Some of President Donald Trump's supporters, including possibly his own vice president, are showing signs of regret, according to a New York Times columnist.
A recent poll shows some Trump voters are unhappy with his handling of immigration, his signature issue, and Republican Senators Josh Hawley (R-MO) and Thom Tillis (R-NC) have each expressed disappointment with the president's agenda, with Tillis deciding to retire and Hawley introducing legislation to reverse the cuts to Medicaid that he'd just endorsed in Trump's megabill, wrote Times columnist Frank Bruni.
"It redefines the flip-flop," Bruni wrote. "And reeks of regret."
Conspiracy theorists have also been jolted by Trump's command to drop their questions about the Jeffrey Epstein case, and even Vice President JD Vance seems exhausted by his responsibilities.
"As the tawdry twists in the Epstein tale keep coming, Trump’s most obliged defenders are being driven to exhaustion," Bruni wrote. "Vice President JD Vance responded to The Wall Street Journal’s report that Trump had once written and doodled a special smutty, predators-in-arms birthday greeting to Epstein with a social media post that asked: 'Does anyone honestly believe this sounds like Donald Trump?'"
"Does anyone honestly believe it doesn’t?" Bruni added. "We’re talking Mr. Grab-Them-By-The-You-Know-What here. And Vance is giving off more than a whiff of panic, which is kissing cousins with regret."
It's not uncommon for voters to experience buyer's remorse, but Bruni said Trump's allies should have known better before tying their fortunes to his.
"Theirs was a willed gullibility — they have always known deep down who Trump is," Bruni wrote. "They wagered that they could live with that. They made a Faustian bargain, abetting him so that he didn’t eviscerate them. They just didn’t understand the full price they’d pay."
Hawley is already trying to undo the Medicaid cuts he approved, and Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) has also called for changes to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act she and her GOP colleagues passed earlier this month.
"Sorry, Senator Murkowski, that patient was dead, and you knew it," Bruni wrote. "Remorse and shame were etched on your face as you sought to explain yourself."
