755117?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 15, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
“If you go back six months ago, you go back to April, Kate Bolduan, what were we looking at?” Enten began. “Well, we were looking at the Democrats with a very clear shot at taking control of the U.S. House of Representatives, according to the Kalshi prediction market odds. We saw them with an 83% chance. But those odds have gone plummeting down — now we’re talking about just a 63% chance while the GOP’s chances, up like a rocket … up from 17% to now a 37% chance.”
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“So what looked like a pretty clear, likely Democratic win in the House come next year has become much closer to a toss-up at this point, although still slightly leaning Democratic,” he added.
When Bolduan asked him to explain what was going wrong, he noted that Democrats were not gaining ground the way they did during the 2017 run-up to President Donald Trump’s first midterm elections in 2018. They also discussed the potential impact of new district maps that so far appear to favor Republicans.
The party in power — in this case, the Republican Party — typically loses seats during midterm elections, but that is not always the case. Most notably, then-President George W. Bush saw a gain of eight House seats and two Senate seats in 2002. By 2006, the political wind had changed dramatically, however, and he saw massive losses: Democrats gained 32 House seats and six Senate seats, taking control of both chambers for the last two years of Bush’s presidency.

Protesters Demonstrate In Philadelphia During The Democratic National Convention

‘Odds Have Gone Plummeting Down’: CNN Data Guru Says Democrat Hopes Of Flipping House Are Fading

CNN Data Guru Says Democrat Hopes Of Flipping House Are Fading

CNN data guru Harry Enten broke down the major issues facing American voters as the 2026 midterm elections approach, and on nearly every issue, he had more bad news for Democrats.
Enten laid out the latest numbers on everything from crime to the economy to immigration — and had to pause to exclaim, &#8220;My goodness gracious!&#8221; — as he asked Democrats what they were doing to change the trajectory of their party.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
🚨NEW: CNN&#8217;s Harry Enten spells out GOP *ADVANTAGES* in midterms🚨
&#8220;Who leads on the economy? Republicans by 7! Immigration? Republicans by 13! How about crime? A big issue for Donald Trump and the Republicans. Look at that: lead by 22 points!&#8221;
&#8220;What are you doing, Democrats!?… <a href="https://t.co/iSRxpatIFS">pic.twitter.com/iSRxpatIFS</a>
— Jason Cohen 🇺🇸 (@JasonJournoDC) <a href="https://twitter.com/JasonJournoDC/status/1970144855318823058?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 22, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Enten spoke with anchor Kate Bolduan about the state of things, and he got more and more animated as he laid out the split between the parties on each additional issue.
&#8220;What are we seeing? You know, Donald Trump being underwater, Democrats are, &#8216;oh, this guarantees us, we&#8217;re gonna fly high in the midterms.&#8217; Let me tell you, this guarantees you nothing. Nothing. Because at this particular point, the Democrats are the New Orleans Saints of political parties,&#8221; Enten said, invoking the 0-and-3 record of the Louisiana NFL team.
&#8220;What are we talking about?&#8221; Enten went on to show which party Americans trusted more to handle major issues. &#8220;Trust the Dems or the GOP more on the economy? Who leads on the economy? Republicans by 7! Immigration? Republicans by 13! How about crime? A big issue for Donald Trump and the Republicans. Look at that: lead by 22 points!&#8221;
&#8220;So the bottom line is this,&#8221; he declared. &#8220;At this particular point, the ball may be on the ground, but the Democrats have not picked up the ball and run with it. If anything, at this particular point, it&#8217;s the Republicans who are running with the ball on the top issues: the economy, immigration, and crime.&#8221;
Bolduan asked Enten to make a comparison between the current polling and the polling ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, when Republicans gained control of the U.S. House of Representatives.
&#8220;This kind of gives away the game,&#8221; Enten observed as he noted that Republicans had been ahead on the same issues in 2022: they were up by 12 points on the economy, by 3 points on immigration, and by 13 points on crime.
Enten noted that while the Republican lead on the economy was slightly lower, the party&#8217;s lead on the two other major issues had grown by wider margins.
&#8220;How about immigration? It was Republicans by three back in 2022,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Look at this! The Republican lead&#8217;s actually gone up by ten points. What are you doing, Democrats?! My goodness gracious! And on crime, Republicans were up by 13, now they&#8217;re up by 22, their lead again expanding by nearly double digits!&#8221;
&#8220;So whatever Democrats are doing, it ain&#8217;t working, Kate!&#8221; Enten exclaimed.

