Perhaps the most telling polls of the post-election Republican debacle compare the public’s view of the economy in President Donald Trump’s first term (before COVID) and in his second.
During Trump I, the president was at plus-9 on the economy, even when his personal approval number was atrocious.
Today, the president is at minus-35 on the economy.
Blame that gap on the influence of Vice President JD Vance.
In October of 2018, Gallup’s “economic confidence poll” of American voters stood at plus-33; in October of 2026 it was at minus-44.
Now, to be fair, lots of negativity was baked into polls after the Biden administration exacerbated post-COVID inflation.
But that also represented a huge opportunity for a new administration.
On Inauguration Day 2025, confidence in the economy stood at minus-19.
Yet by December of 2025 — months before the Iran war — Americans’ confidence in the economy had dropped to minus-33.
Protectionism and tariffs made the major difference.
In his first administration, Trump and the Republicans implemented the kind of “Zombie Reaganism” that Vance and his populist DC Praetorian Guard — the so-called National Conservatives — detest and reject.
Trump’s first-term focus was on deregulation and tax cuts, with only a few narrow and focused forays into protectionism.
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the first big law of the Trump era, slashed corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%, lowered individual rates for everyone, nearly doubled the standard deduction, expanded the Child Tax Credit, and added a 20% pass-through deduction for small businesses.
When it came to the economy, the administration was largely hands-off.
Affordability was a driving reason Trump was elected in 2024.
But what was the first big economic policy of Trump’s second go-around? Unilaterally slapping taxes on products from virtually every country and territory in the world.
The president never made his case to Congress, or the electorate — which means he never had any consensus or buy-in.
Protectionism, as most economists predicted, brought red tape, corruption, corporate rent-seeking and chaos — all done under the auspices of a fake emergency.
Trump’s second term effectively ended on “Liberation Day.”
Just follow the president’s approval on the RealClearPolitics polling aggregate: Trump’s popularity began to fall when word of tariffs leaked, then plummeted by 10 points right after he formally announced them.
The president clawed back 10 points while he delayed tariffs after a market crash, but when the White House finally began implementing them, Trump’s numbers went into freefall.
Every mistake that followed — including the administration’s tragic dillydallying on Iran — only compounded the problem.
Most exit polls find that around 65% of Americans believe tariffs hurt the economy.
Red state or blue state, states with working-class voters, Southern states, rural areas — it didn’t matter.
Big majorities said the tariffs hurt them locally.
In Texas, a state that relies heavily on trade, the Associated Press found that tariffs were 44 points underwater.
In Ohio, 47; in Michigan, 50.
Even if we conceded Vance’s contention that the Iran war was the cause of the midterm debacle, war is a choice that can be avoided; Republicans can criticize the decision or the execution.
But protectionism is at the heart of the NatCon project — and it’s a deeply unpopular policy plank that Vance wants to tie to the GOP for a long time.
The public’s view of protectionism reminds me of its support for Medicare for All.
Voters love to hear politicians championing manufacturing and promising to “bring back” jobs and save Rust Belt towns — but when they experience protectionism in real time, they sour on it fast.
The difference between the first two years of Trump I and Trump II is that “national conservatives” have captured major institutions of the GOP establishment.
They’re shifting conservative fiscal ideas to pander to a narrow band of low-propensity working-class voters — at suburban voters’ economic expense.
If Republicans get into an arms race over who can redistribute wealth better, or send out more checks, or prop up more dying industries, or punish more corporations, voters will have an easy choice.
If they want endless class war and “industrial” social engineering and state ownership of private companies, a party already exists to do all of that for them.
Which is why Vance’s brand of warmed-over progressivism has little future.
David Harsanyi is a senior writer at the Washington Examiner. X: @davidharsanyi
This story originally appeared on NYPost
