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CNN Poll: 58% Say Trump's First Year Is A Failure, Senator Coons's Delegation Arrives In Denmark, Cook Moves 18 House Races Towards The Dems

Democrats can be warriors for working people and champions of freedom and democracy here and everywhere.......

Simon Rosenberg

Jan 16

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Morning all. We’ve gotten a fair number of polls this week, and they all say the same thing - a year into his second term Trump and his agenda are very unpopular. Here’s how CNN sums up their new poll findings:

Public opinion on nearly every aspect of President Donald Trump’s first year back in the White House is negative, a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS finds, with a majority of Americans saying Trump is focused on the wrong priorities and doing too little to address cost of living.
A majority, 58%, calls the first year of Trump’s term a failure.
There’s hardly any good news in the poll for Trump or the Republican Party entering a critical midterm year, with the president’s handling of the economy looming as the defining issue in key House and Senate races.

Pretty brutal. So is Trump’s approval on the major issues:

Venezuela: -16
Immigration: -16 (was +3 in Mar)
Economy: -21
Foreign affairs: -21
Overall Job Approval: -22 (39%-61%)
Tariffs: -25 (new low)
Healthcare: -27 (new low)

This poll, like every other poll released this week, shows the public turning against ICE and Trump’s lawless assault on Minnesota. Here’s my recap of some of that data from earlier this week, a link to my conversation with Greg Sargent where we dive into the data and the politics of Stephen Miller/ICE, a link to my weekly talk where I discuss the terrible events and courageous citizens in Minnesota and The Great Task Remaining Before Us.

This data from a Tuesday YouGov poll remains the most insightful of the data we’ve gotten this week about ICE’s terror campaign:

This CNN poll also has some data that needs wider discussion inside the family. CNN asked the 61% who disapproved of Trump why they disapproved of Trump. The question is open-ended, meaning they were not given a pre-set battery narrowing their choices (as most polls do). Here is what they found (yes it adds up to more than 100% - will try to find out why):

35% Temperament/Personal Behavior
25% Democracy/Rule Of Law/Misusing Power
23% Other Policy/Government
15% Foreign Policy
12% Economy/Cost Of Living

We’ve noted here that “threats to democracy” rose to a top tier issue during the fall elections. This recent Yale University poll found “Democracy,” “Corruption,” and “Election Integrity” to be in the top 5 issues for all voters:

Here’s most important issue in this week’s Economist/YouGov poll:

24% inflation
16% jobs and the economy
14% civil rights/civil liberties
10% health care
8% immigration

Here’s most important issue in a new Emerson Texas poll this week:

There may have been a time this cycle where “threats to democracy” was a second tier issue. It is no longer the case, and our political leaders need to widen their aperture a bit, and communicate around what we call here a three-legged stool - affordability/tariffs, health care, and threats to democracy/corruption. We can be warriors for working people and champions of freedom and democracy here and everywhere. As we’ve discussed the through line to all this is something along the lines of “they are for the oligarchs, and we are for the people.” I write about this in a new Bluesky thread if you want to dive a little deeper.

The Cook Report moved 18 House races towards the Democrats yesterday. This is very good news. Below is their current rankings of the battleground House races. Our focus now will be on flipping the Republican Toss Up, Lean Republican, and some Likely Republican seats. While of course we hope to win by as big a margin as possible, the majority will be won or lost in these 20-25 targeted Republican held seats and we must do everything we can to win all of them:

Note that all 7 of our Hopium House 7 - those newly elected Members from battleground districts who we helped elect in 2024 and have been supporting again this time - are no longer in toss up, and are all “Lean Democrat” or better. Congratulations everyone. This was always the goal - win these tough battleground races, and then make sure they get re-elected. We are on track to do that now. Thanks to everyone who has contributed to these critical House races - remarkably we are almost at $3m raised for battleground House races in just the last two years. What can we do together this year peeps?

Senator Coons and his bipartisan, bicameral delegation has landed in Denmark. Hope to share read outs tomorrow. Watch my terrific discussion with Senator Coons about this vital trip when you have the time. One of the most important conversations I’ve hosted in recent months.