Political Parties Photo Illustrations

Why Even CNN’s Analyst Thinks GOP Has Upper Hand In Midterm

A <a href="https://insideradvantage.com/trump-approval-surges-post-summit-54-44-all-voters-under-65-years-of-age-approve-older-voters-not-so-much/">new survey</a> shows that Trump&#8217;s approval ratings increased after his recent summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin last Friday, giving him majority approval in all age demographics except those over 65.
The survey, conducted by InsiderAdvantage on August 15-17, found that 54% of respondents approved of Trump, while 44% expressed disapproval. Separated by age group, 57% of respondents in the 18-39 and 39-64 demographics approved of the president, compared to 40% of respondents 65 and over.
Trump’s ratings are also up among black and hispanic respondents, according to polling analyst Matt Towery.
The results come amid Trump’s efforts to broker peace in Ukraine. The president met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other European leaders at the White House Monday, in a more friendly and productive meeting than Zelensky’s last Oval Office visit.
InsiderAdvantage has a least-biased rating from <a href="https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/insideradvantage-bias-and-credibility/">Media Bias</a>, and was rated as one of the top ten polling services covering general elections from 2014-2022 by <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/rcp-pollster-scorecard/multiple-state/">RealClearPolitics</a>, coming ahead of several legacy media outlets and YouGov.
These new numbers are at <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/polls/donald-trump-approval-rating-polls.html">odds</a> with many recent polls, which claim a negative approval rating. In a Pew Research Center poll from the beginning of August, 38% of respondents expressed approval and 60% disapproval.
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The surge in public approval comes in the wake of Trump’s Alaska <a href="https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/trump-calls-ukraine-talks-with-putin-very-productive-9095220">summit</a> with Putin last Friday, in which Trump attempted to draft a peace agreement with Putin to end the war in Ukraine. Trump called the meeting “very productive.”
&#8220;We had an extremely productive meeting, and many points were agreed to. There are just a very few that are left. We didn&#8217;t get there, but we have a very good chance of getting there,” Trump told reporters in a bilateral press briefing after the summit.
U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ukraine-russia-steve-witkoff-nato-security-guarantees/">announced</a> on Sunday that Putin made an unprecedented concession during the summit, agreeing to allow the U.S. and European nations to provide security guarantees to Ukraine in a hypothetical peace deal.
“We got to an agreement that the United States and other European nations could effectively offer Article 5-like language to cover a security guarantee,” Witkoff <a href="https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/trump-putin-zelensky-ukraine-news-08-17-25#cmefqp88u000n3b6qsap1u79b">told</a> Jake Tapper on “State of the Union.”
Witkoff said it was the “first time we had ever heard the Russians agree” to such a provision.

