Our most recent book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics. It includes a chapter on congressional and state elections. In 2024, the book explains, the Democrats' problems involved reality, not just messaging. Two years later, Republicans own the reality problems, including the Iran quagmire and the resulting economic pain.
Trump keeps making things worse for his party. In Texas, Georgia, and South Carolina, he supported the nomination of dubious Republican candidates who could lose otherwise winnable races. In Florida, he is attacking a Republican who faces a tight contest.
He is flailing.
First came a proposal to permit tariff-free beef imports, but that immediately angered America’s farmers and ranchers.
Then came a plan to ban exports of domestic diesel fuel, but that met with pushback from major oil companies.
In between, President Donald Trump pitched the idea of simply cutting $5,000 checks to adult Americans frustrated, polls show, by high food and gas prices — if the GOP maintains control of Congress. But that idea, too, has come under fire, even from some Republican lawmakers concerned about the potential hit to the budget deficit.
With just five weeks until Election Day, the White House has thrown out multiple ideas for combating persistent inflation, which has outpaced wage growth. But experts say it is unclear whether Trump can execute any policy that would placate inflation-weary voters and help the GOP maintain control of Congress.
“These are symptoms of panic in the administration about problems that they have in part created,” said David Wessel, director of the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at the Brookings Institution.
Inflation has been running over the Federal Reserve’s target rate since 2021, but an array of Trump policies have fed the problem, economists say. Trump’s decision to join Israel in going to war with Iran has disrupted the global oil supply, leading to elevated energy rates. His tariffs have produced higher prices for some imported goods. And his administration’s immigration crackdown has made low-cost labor harder to find, keeping price pressures on domestic companies high.