Donald Trump is looking to Los Angeles to provide a much-needed distraction as his polling slips on some of his strongest issues and the Republican president grapples with Americans’ increasing displeasure towards the chaos brought on by his second term.
But on Thursday, it appeared that wish had been granted via cursed monkey’s paw.
Trump’s presidency will pass the six month mark next week. With midterm season fast approaching, Congress has yet to pass any of the president’s legislative priorities into law.
A mass deportation program spearheaded by Stephen Miller, Tom Homan and Kristi Noem is increasingly proving unpopular as it abandons a focus on violent criminals for a nationwide smash-and-grab effort. Trump’s promised trade deals continue to elude the administration; he touted an agreement this week which China’s government has already downplayed and looks to largely bring both countries back to pre-reciprocal tariff rates — undoing only the US president’s own escalation.
Conflicts which Trump boasted he could end continue to rage on in Ukraine and Gaza; a third, in Iran, appears to be on the horizon after Wednesday.
And the congressional GOP remains mired in budget discussions as Democrats pound their opponents for planned changes to Medicaid and food stamps (SNAP) that would impose work requirements which the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates will kick millions off the programs.
All in all, the media-savvy Trump was eager for an opportunity to spin the narrative back against his opponents. On the issue of anti-ICE demonstrations in Los Angeles, he thought he had it.
But even as polling shows that Americans largely to not support the sometimes-violent protests which have broken out in Los Angeles for the past several days, polling released this week indicates Americans are just as opposed to Trump’s handling of the situation — and are souring on his immigration agenda overall.
An Associated Press-NORC survey released Thursday had approval of Trump’s immigration agenda at 46 percent approval to 53 percent disapproval, with Republicans being Trump’s only bastion of support on the issue. Among independents, it’s nearly 2-1 against the president, as ICE agents say they’ve ramped up daily arrest targets from 1,000 to 3,000.
In a Quinnipiac poll released a day earlier, nearly six in 10 voters from all parties said Republicans in Congress should do more to check Trump’s power. He was similarly underwater with independents on the issue of immigration, though by a smaller margin. Both polls showed Trump’s popularity hovering just below the 40 percent mark. Even as Trump sought to project an image of imposing law and order on a lawless city run by Democrats, a YouGov poll released on Monday showed his decision to send in Marines against the wishes of state and local leaders was unpopular.
On Thursday, the story took a turn for the worse for Republicans.
As DHS Secretary Kristi Noem spoke to reporters in Los Angeles, her news conference was interrupted by Senator Alex Padilla, a Democrat, who started to make a statement while Noem was speaking. He was then forcibly pushed to the ground and taken out of the room by law enforcement agents.
Video of the incident shocked Democrats and many in Washington over the wholly unprecedented manhandling of Padilla, a sitting senator, in the clip. DHS further bungled the situation by tweeting that Padilla had not identified himself — this was verifiably false, the first words out of Padilla mouth in the clip were, “I’m Senator Alex Padilla”.
Before the end of the day, tensions were soaring on Capitol Hill. Rep. Mike Lawler was shouted at by a Democrat on the House floor. A group of the senator’s Democratic colleagues marched to Sen. John Thune’s office to demand action from the majority leader. In the lower chamber, Democrats demanded the House adjourn while GOP leadership condemned not the tackling of a sitting US senator but his decision to interrupt Noem as she spoke.
If there was any sign of the way things may be headed, it was a statement from Lisa Murkowski, a centrist Republican senator. She condemned Padilla’s treatment by federal agents in the video in strong language: “It’s horrible. It is shocking at every level. It’s not the America I know.”
With a new polling plunge this week and Thursday’s events certain to galvanize his critics, Donald Trump heads into his weekend of spectacle in Washington with several major political narratives quickly spinning out of his control.