Trump’s Approval Rating Spikes Amid Ukraine Peacemaking Efforts, New Poll Finds

Job Approval

Trump Administration

CNN&#8217;s chief data analyst said on Monday that the numbers don&#8217;t lie: the Democrat and media driven pressure campaign to use the late convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein&#8217;s case as a weapon against President Donald Trump is falling flat.
Harry Enten broke down the polling during a segment with anchor Kate Bolduan, telling her that persistent efforts to tie Trump to his administration&#8217;s handling of case had failed to do any real damage. &#8220;This is, from at least a political point of view, quickly turning into a dud of a story,&#8221; he said.
WATCH:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
The Epstein saga is becoming a political dud &amp; nothingburger.
-Google searches for Epstein are down 89% from just 3 weeks ago. 
-Trump&#8217;s approval rating is holding steady &amp; much higher than term 1 at this point in his presidency 
-Less than 1% say it&#8217;s the nation&#8217;s top issue <a href="https://t.co/rnp2M8qzdf">pic.twitter.com/rnp2M8qzdf</a>
— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) <a href="https://twitter.com/ForecasterEnten/status/1954908048184459444?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 11, 2025</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;Take a look here, Google searches for Epstein down 89% versus just three weeks ago, falling through the floor! It is no longer the top term searched alongside Donald Trump’s name,&#8221; Enten explained. &#8220;That’s been trading off between tariffs and Vladimir Putin with obviously the meeting coming up later this week. But at this particular point, the American people’s interest in this story, it’s quickly becoming something of a nothingburger.&#8221;
Bolduan pressed him on overall polling, asking whether there was any indication that support for Trump was waning in reaction to his administration&#8217;s handling of the case and the related files that have not yet been released.
&#8220;No, not really,&#8221; Enten replied. &#8220;I mean, take a look here. Let’s take a look at the overall numbers. Trump’s approval rating in July of 2025, it was 45%. It’s still well within that margin of error here at 44%. And you compare that to where he was in his first term at this point, he was at 37%. So he’s seven points higher, very much in a different political universe now, significantly higher in terms of his overall approval rating than he was at this point in his first term.&#8221;
&#8220;And more than that, among Republicans, his approval rating is near a record high, hovering right at about that 90% mark,&#8221; Enten added. &#8220;So no, he hasn’t lost any of that base. And when it comes to that center of the electorate, he’s basically holding on there. And his overall approval rating, 44%, is pretty gosh darn good for him, considering where he was at this point in term number one.&#8221;

President Trump Hosts Phillipines President Marcos At The White House

‘A Nothingburger!’: CNN Data Whiz Tells Dems Their Epstein Gamble Was A ‘Total Dud’

'A Nothingburger!': CNN Data Whiz Tells Dems Their Epstein Gamble Was A 'Total Dud'

