How to Make Trump Unpopular Again

Democrats need to quickly recognize that the best way to slow down Trump is to drive his poll numbers down.

The pace and breadth of the Trump/Musk Administration's actions feel overwhelming. Anything and everything is under attack. One day, it’s USAID; the next, it’s the National Institute of Health, air traffic controllers, and the Education Department. How can we keep up with what’s happening and respond before Trump moves on to the next thing?

This is by design. This is the “flood the zone” strategy described by Trump ally Steve Bannon. Bannon explained in a 2018 interview:

Every day we hit them with three things. They'll bite on one, and we'll get all of our stuff done. Bang, bang, bang. These guys will never—will never be able to recover.

If the Trump presidency's first month taught us one lesson, it is that playing whack-a-mole doesn’t work. We need a broader strategic framework to stay ahead.

There are no easy answers. Democrats are at a massive media disadvantage. We have neither the messengers nor the platforms to compete with Trump and Musk (And don’t get me started on the message). We need to solve these problems as soon as possible without stepping back and while simultaneously addressing our long-term challenges. To that end, I want to put forward a framework to simplify the task ahead for Democrats.

Make Donald Trump unpopular.

This task is easier said than done, but it’s the only way to slow down — and eventually stop — Trump. As with everything in politics, the most significant forces are beyond our control. Despite messaging and media advantages, the primary reason that the GOP is now in power was a global spike in inflation as the world came out of COVID. But there are methods to bring down Trump’s numbers.

This post is the first in a series about the various strategies and tactics Democrats — from the leadership on down to activists — can employ to make Trump more unpopular.

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Why Make Trump More Unpopular?

A president’s power is directly related to their popularity in three ways. One, vulnerable members of the president’s party are more likely to take tough votes when the president is popular. Two, party performance in the midterms is historically correlated with the incumbent president’s approval rating. Finally, the media narrative around a president is based on their poll numbers. When the numbers are good, the president is portrayed as strong and successful; and when the numbers go down they are seen as weak and feckless. In the first six months of Joe Biden’s presidency, he was treated as a transformational figure akin to FDR or LBJ. Once his poll numbers took a dive after Afghanistan, his press coverage turned. While legacy media coverage matters less these days, it can still set the tone and tenor for larger online conversations.

The less popular Trump is, the more challenging it will be for him to pass his agenda in a narrowly divided Congress; and the more likely it will be that Democrats win the majority in 2026; and the sooner members of Trump’s coalition will abandon him.

While Trump is less popular than any recent newly elected president, he is more popular than he has ever been before.

Democrats need to make Trump unpopular again.

No Layups Rule

In the first month of Trump’s presidency, Democrats struggled to find a balance between cooperation and opposition. Senate Democrats helped pass the Laken Riley Act, a right-wing border security bill. Many voted for Trump’s less controversial nominees, like Marco Rubio and Scott Bessent. The impulse to cooperate came from a desire to respond to the Trump voters who abandoned us. This is a profoundly naive understanding of politics.

Trump won the smallest popular vote victory since Al Gore in 2000. He only won the Electoral College by about 100,000 votes. When accounting for population growth, he didn’t win any more votes than he did in 2020. In 2008, Obama won a comparatively massive victory. Did Republicans feel some sort of compunction to cooperate with the newly elected president, who had an approval rating in the high 60s, during a historic financial crisis?

Nope.

Mitch McConnell, the then-Senate Minority Leader, declared in an interview:

The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.

Without adopting McConnell’s nihilism, we do need a similar approach. McConnell understood that his party’s success was inversely correlated with Obama’s. Unfortunately, politics is zero-sum. Mutually shared political victory between Republicans and Democrats does not exist.

Therefore, Democrats need to adopt a “no layups” rule. This is a concept borrowed from basketball. There are no easy shots. If the other team tries to make a layup, you foul them before they can. This is the mentality Democrats need. We must complicate everything for Trump and the Republicans and use every lever of power to slow things down and gum up the works. Time is the only non-renewable resource in politics. Every day that Trump doesn’t move his agenda is a day he won’t get back. This is what McConnell did to Obama and it’s what Democrats need to do to Trump.

The real test will come when government funding runs out and the debt limit expires. The Democratic approach must be in total opposition to any Republican proposal. We have all the leverage. If Republicans want Democratic votes, they must pay in concessions. This doesn’t mean we demand Medicare For All or an expansion of Social Security, but we can insist on concessions to protect many of the priorities being slashed by Musk and his minions.

To be clear, Democrats are not forcing a shutdown. Republicans have the votes to keep the government up and running. I am simply saying that Democrats shouldn’t bail out the Republicans due to some sense of civic duty.

A messy congressional process undermines the image of strength that has fueled Trump’s recent rise in popularity. A win for Trump is a loss for Democrats. So let’s not give Trump any wins.

I am also not arguing that Democrats walk away from our priorities or ideals. Trump has never tried in good faith to work with Democrats in the past and will certainly not do so in the future. These are dangerous times. Trump is a real threat. There are very few guardrails. Democrats need to be willing to fight harder than ever before. It will be uncomfortable at times. The editorial boards and centrist columnists will attack, but Democrats must play the long game. Take heat now for victory further down the line.

There is no other option.