The question pollsters never ask about Trump

[cartoon id="298640"] On conservative media outlets like Fox News and the Wall Street Journal, Karl Rove is omnipresent. George W. Bush’s former senior advisor and deputy chief of staff can hardly be called conservative, at least when it comes to President Donald Trump. Rove more likely belongs in the never-Trump category. In a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, Rove repeated his age-old theme that Trump’s polling is disastrously low and that America has a bad case of “Trump fatigue” created by the president’s “frenzied pace and lack of focus leave many voters worried and confused.” That any story, whether published in the WSJ or less well-known publication, could run a story that is centered on polling results explains, in part, why the media is held is such low regard. Pollsters, especially Rove, have been inaccurate for two decades. Coming off their colossally off-target 2024 presidential election prediction – the nation would be awake all night waiting to see if Kamala Harris would be the first female president – pollsters should run away and hide. Many polls about Trump’s popularity have been taken, and while the questions in each of them are broad, the important one is never asked: Compared to Joe Biden’s administration, is the country under Trump in better or worse shape? Even the most virulent never-Trumper, if honest, would admit Biden was an unmitigated disaster, and Trump’s America First agenda, still unfolding, is a much-needed step forward. Voters were tired of being the world’s pushovers, thanks to Biden and his predecessor Barack Obama, laying down for the Mexican cartels, the Venezuelan tyrants, the Iranian mullahs, and the Chinese dictators. The 2024 election results also reflected voters were fed up with the Democrats painful, tax and spend policies that led to record inflation. They also hated Biden’s open border, which allowed criminals easy entry into the interior, the murderous consequences of which are on display in major cities across the country – New York, Chicago, Denver, Minneapolis, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland and Boston. Those cities and others adhere to illegal, unconstitutional sanctuary city guidelines that prevent local police from cooperating with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. If states cooperated with ICE, the ugly scenes that are playing out in Minneapolis and were rampant in Los Angeles this summer would not have occurred. Trump promised to, effective February 1, withhold federal funding to sanctuary cities, certain to be challenged, but an indication that the president understands the risk that sanctuaries pose. Side bar: What happened to the Supreme Court’s ruling that lower courts cannot issue national injunctions? Down on the border, Trump shut it down tight. In reference to shutting the border, Biden would say, “Give me the power,” a reference to a congressional amnesty that would have had the reverse effect. But without congressional intervention, Trump sealed the border down tight. Encounters are at a historic low. Trump II quickly ended parole programs for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans and the CBP One interview scheme, both illegal. The key takeaway from Trump’s campaign to rid the nation of illegal aliens: Roughly two-thirds of the aliens ICE arrested and currently detained have criminal histories, and a similar percentage of the aliens the agency has deported from its custody under Trump II, do too. Domestically, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget found that Biden during his four-year term, approved $4.7 trillion in new ten-year debt that includes $1.2 trillion in Executive Actions including forgiving student loans which the Supreme Court ruled he did not have the authority to do. Rove must not be paying attention to the business news. Under Trump, wages are up and inflation is easing. And while gas prices are rising temporarily, they're still well below the nearly $5 per gallon they hit under Biden. Congressional mid-term candidates should welcome a debate about affordability. If they can’t make hay out of Trump’s economic and border success they should find another line of employment. A bombastic but America First president beats a sleepy, auto-pen president who welcomed a foreign invasion and spent the country into steep inflation. - Copyright 2026 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate. Joe Guzzardi is an Institute for Sound Public Policy analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at [email protected].