Trump dealt NIGHTMARE NEWS amid ICE shootings

I'm joined now by data driven journalist. and the author of the strengthen numbers. newsletter, Elliot Morris. Elliot, thanks for joining me again. >> Hey, thanks Brian. Happy to be here. Well, as happy as you can be. >> Yeah. Um, so I want to talk a little bit. about what the consequences on Donald. Trump's polling, Republican polling more. broadly that ICE has wrought onto them. So, can you speak a little bit about uh. what we've seen thus far, how the. numbers have shifted as the result of. not just the killing of Renee Good, but. then more recently, if we have any. polling, Alex Prey? Yeah, look, there's.

two big trends I keep coming back to. The first is Donald Trump's approval. rating on immigration. These are. questions that ask the American people, do you approve or disapprove of the. administration's policies? Essentially, um, so this number was plus 10 or so. when Donald Trump took office. So 10. percentage points more Americans said. they approved than disapproved of how he. was handling immigration. That's, I. guess, a good position for a president. to be in. However, it's not the position. he's in anymore. More recent polling has. him closer to minus 10 on average. New.

York Times poll that came out last week. has him at minus7. So it's possible the. ground is also sort of shifting faster. than the average can keep up with. Either way, that's between an 18 and a. 27 uh point fall for the for the. president over the last year. So that's. the first number. The second one I'd. look at is the abolish ICE number. Uh. recently we've gotten a lot more polling. over over this question of whether or. not the entire agency should be defunded. or abolished. Um this was a very. unpopular idea in the 2018 campaign.

People paying attention to politics back. during the blue wave will remember it. was a somewhat fringe idea on the left. especially among progressives. This is. not a fringe idea anymore. In the. polling that I've looked at for uh over. the past 6 months or so, there's been. about a 50 percentage point increase in. the net percent of Americans who approve. of abolishing ICE. It's about plus 5. today, whereas it was minus 50 when. Donald Trump won the last election. So. like we're just not in the same. political environment anymore. If you're. looking at the data, things have.

massively changed over the last year or. so. And in the specific question of. whether or not ICE has been justified in. its use of force against the killing of. say Renee Good and Alex Prey, uh the. polls are overwhelmingly against the ad. administration. Only about 20 or 30. percentage points of Americans are. saying this is a proper use of force. So. basically, however you slice this, this. is a a bad position for the. administration. It's bad policy. People. don't like it. >> I want to talk a little bit about that. New York Times poll. It looks like a lot. of the gains that Trump had made or. virtually all of the gains Trump had.

made in each each individual demographic. group um have been rolled back and then. some. Can you speak on that point a. little bit? >> It's great. Yeah, this this graph is. awesome. If you look at it, it shows. Donald Trump's approval rating in 2020, 2024, and then now in 2025/2026. Um you can see for young people and for. uh for non-whites especially there's. been a dramatic Uturn in support for. Trump among those groups. So in 2020 for. example uh non-white voters I think are. around minus 60. They move towards Trump.

for the 2024 election. Now they're even. more anti-Trump than they were in 2020. before Donald Trump lost the election. you know by four and a half five points. to Joe Biden. Young people same way. They're even more liberal than they were. at this point in 2020 during what we. might call peak woke. Uh so like if if. you're Donald Trump and you're trying to. figure out what your electoral coalition. looks like uh for the midterms or for. his successor in 2028, this is uh not a. good position for for him to be in. I. I'd be happy to be the Democrats right. now.

>> And so do you think that we're. witnessing a more permanent realignment. and that in fact the the shift to the. right between 2020 and 2024 was that was. the temporary real realignment? is what. what I think a lot of the Democrats. worried about was okay, we've lost, you. know, we've lost large swaths of people. and and this is existential for the. Democratic party moving forward. If you. if you can't win young people and and. you're trying to win elections and. you've lost the future, then then how do.

you how do you sustain yourself as as a. viable party moving forward? And so, does it look like there is a permanent. uh uh reshuffleling of these individual. demographic groups now? Yeah, realignments are never permanent. I. mean, over the long term, they all sort. of reverse. Reagan Republicans, for. example, among young people, young. people are now um majority majority. liberal. Um older people in the New Deal. era were really democratic. That's m. that's mostly flipped at this point. So, realignments are never permanent. I I.

think people read too much into the 2024. election results for Donald Trump and. saying young people were right leaning. Some pundits and strategists were saying. they were like the most conservative. generation uh since the Reagan. Republicans. That was obviously, I. think, a dramatic misreading of the data. at the time. There were lots of people, I think, who wanted that to be true, writing writing those takes. And it. turns out that that wasn't the case. You. know, I I've written plenty of. postmortems on the 2024 election. I. think actually what happens what.

