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Looking far ahead at how the 2028 presidential nominations will line up, former Republican party campaign consultant Matthew Dowd predicted Donald Trump will, in all likelihood, put his party in an awful bind.

Reacting to accusations that the president is attempting to "freeze" the field as he flirts with running for a third term despite constitutional prohibitions, Dowd suggested Trump would wait to the last minute to pick his successor, thereby leaving the GOP leadership stuck with whomever he anoints.

Speaking with host Alex Witt on MSNBC, Dowd followed up comments that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-NY) couldn't beat Trump but matched up well with Vice President J.D. Vance.

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"It's primarily about the grift," he began. "That's the first point of it. But he is freezing the field, one, by virtue of his enormous personality and sway in getting media attention. But he does make other Republicans sort of stop and not do anything in the course of this."

"And I think that's part of his plan because Donald Trump doesn't want to be viewed as sort of the lame duck," he elaborated. "'We're going to to move on, we're going to have another leader emerge.' And I think he's going to try to push that as long as possible."

"I don't think there's any way in anybody's mind that he can constitutionally run, it's specifically forbidden in the Constitution," he claimed. " I think secretaries of states in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Colorado, any number of states won't allow him on the ballot and will be supported by the courts in that. But i think it does put the Republicans in an awful position because they can't come up with their next leader."

He added. "And I think what allows Donald Trump to do is lay his hands on the last, on the last minute, on somebody, and then it puts them in an awful position of them having to rally around a one person that he lays his hands on in the final minute of this, and that's problematic."

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Newsmax hosts made an hourly plea over the weekend for viewers to "vote" in an unscientific online poll after a Fox News survey showed that President Donald Trump's approval rate was plummeting.

"Well, not sure if you saw the news, but Fox News is claiming President Trump is actually declining in the polls," the announcement from Newsmax anchors said nearly hourly on Sunday. "President Trump responded and said Fox News polls cannot be trusted."

Fox News host Rich Edson warned Oklahoma Superintendent of Schools Ryan Walters that he was "opening the door" for Satanism by pushing for religious-based charter schools.

In a Sunday interview, Walters defended his call for the U.S. Supreme Court to find in favor of taxpayers funding a Catholic charter school.

U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders led congressional progressives on Friday in condemning the Trump administration's arrest of a county judge in Wisconsin for allegedly helping an undocumented man evade capture by federal immigration agents.

FBI agents arrested 65-year-old Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan, who faces felony charges of obstruction and concealing an individual, whom she is accused of giving refuge in her chambers as federal officers sought to arrest him.

Rep. James Comer (R-KY), chairman of the House Oversight Committee, accused President Donald Trump's administration of stonewalling his requests for files about accused child trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

During a weekend interview with Sharyl Attkisson, Comer talked about his Task Force on the Declassification of Federal Secrets, which is looking at the Epstein files, President John F. Kennedy's assassination, the Sept. 11 attacks, and other conspiracy theories.

According to CNN data analyst Harry Enten, House Republicans should be exceedingly alarmed at Donald Trump's "terrible" new polling numbers unless they want to be out of a job after the 2026 midterms.

Sitting on the "Inside Politics" panel with host Jessica Dean, Enten insisted an approval number like Trump's current 41 percent will "doom" GOP lawmakers.

Dean prompted her CNN colleague with, "In these midterms, it's going to be these House, all House members that are going to be on the ballot. iI's going to be these congressional members that are going to have to face the consequences and Trump, Harry, he's not going to have to."

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"He's not going to have to," Enten agreed. " But I'll tell you, there is pretty much zero chance, if Donald Trump's approval rating is 41 percent in November of 2026, the Republicans have any shot of holding the House of Representatives."

He emphasized, "There is no, I repeat, there is no precedent for a president's approval rating being as low as Donald Trump's is right now and then his party holding on to the House in the midterm elections."

"We were talking about it yesterday," he recalled. "I mean, when you look at approval ratings this low, this early, you look at where the generic ballot is this low this early, that usually spells doom for the president's party when it comes to midterm elections."

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Fox News host Howard Kurtz expressed outrage at criticism over a makeup studio that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had installed at the Pentagon.

"Here's a story that I think is complete and total BS," Kurtz said on Sunday. "And that is about Hegseth wanting a makeup room at the Pentagon. Now, if you think about it, I mean, there was some question about how much it would cost, and they scaled it back."

Kari Lake, a special advisor to the United States Agency for Global Media (USAGM), insisted that she was happy to put herself out of a job if it meant significantly downsizing the Voice of America and other agencies.

During a Sunday interview on Fox News, host Maria Bartiromo asked Lake if the U.S. Supreme Court would hear cases against President Donald Trump's administration.

Donald Trump Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins found herself desperately searching her memory on CNN for one trade deal the president has pulled off when asked about his boast in a Time magazine interview.

Appearing on CNN's "State of the Union," with host Dana Bash, the very talkative Rollins responded to a question about Trump's much derided "200 deals" boast that has since fallen apart by promising something might be coming soon.

"The president told Time magazine, quote, 'I have made 200 deals," Bash pointed out to her guest. "He didn't give us any details about what those could be, what countries he's talking about. Has he actually inked any trade deals and with whom?"

ALSO READ:'We’ve made a mistake': Trump’s trade war sends GOP into frenzy

Rollins first pivoted to an earlier discussion about the price of eggs –– a hot topic in the 2024 election –– which led host Bash to interrupt with, "Let's focus on the trade and on the deals."

"Yes, for sure," Rollins replied. "On the deals, we have 100 countries that are knocking on the door, I believe. I'm not in the room, I'm not negotiating the trade deals, but my understanding is we should have several this week that are coming forward that are very, very close."

" China is a very important one," he quickly added. "Every day we are in conversation with China, along with those other 99 countries that have come to the table. Many countries have already flown to Washington and are meeting with [Commerce] Secretary Lutnick, meeting with [Treasury] Secretary Bessent, meeting with our USTR Jamison Greer. And there is a tremendous amount of progress on all fronts that we'll see again more this week."