@LeaderJohnThune@SenateGOP Look at this ratio! You are worthless and squandered two years of passing legislation that would have created tremendous prosperity in this country and completely obliterated those intent on destroying it.
So... yes. But also no.
Yesterday, I mentioned that Suzie Wiles had a political strategy that failed.
The strategy was fairly simple and not entirely unrealistic.
The issues that are politically unconventional, hard-nosed, or third-rail? Those things would be handled in the shadows.
You could find the progress on things—especially immigration—if you really cared to look.
But the White House shuddered it as a daily news item.
They did that because Trump signed off on a Wiles strategy that was engineered to win a conventional midterm.
Keep yourself out of crazy headlines. Be "disciplined Trump," win on policy and don't make a bunch of waves.
Things like the Iran War took center stage because the White House was perfectly comfortable with it doing juet that.
Foreign policy hawkishness is as lukewarm, traditional R as it gets. You're not going to have the floor fall out on you because Rs are being hawks on Iran.
And that part of it proved true. The GOP did marginally better than it did in 2022, in a year where the environment was naturally lined up against them instead of one where it was aligned in their favor.
I absolutely nailed GOP turnout and it was seen as an optimistic proposition at the time.
The problem was that this droll, gray, on-message administration was supposed to limit Democrat turnout.
In fairness to Wiles, I thought that'd hold true as well.
But it didn't.
Democrats turned out like Trump is taking a flamethrower to the neoliberal structure... probably because he is.
I could kick myself because I kept saying that you only knew what Trump was doing if you read liberal articles and I thought so little of it. I dismissed it as a larger political tell. But it was, and I missed it.
The administration missed it, too.
And Stephen Miller is the adjustment.
See, if Democrats are going to have this unbelievably reliable turnout, there's really only one response.
Donald Trump.
Trump—unabashed and unvarnished Trump—is the only answer the GOP has.
They left that weapon in the armory because they didn't think it'd be needed.
They were wrong. I was wrong.
So now you see the shift.
Wiles is out of the administration and Stephen Miller is coming in as Chief of Staff because the next 2 years are going to SOUND radically different.
Disciplined Trump is going the way of the dinosaur.
Miller and Hegseth are going to be thrown out center stage.
Trump himself will start sounding more and more like Trump.
Because 2026 is over, and if the GOP wants to correct course in 2028, they're going to need to message to the base that won in 2024.
It won't be the 2024 coalition exactly.
That was too broad to hang onto.
As was Obama's 2008 coalition.
After his clubbing in 2010, Obama transitioned into building a more intersectional, diverse coalition.
He won with the people who brought him to the dance in 2012.
And Trump is already taking notes on behalf of his chosen surrogate in 2028.
HUMANITARIAN DIPLOMACY
UKRAINE - RUSSIA
I am deeply honored to receive the Order of Princess Olga, First Class, from President Zelensky.
Our efforts to secure a ceasefire in Oleshky, which helped save nearly 800 people, plus the reunification of 34 children with their families demonstrate that a shared mission can make a meaningful difference in people’s lives.