Jeffrey Epstein

I lock my front door every night. Not because I despise the families who live down the street, but because I cherish the three sleeping heads under my roof.
That impulse — to guard what we love — lies at the heart of the conservative case for a secure border. Too often, we let opponents cast us as people against something (immigrants) when, in fact, we’re actually: for our children’s safety, for working-class wages, for the fragile civic glue that lets strangers treat one another like neighbors.
Polling shows the <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2024/02/15/how-americans-view-the-u-s-mexico-border-situation-and-the-governments-handling-of-the-issue/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">mainstream agrees</a>. Eighty percent of Americans, including a majority of Democrats, say Washington is mishandling the migrant surge, and immigration now tops Gallup’s <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/611135/immigration-surges-top-important-problem-list.aspx" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“most important problem”</a> list.
Conservatives are right to sound the alarm. We just need to explain that we&#8217;re doing so out of a sense of stewardship, not spite.
History backs the prudence of timed, purposeful immigration. During the American Revolution, foreign-born allies such as <a href="https://www.history.com/articles/6-foreign-born-heroes-of-the-american-revolution" target="_blank" rel="noopener">France’s Lafayette and Prussia’s von Steuben</a> arrived with artillery drills, engineering skills, and diplomatic muscle that an infant republic simply lacked; without them, Yorktown’s surrender may never have come. The young nation welcomed outsiders for a specific mission: win independence and teach the citizen army how to march, aim, and dig trenches.
Fast-forward to the wreckage after Appomattox. The Civil War killed more than 600,000 Americans and scorched the rail lines meant to reunite the continent. Rebuilding demanded manpower the battered South and draft-depleted North no longer possessed. Thousands of Irish and German laborers <a href="https://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?psid=3147&amp;smtID=2&amp;utm_" target="_blank" rel="noopener">laid the ties and pounded the spikes</a> of the transcontinental railroad, knitting markets back together and jump-starting a devastated economy. Immigration in that moment was not charity. It was the scaffolding of national recovery.
The same pattern repeated when smokestacks crowded city skylines. By 1920, immigrants and their children supplied <a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2760060/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">over half of all manufacturing workers</a> — two-thirds if you count grandchildren — allowing American factories to roar at a scale native labor alone could not have matched. The message is clear: when the nation needs fresh shoulders, controlled immigration can be a patriotic tool.
Yet prudence also means knowing when the job is done. After the industrial boom settled, Congress judged the house full and passed the <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1921-1936/immigration-act" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Johnson-Reed Act of 1924</a>, limiting visas to 2% of each nationality’s 1890 population, and virtually closing the door to Asia. Even a country famous for welcoming immigrants understood that unending inflows can outrun assimilation, depress wages, and strain public trust.
We are living through another such inflection point. The crisis is not a shortage of bodies but a shortage of babies. America’s fertility rate hovers well below replacement while housing prices, classroom head counts, and entitlement programs all creak under existing loads. Before we import millions more people, we should ask why so many citizens feel they cannot afford to start or grow a family.
Conservatives aren’t anti-immigrant. We are pro-family, pro-fairness, and pro-order.
When we do invite guests, we open the front entrance — offering lawful visas to people who follow the rules — rather than waving strangers through a broken window. Securing the southern border, finishing reliable fencing, and speeding up deportations for criminals are not acts of hostility but of hospitality rightly ordered. They protect wages for citizens at the bottom rung, preserve classroom resources for kids who are already falling behind, and honor the millions who waited in line.
Positive reform flows from the same ethic. Conservatives can champion faster asylum rulings so genuine refugees are sheltered quickly while false claims end swiftly. We can simplify legal work visas tied to market demand, not political patronage, and insist those visas come with a date certain to go home or a clear path to stay that includes English proficiency, tax compliance, and civic education. We can tighten E-Verify so employers cannot undercut American labor, and we can steer foreign aid toward church-based charities that fight cartel terror in place — reducing the push factors long before migrants reach the Rio Grande.
The test for our movement is tone. Instead of saying, “We’re against immigration,” say, “We’re for the American worker, for the rule of law, for assimilation strong enough to turn strangers into compatriots.” Tell the single mom in El Paso that a porous border lets fentanyl and traffickers hunt her kids. Tell the legal immigrant in Phoenix that respecting the line he stood in is an act of justice. Tell the Honduran father that a stable, self-confident United States is the best gift we can offer the world, because chaos here would slam every golden door shut.
Someday my children will ask what we did with the inheritance our grandparents secured — ordered liberty, decent wages, a common language of rights and responsibilities. I want to tell them we acted as guardians, not gatekeepers; that we said “yes” to a future large enough for newcomers and natives, but only after we repaired the foundation already cracking beneath our feet.
Conservatives are right on immigration because we refuse to trade short-term sentiment for long-term stability. We are not building a wall of hate; we are stewarding a border of love. And love, like any good father knows, sometimes says “stop” today so it can say “welcome” tomorrow.
Gates Garcia is the host of the YouTube show and podcast “We The People.” Follow him on Instagram and X @GatesGarciaFL.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

American flag

Conservatives Are Right On Immigration. We Just Need To Say It Better. 