happened was there was a status quo. anti- status quo bias uh sort of. anti-incumbent bias in the population. People were just really pissed off at. Democrats because of inflation, maybe. because of the Afghanistan withdrawal, maybe um just like a postcoid malaise, right? I think we sort of forget the. pandemic era. That was just like really. tough for for most people. And they. reflected that in their election. Now, we have the benefit of hindsight now, so. you know, I don't want to embellish too. much, but I think that that case was was. right. And with the benefit of. hindsight, we see most of those.

demographic shifts that Trump benefited. from reversing maybe even losing more. ground than Republicans uh had lost in. in in the leadup to 2020. One especially. interesting uh development today was. that the Republican or a Republican. candidate for governor in Minnesota, that's Chris Matt, dropped out and he. basically invoked how this. administration has weaponized ICE and. and and he he noted something. interesting. He said that the the the. national brand has made it impossible.

for him to run as a Republican in. Minnesota. And I thought that was so. striking because, you know, when you. want to talk about these postmortems. from 2024, so much ink was spilled on. this idea that Democrats were contending. with with a toxic brand and and how do. we get away from from this unpopular. brand that's weighing all of these. candidates down? And in fact, the only. candidates that seemed to be doing well. were candidates who ran away from the. brand. And now we've seen that. phenomenon kind of flip where.

Republicans are being saddled with a. toxic brand by virtue of how Trump has. weaponized ICE and really comported. himself through the entirety of his. presidency. So do you think that we're. seeing something of a sea change here. where Republicans are falling into the. same, you know, toxic brand trap that. Democrats had fallen into before? Yeah, it's another good reminder to not. be so myopelic when we're evaluating the. electorate, to not be so shortsighted. Um because conditions really can change. pretty fast. So, if you're a Democrat in. 2024, you don't want to be running to.

the left of, you know, of Kla Harris. You're definitely not going to win. I. don't think any Democrat would have won. in 2024, but if if you were AOC, you're. definitely not winning in 2024. Now, Kla. Harris, if he rerean the election, might. win an AOC figure, could have a pretty. good shot because of the where of where. the public has gone on these key issues. that Donald Trump doesn't have his. inflation advantage anymore. He does not. have an adv an advantage on immigration. This whole 50 point swing in abolish is. is evidence of that. So, um if if you. are like trying to write electoral.

strategies, it's just a good a really. good reminder not to overread short-term. trends. Um, the thing I have been I've. been writing about uh I wrote I think. about this in July of 2025. Republicans. even a year ago were seen as focusing. too much on immigration. Um, like right. when Donald Trump was elected president, his his policy that he uh I that people. say he won the election on, even as. early in his presidency as January 2025, people were saying h there's like too.

much focus on this. So, um, there's also. just sort of a misreading component, I. think, going on when people are trying. to make strategic prescriptions for the. Democratic party. Um, and equally, yeah, like you don't want to be an extremist. on the Republican side either. Donald. Trump is showing what happens when you. are. You had mentioned not to be too. myopic, not to be too shortsighted in. terms of diagnosing anything that's. happening or thinking that something. that happens today is going to have some. huge impact, you know, 6 months down the. line, a year down the line, two years, three years. We've seen how quickly.

things can move in politics. And so I'm. curious with something like this, to. what degree do you think that this has. some lasting impact on the shifts within. the electorate versus, okay, people are. upset now, but let's say Trump reigns. back on ice a little bit 3 weeks from. now. You know, the numbers bump back up. for him and and you know, we do like. kind of a reversion to the mean, right? Right. And so I'm curious the about the. permanence of the changes that Trump is.

having on the electorate by engaging in. such unpopular activity as this. Yeah, there's two things maybe going on with. Trump's numbers right now. One is just a. generalized backlash. Uh this happens in. in every presidential administration. There's a thermostatic backlash. political scientists like to say where. policy gets moved to the right. You're. turning up the thermostat making it hot. and the people say no, turn down the. thermostat. It's too hot. let's go the. other direction. Policy moves too far to. the right and people want it to go back. to the left to the middle. Your.

reversion of the mean thing. Um but. there's also in public opinion a concept. of tipping points. So maybe we're having. thermostatic dynamic on immigration, but. on the use of force in immigration. enforcement, we might be at a tipping. point where the public says um we don't. want this anymore. This level of force. being used in American cities is getting. people killed. We want a less forceful, a less violent immigration enforcement. in America. maybe the one that looked uh. that we had under um under Barack Obama, maybe people would prefer that. But I. think we're at that tipping point now.

