I woke up to talk of a backlash forming against Donald Trump and the Republicans in response to his month-long assault on the government and their upcoming vote to cut taxes on the very obscenely rich at the expense of safety-net programs. 

I want to believe it, that this backlash is real, because the fate of our republic depends on it. Honestly, though, I don’t know why I should. 

There is some evidence suggesting that some Republican voters feel betrayed. Social media is increasingly active with buyer’s remorse. (Follow this account for a regular feed of regret.) Others are experiencing what happens when you flirt with fascism. Some polls suggest very slim majorities don’t like some of what the administration is doing, like pardons for traitors, cuts that harm farmers and veterans, and endless talk of Social Security and Medicare being scams.

But is the backlash real?

Or is it wishful thinking?

Timothy Snyder, the eminent scholar, said “something is shifting.”

“They are still breaking things and stealing things,” he said Saturday. “And they will keep trying to break and to steal. But the propaganda magic around the oligarchical coup is fading. Nervous [Elon] Musk, Trump, [JD] Vance have all been outclassed in public arguments these last few days. Government failure, stock market crash and dictatorial alliances are not popular. People are starting to realize that there is no truth here beyond the desire for personal wealth and power.”

I don’t know about you, but I’m not buying the idea that voters who were unbothered by “they’re eating the dogs, they’re eating the cats” are suddenly bothered by public arguments against Trump’s policies.

They voted for him, because he promised to hurt people whom they believed deserved pain. That his policies are hurting them is not, to them, a feature of his administration. It’s a bug. They want him to fix it. 

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Like Snyder, Robert Reich attributes this downturn in support to the fundamental character of the American people. “We cherish our system of government,” Reich said. “We believe in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the separation of powers, and checks and balances, and we believe no person should be above the law. We prefer democracy to dictatorship. Our system was founded in opposition to monarchy.”

Reich added:

“If Trump were just attacking the government, many Americans would be cheering him on. But he’s now attacking our system of government. He’s moving America from democracy to dictatorship (or monarchy).”

Discontent could be the basis for a backlash. 

But let’s not make it more noble than it is.

I mean, it feels good to believe that the American people believe in all these grand things, but most of those who voted last time around were not thinking about all these grand things on account of voting for the candidate who clearly stated that he was against every one of them.

Fact is, liberals look at bad polls and see a backlash brewing, but what those polls could really mean is Trump is acting like a man who will never leave the White House and does not care what you think. As Heather Cox Richardson said, instead of “backing down on their unpopular programs,” which is what liberals would expect a normal president to do, “Trump and the MAGA Republicans are intensifying their behavior, as if trying to grab power before it slips away.” 

But when it comes to truly wishful thinking, see James Carville. 

Last week, on Sean Hannity’s show, the famed Democratic strategist said the administration’s policies are making the president unpopular by the minute and that “the collapse is already underway,” he said.

“Let’s see when they put the Medicaid budget, when they put the tax — the $4.5 billion [or] trillion of tax cuts to wealthy people,” Carville said. “Just let the ball come to you. We don’t need to be aggressive now.” 

On Dan Abrams’ show, Carville said the Democrats don’t have to do anything right now. Public opinion is shifting. They can “play possum.”

“This whole thing is collapsing,” he said. “It doesn’t need Elizabeth Warren and somebody screaming to pacify some progressive advocacy groups in Washington, which, by the way, I wish these people were just useless. They’re actually worse than useless, that they’re detrimental. They never, ever learn to shut up. And so then this is what I believe. I believe that this administration, in less than 30 days, is in the midst of a massive collapse and particularly a collapse in public opinion.”

I don’t know why people who should know better are pretending that we live in a time of conventional politics. Yes, in the olden days, we could expect public opinion to turn after the president’s policies become unpopular. We could expect him to change course in response to that downturn, or, in the event that he did not change course, we could expect the opposition party to take advantage of that mistake. 

We do not live in a time of conventional politics:

• The administration has revived a trio of lawsuits against news broadcasters who told the truth. This is in addition to Trump’s own personal lawsuit against CBS News, demanding $20 billion, because “60 Minutes” edited an interview with Kamala Harris. 
• The White House has barred the Associated Press for using incorrect words. A US attorney in Washington said today that the Department of Justice “will be vigilant in standing against entities” like the AP, that “refuse to put America first.”
• Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth fired Pentagon attorneys who would be “roadblocks to anything that happens,” he said. (During this first term, Trump asked the previous secretary of defense why soldiers could not be deployed to suppress dissent, even wondering aloud why protesters could not be shot.) 
• The acting director of ICE has asked the Department of Justice to investigate whether a sitting member of Congress broke the law by informing constituents of their constitutional rights. 

And, according to this Twitter account, “Maga Nazis in Coeur D’Alene, Idaho, dragged out people at a town hall when they opposed cuts to Medicaid, the citizens were attacked and detained by unknown assailants while a MAGA speaker mocked the victims and thanked the rest of the crowd for being docile subservient cowards.”

Here’s the video. Warning: it’s hard to watch.

They have zip-ties. 

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— The Editorial Board (@johnastoehr) February 24, 2025

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Trump is untroubled by public opinion except when he is, in which case, the problem isn’t fixing things so that his policies are not hurting people, but figuring out ways, legal and not, to get people to shut up.

In the beforetimes, the Democrats could play possum.

This is the aftertimes.

They can’t.