Politics
The GOP race for SC governor heats up without Trump’s endorsement — for now
One Republican candidate in South Carolina’s open gubernatorial primary said Donald Trump would “decide my fate.” Another pledged to send the state’s National Guard troops wherever Trump wants. A third accompanied the then-presidential candidate to his 2024 criminal trial in Manhattan.
In recent interviews with Blue Light News, three contenders for the seat being vacated by Gov. Henry McMaster gushed over Trump’s coveted endorsement and described some of their early efforts to secure it as the president plans to attend a fundraiser in the state for the reelection of his longtime ally, Sen. Lindsey Graham.
The winner of next June’s Republican primary is all but guaranteed to become deep-red South Carolina’s next executive. The candidates include the state’s lieutenant governor, attorney general and two members of its congressional delegation — all of whom are thirsting for the president’s support.
A new Winthrop University poll — the first major independent survey of the primary — found Rep. Nancy Mace and Lt. Gov. Pam Evette led the field in a statistical tie at 17 percent and 16 percent, respectively. Rep. Ralph Norman and Attorney General Alan Wilson followed with 8 percent each.
Though early favorites have started to emerge, the race remains wide open without Trump’s nod.
“He’ll get to decide my fate. He is a kingmaker, and I hope in this case he will be a queenmaker,” said Mace, the third-term member of Congress known for being outspoken on conservative cable news and social media.
South Carolina has a long history of fierce loyalty to Trump. McMaster became the first statewide elected official to endorse the president’s nascent 2016 campaign, and Graham is one of his closest advisers on Capitol Hill and friends on the putting green. Democrats haven’t won the state in a presidential election since Jimmy Carter defeated Gerald Ford in 1976.
But so far, Trump has stayed out of the race, forcing the contenders to try to define themselves and their candidacies without input from someone who has dominated the party for a decade and remade it in his image. In that way, the race — taking place during a pivotal midterm cycle — mirrors the challenge awaiting the Republican Party, which must begin to grapple with a future without Trump, who is in his final term.
For now, the candidates aren’t willing to explore that future.
“Donald Trump is the gold standard. He casts a very long shadow over state politics here in South Carolina, especially in the Republican primary,” said Wilson. “Anyone who says they don’t want the president’s endorsement is crazy.”
From his perch in Columbia, Wilson has filed nearly 20 briefs across the federal judiciary in support of Trump administration initiatives like federalizing the National Guard or enforcing the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, according to a Blue Light News analysis. His campaign website features a “Trump Tough” section, which includes a slideshow of selfies and step-and-repeat pictures with the president.
Trump’s only attention to the race so far was a captionless post on Truth Social in mid-August showing the results of a survey that put Mace atop of the crowded field — a poll that the congresswoman shared with the president, according to campaign spokesperson Piper Gifford.
“I absolutely communicate with the White House on this race and provide data and information to them and to those who will be ultimately making the decision,” Mace said in the recent interview.
Wilson has also been in touch with “high level members” of the White House about his candidacy, but has yet to broach the race directly with Trump. “They are aware of my campaign. They are aware of what I have done as attorney general. They are aware that I have defended the president’s agenda, that I have defended the president,” he said.
Evette entered the race in mid-July. Though she served two terms alongside McMaster, her foray into gubernatorial contention will be her first time running for elected office on her own ticket. Asked about any behind-the-scenes conversations with the White House seeking support, the state’s second-in-command demurred, while reiterating her loyalty to Trump at his political nadir.
“In January of ‘23, President Trump came to South Carolina, and he was looking for friends,” Evette said, recalling Trump’s brief time in the political wilderness following his 2020 loss and the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. “Out of all the people that are in this race, I was the only one that showed up for him, stood shoulder to shoulder with him when there were no polls to say that he was going to win.”
She recalled national consultants warning her, “‘You have a bright future, you’re killing yourself. Like, why are you doing this? He’s going to get indicted.’ And I was like, well, loyalty matters.”
Loyalty to Trump might determine his endorsement, and the candidates are willing to leverage that litmus test against one another.
Unlike Evette, