A quick rundown today of all that ails Trump and Republicans as they try to make the case to voters to allow them to remain in power in Congress after November. If you appreciate what you see here, please spread the word, choose a paid subscription, or drop a few dollars in our Coffee Fund. Your support directly funds our independent, adversarial journalism. - jg
We’re winning the war in Iran — which will be over right after the election. A “great healthcare plan” is right around the corner — forever “two weeks” away, according to Donald Trump.
The economy is doing so well that Trump has promised $5,000 checks to every American — as long as they elect Republicans.
These are some of the narratives that Trump and Republicans are trying to sell as November inches closer, and as Trump tries to buy votes in the midterms. But the reality of these competing catastrophes is far different than the rosy stories being told in congressional hearings and TV hits from Trump and members of his administration.
Here are a few of the disasters brewing as Trump tries to bribe Americans to vote for Republicans, and as Republicans try to convince Americans that everything is someone else’s fault.
Iran
In Iran, the situation has deteriorated rapidly. Iranian-backed Houthi forces have taken a key island in Yemen, giving them control of the Bab al-Mandab Strait, the second-most critical maritime shipping chokepoint in the world. Iran also says it has destroyed a U.S. drone over the Strait of Hormuz.
These developments come after last week’s violence in the Strait. Last week, Iran attacked 10 ships in the Strait of Hormuz and the U.S. blew up several Iranian oil tankers, causing oil prices to rise. Then, Iranian-backed militias in Iraq severely damaged a Saudi oil pipeline that bypasses the Strait of Hormuz, causing it to be shut down for at least the next few weeks, and maybe months. The damage to the pipeline is expected to cause a further spike in oil costs.
Also last week, Iranians damaged U.S. fighter jets at a base in Jordan, and acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao admitted that Iranian forces “blew the hell” out of a naval base in Bahrain in June.
Oil prices
The cost of oil is a major problem for Republicans and their working class base. Diesel is now averaging more than $6 a gallon, hurting the truck drivers, farmers, and construction workers who Republicans desperately need to show up in November. Trump is so worried about the cost of diesel fuel on his working class constituents that he has asked Ukraine to stop targeting Russian refineries.
With control of Congress and the White House, Trump and Republicans are running out of people to blame for the problems affecting the nation. Having deported hundreds of thousands of immigrants in the last two years, there are fewer of them to blame. In fact, the surge of immigration agents to major cities have caused job losses — and not just for the immigrants who have been arrested, according to a study released this month by the Brookings Institute. The study found that job losses outpaced arrests in 64 cities targeted by the Trump administration’s immigration crackdowns. In a city the size of Atlanta, about 13,000 jobs were lost thanks to the surge of immigration enforcement, the study found.
With fewer immigrants to blame, Trump and Republicans can always rely on Joe Biden as a scapegoat for a sluggish economy. But two years into the Trump administration, Trump’s tariffs are more of a factor on inflation than anything left over from the Biden years. Those tariffs “continue to exert upward pressure on consumer prices,” according to the Federal Reserve.
‘The government’
The first months of the Trump administration were dominated by Elon Musk and DOGE slashing 400,000 federal jobs, cutting contracts and government leases, and other efforts to reduce government spending. Now, we know that DOGE can’t account for 96 percent of the $215 billion it says it saved American taxpayers, according to a report released last month by the Government Accountability Office. After the cuts, Trump and Republicans teamed up to run a $1.8 trillion deficit in 2025.
That debt-accumulation continues apace.
The debt
The national debt continues to rise under Trump at rates similar to Biden’s term in office — or higher, depending on the next two years’ federal budgets, and crossed the $40 trillion last month under Trump. Trump claims his tariff revenues will help cut down on the deficit. While tariff revenue rose to $264 billion last year, it has since dropped as refunds required by a February Supreme Court decision have cut into the amount, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center.
Meanwhile, the rate of interest on the national debt is outpacing growth in the form of GDP. While the Trump administration claims that economic growth can help to balance this dynamic, the level of growth that would be required hasn’t occurred since the 1990s.
Trump’s promised $5,000 checks to Americans — only if Republicans win the midterms, of course — would add $1 trillion to the national debt. That’s a steep price to pay for a single election cycle.
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