Conservatives

Illegal Immigration

Southern Border

Some people are panicking over supposed polls showing President Trump&#8217;s decreased popularity.
Let&#8217;s get real for just one second.
The actual statistics on President Trump&#8217;s popularity are about where they have always been. According to <a href="https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/trump-approval-rating-poll-july-2025-745b0f5f?gaa_at=eafs&amp;gaa_n=ASWzDAi7o-T3QohHurCs8gB7kYhonkehk3eAwLpJ0djywO3zXVNFdEtRQ3msqU38xm4%3D&amp;gaa_ts=6883def5&amp;gaa_sig=9CU2GWrCdhEPcIZoYbt_JZ1EO4f0ZLQ5w8XKrmUIKxpS46ZZU3Wycx1Y3mQxSrk-Vd5IqwCAzXLHfEqGwbfxeQ%3D%3D">The Wall Street Journal</a>:
<blockquote>Buoyed by voters’ improving views of the economy, President Trump’s political standing is showing notable resilience, a new Wall Street Journal poll finds, despite the unpopularity of the GOP’s big tax-and-spending law, dissatisfaction with Trump’s tariff plan and high suspicion that the government is hiding important information about its investigation into Jeffrey Epstein. &#8230; Some 46% approve of his job performance—unchanged from April—with 52% disapproving.</blockquote>
Eighty-eight percent of GOP voters approve of his job performance, and 66% strongly approve.
This means that President Trump’s support is durable, and that’s because life in the United States is as good or better than it was back in February or March. That’s the real reason we have not seen the sort of economic collapse many people were predicting, largely because Trump backed off of many of the tariff rates he was pushing on Liberation Day.
Instead, we’re seeing trade deals brokered by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. As I have said before, President Trump is not “chickening out” by backing off the tariffs. He is responding to reality.
Life in the United States is safer because President Trump took concerted and brave action in bombing the Iranian nuclear facilities, despite actual panic in the Republican Party, suggesting that such an action would lead to World War III. Not only did that not happen, it put Iran on its back foot in a serious way, and may completely reshape the Middle East.
A lot of people freaked out about the one “Big, Beautiful Bill.” But the reality — for those of us who actually have been following politics longer than five minutes — is that all of the concern over deficit spending in the one big, beautiful bill must have been ignoring the fact that the deficit in the United States has been blowing up for decades, and that the one big, beautiful bill did not change that trajectory in any way except a little bit downward.
That’s because in order for that bill to radically increase the debt and the deficit, you would have to assume the Obama tax rates from 2015 would snap back into place, which was not going to happen. Republicans were not going to let that happen.
Why is all of this important? Because the American people and the markets have gotten used to separating the wheat from the chaff when it comes to President Trump&#8217;s policies — which is the best way of looking at a president, not just the stuff that he says, particularly President Trump, but the stuff that he actually does.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-2246-showdown-trump-vs-powell?elementPosition=0&amp;row=0&amp;rowHeadline=The+Ben+Shapiro+Show&amp;rowType=Horizontal+Show+Episodes+Carousel">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
On Thursday, there was an outsized focus on a tete-a-tete between President Trump and Jerome Powell, Chairman of the Federal Reserve. The president took his criticisms directly to Powell at the Federal Reserve. It made for good TV. He went to tour the construction happening at the Federal Reserve building — a $2.5 billion renovation of two historic buildings designated as part of the Federal Reserve headquarters.
Trump suggested Powell is overspending on the rebuilding of the Federal Reserve.
Trump said that costs have gone up. Powell openly disagreed.
In a normal era, people might panic over this because the president of the United States was chiding the Federal Reserve chair, in front of everyone, about these alleged construction overruns.
Trump was asked, “What would you do if you&#8217;re leading a construction project and somebody went into cost overruns?” 

Trump said, “I&#8217;d fire him.”
Anyone who thinks that Trump was making a serious threat is incorrect. That’s why the stock market did not react with panic.
The reason he&#8217;s not going to fire Powell is because the markets would freak out. And President Trump does not want the markets to freak out.
There are people on the Left that I know who were quite freaked out about President Trump being elected: “Oh, my God, it’s going to be the end of the world. He&#8217;s so crazy.”
I always say to them that there&#8217;s a beauty to the American constitutional system, and that system will blunt most of the stuff that isn’t good; if he or anyone else ever tried to subvert the Constitution, the judiciary would stop them.
The judiciary has done that. They&#8217;ve told President Trump many times not to do something, and then he has abided by the judicial rulings. In many cases, he&#8217;s been right, and the Supreme Court has ruled in his favor after a lower court did the wrong thing.
But there&#8217;s something else about President Trump that is unique: when he runs up against the guardrails of reality, he steps back from the brink.
And so when it comes to Jerome Powell — and again, there&#8217;s a lot of outsized panic in the commentary about Trump and Powell — he&#8217;s not going to touch Powell. And that’s because if he were to do so, the markets would react badly. And Trump does not want the markets to react badly.
So that&#8217;s what reduces the incident to the level of vaudevillian slapstick comedy.
The important thing again about President Trump is that he pursues heterodox policies. He&#8217;s breaking a lot of the stalemate that has characterized Washington, D.C., and a lot of the traditionalist thinking that has characterized Washington, D.C., on everything from economics to executive policy to the Middle East.
President Trump likes to break things, and many of those things deserve to be broken.
But President Trump also understands that if he is about to irrevocably break anything that is going to hurt him politically, he just won’t do it.

