Version imprimableNow things have changed. Republicans have criticized his immigrant deportation policies, his racist posts, and his threat to take over the election process. At the same time support for Trump is declining as shown in polls. Trump and the Republicans fear, and many Democrats believe, that they could lose the next midterm election on November 3, 2026.
The turning point was the murder in Minneapolis of nurse Alex Pretti by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, visible to the entire nation on videos of the event filmed by bystanders. Pretti’s murder forced Trump to relieve the pretentious and sadistic Gregory Bovino, who had been in charge of the ICE deportation operation there and replace him with Border Czar Tom Homan as well as removing 700 of 3,000 federal agents there. Yet ICE continues its operations in Minneapolis and in other cities across the country, facing resistance everywhere.
The American public has been horrified and angered by ICE and its violent attacks on both immigrants and U.S. citizens. Today according to recent polls, 65% of Americans say ICE has gone too far. This is a view shared by 95% of Democrats, 71% of independents, and 27% of Republicans. And 50% of those polled say ICE is making them less safe while only 22% believe it is making them safer. Note that some 57% of women, a critical segment of the electorate, feel much less safe. Support for Trump remains at 39%, this usual score, but now, and this is something new, 51% strongly disapprove.
Trump recently posted a video online, based on “The Lion King,” that showed Trump as the king of the jungle but portrayed both former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama as apes. The portrayal of Black people as apes is an old racist trope that goes back to the days of slavery and to the Jim Crow era of disfranchisement, segregation, and lynching and served to dehumanize African Americans. Both Democrats and Republicans strongly condemned the post. Senator Tim Scott, the Republicans only Black senator, usually a loyal Trump follower, said he hoped the post was a fake, “because it’s the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House.” But it was not a fake, Trump or one of his assistants had actually posted it. After the criticism, he was forced to take it down—but he refused to apologize.
Creating more criticism, Trump recently said, “We [the Republican Party] should take over the voting, the voting in at least many — 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.” Trump claims that in Democratic Party states and cities, such as Philadelphia, Atlanta and Detroit voting is corrupt. And elsewhere he complains that aided by the Democratic Party immigrant’s who are not citizens are voting. In fact, there is little voter fraud in the United States and non-citizen voting is not an issue. Under the U.S. Constitution, states manage elections and the U.S. president has no role whatsoever. Some Republicans have also criticized Trump for saying the Federal government should run the elections. There’s fear that Trump might declare a national emergency at the time of the election, though the law says no “troops or armed men” can be present at the polls.
Trump is pushing and so are we. Across the country people are organizing against ICE in their communities, planning to defend their elections, and will demonstrate again on March 28, declaring Stop Ice! And No Kings!
7 February 2026
