The incredible shrinking Donald
By 
Remember when Times opinion editor Patrick Healy — the very same one who drove Krugman away from the paper for being too anti-Trump for his tastes — convened an emergency panel trying to explain Trump’s overwhelming popularity, based ostensibly on a single poll showing a plurality of voters seeing the country headed in the right direction during Trump’s extremely brief honeymoon-ish phase (although clearly actually on his personal view that the country was now headed in the right direction)? Well, funny thing about that:
As the Iran war has pushed the global economy into an oil crisis and gas prices reach a four-year high, Americans’ ratings of President Donald Trump on several issues are deeply underwater with majorities disapproving of how he is handling every issue measured, according to an ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll conducted using Ipsos’ KnowledgePanel.
Despite strongly negative headwinds for Trump and his party, Democrats are leading but not running away with the midterm elections at this point.
Trump’s approval rating has dipped to 37%, the lowest of this presidential term, and his 62% disapproval rating is a record high over both presidential terms.
The poll finds Trump is also underwater on managing every issue measured, as two-thirds of Americans say the country is headed in the wrong direction and Democrats’ midterm lead over Republicans has increased slightly to 5 points.
As a side note, while the gap in the generic Congress polling is likely to expand given the extent to which midterm elections have become nationalized, it should be a reminder that while Trump’s unpopularity is a major opportunity, it’s not a guarantee of optimal performance — the Democrats still need good candidates running good campaigns, and Ken Martin either needs to show that he’s capable of competitive fundraising or be quickly replaced with someone who is.
The larger picture here, though, should embarrass everyone who went along with the claim that Trump’s narrow election in an incredibly favorable environment for out-parties was some kind of far-reaching mandate. And it will hopefully continue to embarrass enough of the marginal voters who thought they were voting for cheaper burrito taxis.