U.S. President Donald Trump Visits Scotland For Golfing Getaway

Trump’s Enduring Support And Strategic Restraint

Federal Reserve

Iran Airstrike

Jerome Powell

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Democrats expecting another &#8220;blue wave&#8221; in 2026 should &#8220;hold the phone,&#8221; CNN&#8217;s chief data analyst warned this week, revealing that the party&#8217;s generic ballot advantage has collapsed to less than half of what it was before their historic midterm victories in 2006 and 2018.
CNN data guru Harry Enten delivered the “reality check” to Democrats in a Wednesday CNN segment, noting their current two-point lead pales in comparison to the seven-point advantage they held at this stage before previous wave elections.
“Their lead is less than half, less than half of where it was in either 2017 or 2005 in July of those years – the year before the midterm election,” Enten said, noting that democrats had a generic ballot lead of 7 points in both the 2005 and 2017 midterms, respectively, compared to just 2 points in the leadup to 2026.
The data paints a drastically different picture than what many Democrats might hope for heading into the midterms.
&#8220;Yes, Donald Trump may be unpopular, but Democrats have not come anywhere close to sealing the deal at this particular point,&#8221; Enten told CNN host John Berman, adding that Republicans are &#8220;still very much in the game&#8221; for control of Congress.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Reality check: Dems are way behind their 2006 &amp; 2018 pace on the generic ballot at this point in the cycle.
Ahead by only 2 pt vs. 7 pt in 2006/2018 cycles.
Seat-by-seat analysis actually reveals more GOP pickup opportunities than Dems! Very much unlike 2006 &amp; 2018 at this pt. <a href="https://t.co/CRgXukTjz6">pic.twitter.com/CRgXukTjz6</a>
&mdash; (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) <a href="https://twitter.com/ForecasterEnten/status/1945492536836993510?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 16, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Enten noted this election cycle more closely resembles 2024 than either of the previous Democratic wave years, telling viewers expecting a Democratic sweep to &#8220;hold the phone.&#8221;
&#8220;At this particular point, this election cycle looks a lot more like 2024 than it does than either 2018 or 2006,&#8221; Enten said based on recent polling from Ipsos and other organizations.
The CNN data guru notes that the Cook Political Report&#8217;s seat-by-seat analysis actually reveals more pickup opportunities for Republicans than Democrats, at a projected net gain of +12 for the GOP.
In July 2017, Cook projected a net gain of +33 for democrats, and they ended up picking up 41 House seats during the 2018 midterms of Trump’s first term.
Midterm elections have historically served as a referendum on the party controlling the White House, and in only one instance in the past half century has the president’s party both held the House going in and managed to keep it: the 2002 midterms, following the 9/11 attacks.
The 2024 election, which Enten cited as most similar to current trends, saw Republicans maintain their House majority, with Democrats netting just a single seat — a stark contrast to the 31 and 41 House seats Democrats captured in the 2006 and 2018 wave elections.

