CNN’s Harry Enten found evidence that congressional Republicans are shooting themselves in the foot by abdicating their role to President Donald Trump.
Republicans took back both houses of Congress when Trump won a second term, but a year into his presidency, GOP voters remain enthusiastic about the chief executive but are losing faith in their elected representatives, the data analyst found.
“The party that does have a motivation problem is the Republican Party,” Enten said. “You know, this, I think, sort of tells the story, extremely motivated to vote this election cycle, you go back to October of 2024, just before Donald Trump was re-elected. Hello, Republicans led on this measure; 67 percent of Republicans or those who lean Republican said they were extremely motivated to vote in 2024, compared to just 62 percent of Democrats. Republicans felt like, hey, we’re going out for ice cream, like a child going out for ice cream.”
“You come over to this side of the screen, Republican enthusiasm down,” Enten added. “Now they feel like they’re going to the dentist. Just 50 percent of Republicans say they’re extremely motivated to vote in 2026, compared to 66 percent of Democrats. That’s actually up a little bit, so Republicans are depressed in terms of their motivation compared to Democrats, and very much so compared to Republicans back during the 2024 cycle.”
That lack of enthusiasm could be an issue as Republicans face voters this November, but Enten said the polling shows that’s a problem of their own making.
“You know, turnout is lower during a midterm cycle than it is during a presidential cycle, and you want your folks to be motivated to go out there and vote, and this gives the game away right here,” Enten said. “Choice for Congress, the margin among voters overall in our CNN/SSRS poll, Democrats led by five points. But among those extremely motivated, hello, it’s a 16-point advantage, so Democrats have a turnout advantage. You’ve been seeing that in those off-year elections, right? New Jersey, Virginia governor, those special elections for the House that Democrats have been coming out in droves and very much outperforming the baseline from 2020 for how well Kamala Harris did in those districts, and that seems to be translating to our generic ballot measure, as well, with Democrats extremely motivated to turn out to vote and have a much larger lead in the race for Congress than they do among voters overall.”
“Feeling about Trump is one thing, then it’s about feeling, how do you feel about those Republicans in Congress, right?” Enten added. “This, I think, is a very important slide because essentially saying, hey, do you believe that the GOP is effective at passing laws? And this is among Republicans in January of 2025, 90 percent of Republicans said that they believe that, in fact, the GOP in Congress would be effective at passing laws. Now it’s just 70 percent. That is a huge drop, so that enthusiasm for Donald Trump isn’t necessarily translating into enthusiasm for voting for Republicans for office, because Donald Trump is signing a lot of executive orders, and Republicans in Congress aren’t necessarily passing a lot of laws.”
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