GOP calls Trump its ‘secret weapon’ — but polls show warning signs heading into midterms

Republican National Committee Chair Joe Gruters says that President Donald Trump is the GOP's "secret weapon" that will help the GOP "defy history" in November's midterm elections, when the party in power traditionally loses House and Senate seats. But one year into his second tour of duty in the White House, public opinion surveys suggest many Americans are souring on the president and his agenda.

The president's approval rating stands at 45% in the latest Wall Street Journal poll, at 41% in Reuters/Ipsos, and an average of all the most recent national polls compiled by Real Clear Politics puts Trump's approval at 42%, with 55% giving him a thumbs down on the job he's doing.

Trump started his second term in positive territory, but his approval ratings sank below water last March, and have slowly edged deeper into negative territory in the ensuing months.

"Support among Republicans has remained in place, but the opposition has become even more calcified," veteran Republican pollster Daron Shaw told Fox News Digital, as he pointed to Democrats.

Shaw, who helps run the Fox News Poll with Democrat Chris Anderson, said that "the approval numbers amongst Independents, I think, are what probably troubles the White House and Republican operatives across the country."

"It’s true that Independents don’t turn out in particularly high levels in midterm elections, but they do vote and that’s where erosion in support of the president can cost Republicans seats not only in the House but also in some close Senate races," he warned.

SURVEY SAYS: ISSUE THAT HELPED TRUMP AND REPUBLICANS IN 2024 HURT THEM NOW

Deep concerns over inflation boosted Trump and Republicans to sweeping victories at the ballot box in 2024, as they won back the White House and Senate and kept their House majority.

But Democrats say their decisive victories in November's 2025 elections, and their overperformances in special elections and other ballot box showdowns last year, were fueled by their laser focus on affordability amid persistent inflation.

Trump's approval ratings on the economy are, on average, slightly lower than his overall approval ratings.

The cost of living has been a key issue at the ballot box the past couple of years. And an overwhelming majority questioned in a Fox News national poll conducted last month expressed concern about high prices.

But Republicans highlight the series of tax cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, Trump's signature domestic policy achievement so far during his second term, as they argue that the GOP will flip the script on affordability this year.

"From an affordability standpoint, I think we win hands down based on the policies this president has pushed," Gruters argued.

RNC BETS ON ‘SECRET WEAPON’ TO HELP GOP ‘DEFY HISTORY’ IN MIDTERMS

Democrats disagree.

"As working families struggle to afford groceries, utilities, and health care, and worry about finding a job, Trump is busy meddling in foreign countries and palling around with executives, failing to address Americans’ top concerns on the economy," Democratic National Committee Rapid Response Director Kendall Witmer argued in a statement.

The president's numbers on the issue of illegal immigration, another issue that helped lift him to a re-election victory, have eroded over the past year. The issue is once again front-and-center, following this month's fatal shooting of a Minnesota woman and mother of three by an ICE agent as she protested the Trump administration's immigration enforcement efforts.

With the midterm election cycle quickly heating up, Shaw noted that "this is a markedly better issue environment for the Democrats than they saw in 2022 or 2024."

The presidential approval rating, along with the generic ballot, is a closely watched polling indicator ahead of the midterm elections.

And Trump's most recent two-term presidential predecessors saw their parties take a shellacking in the midterms during their second terms.

Then-President George W. Bush's approval rating was more than 15 points into negative territory by Election Day 2006, while former President Barack Obama hovered 10–12 points below water in the months leading up to the 2014 midterms.

Fast-forward to 2026, and the GOP is now dealing with a low propensity issue that it didn't have to worry about back then: MAGA voters who don't always go to the polls when Trump's name isn't on the ballot.

But Gruters noted that Trump's made stops in recent weeks in three key midterm election battlegrounds and said that the president's "going to barnstorm the country with our candidates."

"We got to make sure we turn our voters out, and we got to make sure that we have people energized. And there's nobody that can energize our base more than President Trump," the RNC chair said.

Shaw, who served as a strategist and pollster for Bush in his 2000 and 2004 campaigns, said that nowadays "the turnout question now is really a Republican question more than a Democratic one."

That's a reversal from the pre-Trump era, when Democrats were considered low propensity voters.

"There is very little question Democrats are going to turnout to oppose Trump and the Republicans," Shaw said. "Are Republicans going to show up and vote?"