Um so some previous tipping points, right? Like um you you inherently don't. know when they're coming. You really. only know them in hindsight. So I can't. say we're definitely at one now, but. maybe in 6 months we can you can play. this clip again and say whether or not I. was right or wrong. Um like the Vietnam. War is a really good example. before the. Tet offensive um in 1968. It looked like. that war was going to last forever and. then the political um um coalition for. that war fell off for the war in Vietnam. fell off in like a year and a half.

afterward after that. So um we might be. at a a much different position in a year. and a half. In other words, we might. look back and say this was the tipping. point against ICE or DHS in general. >> Okay. So So this might be the tipping. point against ICE, but what about for. the politicians that are that are. backing this? Like might it just be okay. this is this is a tipping point for the. electorate in terms of their support for. ICE but they'll continue to support the. politicians who are responsible for this. program or when you say that this might. be a tipping point does that does that.

equate to a complete lack of support for. the person responsible so for Trump. meaning even if he like you know reigns. it in it doesn't matter we've already. hit the tipping point and he's lost. support as a politician himself or for. his party as opposed to just people. thing. We still support and approve of. Trump, but we just do not approve of his. policies. And if he's willing to rein it. in, then we'll continue to uh to to to. give him our support. >> Yeah. I mean, hopefully Donald Trump. will not be president again. That would.

be like the breaking of the. constitution. >> I guess as a using him as like a as like. a proxy for, you know, MAGA or the. Republican brand of the Republican party. or these Republican candidates. >> I think the people to actually hone in. on is the Republicans from competitive. districts and Senate seats. Those are. the ones that are up for grabs in the. midterms. We know the midterms so far, Democrats are much more enthusiastic. They're energized to vote than. Republicans. So, I'm going to assert. that they will very likely win in the. midterms. And most of these seats that.

are competitive that were competitive in. 2024. Democrats will win and those. Republicans will be kicked out of. office. So the question I think actually. is like what can the Democratic base. accomplish with the people they select. in their primaries and with the. candidates um that they're pushing sort. of an anti anti-DHS agenda. Can they put. those onto the Democrats who will win. those competitive seats um and and hold. them in 2026 and in 2028 when it's. pretty likely that Democrats will also. take back the presidency, you know,

depending on who they nominate. Let's. not get over our skis there. So, like. you're not going to be able to dislodge. the MAGA members of Congress. You might. be able to say you might be able to push. them to like accept some um some. investigations, but the real power in an. anti-ICE, anti-DHS movement is going to. come from the Democrats, and they're. going to be able to enforce whatever. agenda they feel like their voters want. them um to to enforce when they take. back power in Congress and the. presidency. >> You know, you had mentioned taking back. power in Congress. Obviously, the House.

uh the prospects for Democrats taking. the House is look really good, but as we. look toward the Senate, do you think. that we could be in a world where some. of these very competitive Senate races, I'm talking races in Ohio, in Alaska, in. Iowa, um Maine, Texas, that that you. know, if things go continue to go um in. the way that they're going right now, that Democrats could have a decent shot. at actually winning those races. >> I'll give you an anecdote. Uh there's. some reporting that Ted Cruz in a. meeting with his donors was expressing.

some pretty virulent anti-Trump. sentiment and saying that if Trump keeps. going with his ICE crackdown and his. healthcare roll backs then Republicans. are going to lose the Senate. I think. that that if is the important if and if. we keep going down this road where. citizens are being killed by ICE every. week and that's the lead news story and. and the Republicans in Congress, the. Senate and uh the White House and the. administration, the people in charge, the officials in charge of DHS like Greg. Bovino, if they're not changing pace, then we're in a world where Republicans.

could be losing their majority in the. House. Um and Democrats are going to. pick up that majority in the Senate. That's possible. I'd say today it's. probably like a 35% shot, which is much. better than I think people would have. predicted a year ago. It's still not. above 50/50, but that's the key. If if. if things don't change for uh change. course in the Trump administration, I. think we're probably pretty close to. that 50/50 tipping point for the Senate. >> All right, we'll leave it there, Elliot. For folks who are looking to hear more. from you and read more from you, where. can they go?

>> Thanks, Brian. Yeah, people can just. Google strengthen numbers substack on on. Google and and they'll find my website. I would highly recommend it. It is the. single best uh data-driven newsletter. there is on the internet. I use it every. single week. I use it very often in my. videos as well. So, I could not. recommend highly enough. If you're. interested in any numbers that this is. the uh this is the news source to go to. So, I'm going to put that link right. here on the screen and also in the post. description of this video. If you're not. yet subscribed, please go ahead and. subscribe. Elliot, as always, thanks for. the work you do. Thanks for the time. today. >> Yeah, thanks Brian.

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