President Donald Trump has put Republicans in a tough spot ahead of midterm elections — and GOP insiders are starting to acknowledge it behind closed doors, according to reports on Friday.
In a new episode from The Daily Blast, The New Republic's podcast from host Greg Sargent, he reported new polling results have revealed that Trump "is literally the most unpopular U.S. president ever when it comes to gas prices" as questions about the president's corruption have come into the public eye.
"NBC News is reporting that some House Republicans privately admit that Donald Trump and MAGA are now a serious liability in the midterms," The New Republic reported. "They’re in a trap. Republicans can’t decide whether to rely on Trump to turn out his supporters—voters that Republicans very much need—because that risks tying them too closely to the ailing, unpopular president."
Now, Republicans are growing increasingly worried about whether to stand with the president.
"That GOP trap—whether or not to run with Trump—perfectly captures how the GOP’s uncritical embrace of the president is backfiring in just about every way," according to The New Republic.
Sargent cited how the soaring gas prices could determine how Republicans perform in November's midterms, referencing comments from right-leaning economist Douglas Holtz-Eakin from a Washington Post report earlier this week.
"He said that people inside the White House, Republicans in and around the White House, are growing anxious," Sargent reported. "He said, 'They’re very worried.' And then he said this: 'I think there’s no way to sugarcoat that if we don’t get the price of gasoline down, Republicans are toast. It’s really simple.'"
The Bulwark's Mona Charen, host of The Mona Charen Show, added her insights — and whether she thought Republicans could recover from the crushing polls.
"Well, I mean, barring some sort of miracle, it doesn’t seem likely," Charen said. "They always say that prices go up like a rocket and come down like a feather. And so it is hard to get prices down quickly enough. The conventional wisdom is that people make their voting decisions by August of an election year, and pretty much after that it doesn’t much matter—they’ve made up their minds. So we’re in May. Could something happen to bring prices down by August? I’m not going to say it’s impossible. I just think it’s exceedingly unlikely."
She also described how Democrats could use this to their advantage — and how the fight against authoritarianism is far from over.
"As for whether Republicans are toast, I would just say this," Charen added. "In all likelihood, they’re going to have a bad year. Democrats should be doing everything possible to make it a terrible year. But this is going to be a long-term struggle that we are in against illiberalism and quasi-fascism. And it ain’t going to be over in November."