Now, Let’s Get To Work People!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Winning The Midterms - Support Our Candidates

Hopium’s Winning The House Campaign (2026) - $71,300 raised, $250,000 goal (new stretch goal) - Donate to all four endorsed House challengers with one click | Learn More | Enjoy our new conversations with Christina Bohannan (IA-01), Mayor Paige Cognetti (PA-08), Jo Mendoza (AZ-06), and Janelle Stelson (PA-10)
Mary Peltola For Alaska Senate - $15,300 raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Volunteer and learn more. Amazing start everyone!
Winning Ohio - $11,800 raised, $250,000 goal - Our new campaign splits contributions evenly among Sherrod Brown, the Acton/Pepper ticket, and the Ohio Democratic Party. Donate today and help us turn this critical 2026 battleground blue! | Watch my conversation with David Pepper, who does a great overview of the opportunities we have in Ohio this year
Roy Cooper for NC Senate (2026) - $66k raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Learn More | Volunteer | Enjoy my conversation with Gov. Cooper and a new, terrific one with NC Dem Party Chair Anderson Clayton
Jon Ossoff GA Senate (2026) - $111k raised, $250,000 goal - Donate | Learn More | Volunteer | Enjoy my inspiring conversation with Senator Ossoff

Expanding The Senate and Electoral College Maps, Winning In Red States and Red Places (2026-2032)

Hopium’s Audacious Expansion Fund - $273,000 raised, $500,000 goal (new stretch goal) - Join our new campaign to expand our map by investing in the Democratic Parties of Alaska, Florida, Iowa, Maine, and Texas. Many thanks to two generous Hopium community members who have audaciously donated $10,000 to each of our five state parties

This recent post recapped our our very productive year together in 2025. In three new essays (here, here, here) I discuss how one of the ways we win the 2026 midterms is by providing early support to our candidates and parties to allow them to staff up, be loud, define the terms of the debate now, before the inevitable onslaught on AI slop, Russian disinfo, and Trumpian lies funded through bribes and corruption wash across the land.

The midterms could be won or lost in these next few months - not in the fall of 2026 - and we need be fighting now with everything we got.

Winning The Big Arguments With Trump, Defend Our Democracy - We have two recommended actions today:

1 - Call Your Senators and Member Of The House And Demand They Act Upon Our Five-Part Agenda - We need to be loud people, very, very loud and make the case for our now five part agenda:

Stand with Ukraine and our European allies, and far more forcefully challenge Trump’s traitorous efforts to sell out the US and the West to Russia; demand Congress rebuke/issue a no confidence vote on his current efforts to force Ukraine to surrender
Congress must stand forcefully for rule of law in the Caribbean and the Pacific - these illegal strikes must end; no war can be waged without Congressional approval; there must accountability for those who have broken the law, and the US must withdraw from Venezuela and cease other threats to violate the UN Charter and the sovereignty of other nations
Roll back Trump’s terrible, illegal tariffs that are re-igniting inflation, driving up prices, shifting the tax burden from the wealthy to working people, hurting small businesses and farmers, reviving tyrannical “taxation without representation,” and alienating governments and people throughout the world. To put America on a sounder fiscal course due to the enormous deficits brought by Trump’s 2025 tax cuts we should reverse these cuts to the wealthy and corporations
Defend our democracy, rule of law, and our liberties by blocking the expansion of ICE; restoring due process for immigrants across the country; vigorously defending the 1st Amendment; warring against his outrageous targeting of his domestic political opponents; ending the use of the military on our streets and the dangerous occupation of our cities; stopping the unprecedented regime corruption; and by forcing the Administration to finally comply with Congress end the rancid cover up of the Epstein crimes.
Fight Trump’s war on science, higher education and our public health; reverse - not delay - the cuts to the ACA, Medicaid and our clean energy investments; support and co-sponsor the Stand Up For Science/Rep. Haley Stevens effort to remove Robert Kennedy from HHS.

2 - Celebrate America, Our Constitution, Our 250th Birthday By Bringing Our Resolutions Project To Your Community - This July 4th America celebrates it’s 250th birthday. We need to make this holiday, a celebration of our Declaration Of Independence from a mad king, our day, and not allow it to become his.

One way we can do this is by bringing our Resolutions Project to your community or state. Imagine if by July 4th of next year a large number of towns, counties and states had passed formal resolutions, in the spirit of our Declaration of Independence, defending our Constitution and condemning the “injuries,” “abuses,” and “usurpations” of our mad king. For as our Founders wrote in the Declaration:

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

So far Hopium members have introduced or passed resolutions in 85 communities in 23 states. In the coming days we will be convening to discuss how to bring this campaign to more places and start planning to Own The Fourth next year.

Finally, please self-report your activities to our daily paid subscriber chat. These reports help inspire all of us to do more and fight harder!

Keep working hard everyone, and I remain so incredibly proud to be in this righteous fight with all of you - Simon

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