119th Congress Begins Its Term On Capitol Hill

CNN Data Chief Shatters ‘Blue Wave’ Hype: Democrats’ 2026 Lead ‘Less Than Half’ Of Past Midterms

Congress

News

For years, the diplomats and pundits who inhabit Washington have painted the MAGA movement as “isolationist.” And while they correctly identify MAGA’s antipathy for spending money on bloated international bureaucracies, they typically get its actual foreign policy preferences entirely wrong.
This caricature doesn’t survive statistical scrutiny. According to new polls from the Ronald Reagan Institute and the Vandenberg Coalition, MAGA voters overwhelmingly reject withdrawing from the world stage. In fact, a whopping 73% of MAGA Republicans want the United States to be more engaged overseas — beating out Democrats at 65% and non-MAGA Republicans at 59%.
The Vandenberg polling shows the same trend: 80% of MAGA voters support America taking a leadership role in global affairs, and 87% back increasing military spending to keep the United States strong.
Nowhere are these preferences clearer than in Europe. The Left loves to characterize the MAGA movement as soft on Russia and dismissive of NATO. But a majority (76%) of MAGA Republicans say the United States should defend NATO allies if they’re attacked by Russia. That’s a firm commitment to deterrence, not a giveaway to Vladimir Putin.
Even more striking, Reagan Institute data show nearly six in 10 Republicans, including MAGA voters, support increasing the U.S. military presence in Eastern Europe despite years of freeloading off the American taxpayer. MAGA supporters see how President Donald Trump pushed NATO countries to spend more on their own defense and succeeded. The MAGA movement is not abandoning allies–it’s seeking to strengthen them by pushing them to carry their fair share of the security burden.
China is where MAGA voters are sounding the loudest alarm — and for good reason. They don’t view the Chinese Communist Party as a distant strategic competitor but as a direct threat to the homeland.
According to the Reagan Institute’s new data, 91% of MAGA voters are “extremely” or “somewhat” concerned about Chinese land purchases near American military bases, 89% are concerned about CCP-linked companies like TikTok spying on Americans, and 86% are concerned about military-age Chinese men entering the U.S. illegally. They intuitively understand what many in Washington still downplay: that the CCP is infiltrating our society, stealing our data, manipulating public discourse, and using every tool of economic and political influence to weaken America from within.
That urgency extends to China’s global ambitions: Vandenberg polling shows that 84% of MAGA voters say it’s extremely important for the U.S. to maintain superiority over China in military, economic, and technological power. MAGA voters don’t value more summits or empty gestures. They want a strategy that defends our borders, counters CCP espionage, reclaims our technological advantage, and confronts China’s aggression head-on.
That same clarity extends to Taiwan. Once MAGA voters consider what’s at stake — control of the world’s semiconductor supply, protection of vital sea lanes, and preservation of American credibility — 84% say the United States should defend Taiwan if China invades. They know that if America retreats, our enemies advance — and global chaos fills the vacuum.
MAGA voters are even more focused on the Iran threat. Recent polling lists preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon as one of MAGA voters’ top national security concerns — second only to illegal immigration at the southern border.
An overwhelming 90% of MAGA voters say this issue directly impacts American security and prosperity — and that was before President Trump’s strikes on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. After those strikes, 74% of MAGA conservatives said they would support additional military action, and 68% said the world is now safer because of them. A staggering 92% agree it is extremely important to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.
For decades, American foreign policy was mired in either overextension or half-measures, endless negotiations, and failed attempts to buy peace. That record eroded the American people’s appetite for deploying power overseas. But they watched in dismay as the Biden Administration acted with weakness, unfreezing billions of dollars in Iranian assets, ignoring proxy attacks on U.S. troops, and groveling for a nuclear deal. President Trump, by contrast, has shown what it means to project strength without starting wars.
MAGA voters don’t want to remake the world in the United States’ image. They want a foreign policy that puts American security first, prioritizes deterrence, and uses force sparingly but decisively.
This worldview rejects the false choice between interventionism and isolationism. It’s a foreign policy grounded in the prudent use of American power. MAGA voters are asking for an alternative to Biden’s weakness: a foreign policy rooted in sovereignty and strength.  They want a foreign policy through which our enemies fear us, our allies respect us, and deterrence protects us — and a foreign policy that never apologizes for putting America First.
Yousif Kalian is a Policy Advisor at POLARIS National Security. He has over a decade of experience advancing U.S. interests in the Middle East and Eurasia.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

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