“The Republicans are in deep trouble.”
A conservative pollster has some bad news for the GOP: President
Donald Trump’s sagging poll numbers could cost the party control of both houses of Congress.
“I think the Republicans are in deep trouble in the House and the Senate as well,”
Frank Luntz said on Sunday on
Fox News. “If the election were held today, frankly, I think Republicans would lose both.”
Last week, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) admitted the party was facing a “challenging” year.
“We know the wind is going to be in our face,” he told Kentucky Today. “
We don’t know whether it’s going to be a Category 3, 4 or 5.”
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) issued an even starker warning last month.
“If conservatives are complacent, and mark my words,
we are going to see historic turnout from the extreme left in November,” Cruz told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt in early March. “Which means if conservatives stay home, we have the potential,
we could lose both houses of Congress.”
More: Conservative Pollster Sounds The Alarm: GOP Could Lose Both House And Senate
Frank Luntz's predictions are also echoed by the Cook Political Report, FiveThirtyEight, and others.
“If conservatives are complacent, and mark my words, we are going to see historic turnout from the extreme left in November,” Cruz told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt in early March. “Which means if conservatives stay home, we have the potential, we could lose both houses of Congress.”
Given the quantity of people who are registered as Democrats and assuming they predominantly vote for Democrats, if there is an "historic turnout from the extreme left in November," it really won't much matter what Republicans.
The percentages shown in the first charts above may seem close; however, when considered in the context of
there being some 200M+ registered voters, it's not at all miniscule and miniscule or not, it's certainly enough.
Independents will make the difference as goes Democratic and Republican primacy following the midterm election. I don't know what way Independents predominantly lean as goes Trump and his policies.
Scuttlebutt currently suggests that economic satisfaction will drive how people vote in November. The Indies whom I know, myself included, however, are well aware that despite Trump's tax cuts, they're no better off economically than they were before his tax cuts; that is to say their (and my) lifestyle hasn't improved, let alone materially improved.
On the other hand, Trump's proposed tariffs and the targeted retorts to them are not fondly received by the public in general, even though slightly more folks think the steel and aluminum tariffs may be helpful to some extent.
Looking at the "tariff" chart above, one sees that Independents range from about even to construing Trump's steel and aluminum tariffs as more hurtful than helpful.
Furthermore, In
a survey conducted last fall, the Chicago Council on Public Affairs found that 72% of Americans thought trade is good for the U.S. economy, 78% thought it benefits consumers like themselves, and 57% thought it helps create jobs in the United States. Even more disconcerting for GOP prospects this fall is that the same survey found that 48% of Republicans favor free trade. Even core Trump supporters joined the pro-trade parade: 62% said it was good for the economy, 68% said it benefited consumers, and nearly half (48%) saw trade as good for job creation.
IMO, the tariff matter will greatly outweigh the tax cuts. I think that because the tax cuts show up as relatively small sums in one's paycheck, whereas tariffs' effects are "in your face." People notice price increases for goods they routinely purchase. Businesspeople notice that their sales of tariff-subject goods are off from what they were prior to the tariff.
At the moment, Trump's tariffs are but proposals. That they are is problematic in multiple ways:
- Nobody likes the uncertainty their being proposed creates.
- People who have seen incremental increases in their paychecks due to the tax cut will be pissed if they see the gains evaporate due to their having to pay higher prices for goods they were already buying prior to the tax cut. What the "lord" given in a tax cut is pointless if "he" taketh it away via tariff-imposed higher prices.
- And if the avoe aren't bad enough, there's also the impact on of those folks who received pay raises whereby the raise pushed them into the bottom layer of a higher tax rate bracket. Why? Because (1) the increase in one's statutory tax rate is greater than the tax cut one received, unless one is in the top tax bracket, and (2) everyone's tax cut is a decreasing cut -- the cut was designed to eventually disappear and eventually become a tax increase for all but taxpayers in the highest income/tax bracket.
- Trump's tax plan's Income tax brackets (S= Single filers; M = Married and/or Joint filers)
- 10% bracket
- S -- $0 - $9,525
- M -- $0 - $19,050
- 12% bracket
- S -- $9,525 - $38,700
- M -- $19,050 - $77,400
- 22% bracket
- S -- $38,700 - $82,500
- M -- $77,400 - $165,000
- 24% bracket
- S -- $82,500 - $157,500
- M -- $165,000 - $315,000
- 32% bracket
- S -- $157,500 - $200,000
- M -- $315,000 - $400,000
- 35% bracket
- S -- $200,000 - $500,000
- M -- $400,000 - $600,000
- 37% bracket
- S -- $500,000+
- M -- $600,000+
- The GOP Tax Bill’s Estimated Effects In 2018
View attachment 186941
- The GOP Tax Bill’s Estimated Effects In 2027
View attachment 186942
- Obviously, I have no idea how many folks will be pushed from one bracket to the next, but it doesn't take much to see that as little as a 2% increase in at the cash register will wipe out whatever benefit most taxpayers, the middle income ones, realized from them. Thus, unless those taxpayers receive from corporations benefiting from the tariffs dividend payments that exceed the price increases, the tax cut was of no net value to those taxpayers. (Changes in a corporation's stock price don't matter because unlike taxes and dividends, they are unrealized gains. That is, they are not cash transaction events.)
Now one can think whatever one wants as goes the GOP's prospects this fall; however, insofar as I think most Independents fall into the middle income/tax brackets,
education levels more than income predicted the likelihood of one's (a class of voter's) supporting Trump and his policies, and
Independents overall are more educated than are Trumpkins (see also:
Behind Trump’s victory: Divisions by race, gender, education), I'm of the mind that the GOP will not fare well at the voting booth this fall. I think, furthermore, that McConnell, Cruz and the GOP strategists who provide them far more precise "pulse of the people" information and analysis that is made public are well aware of the same set of realities that I've outlined above.
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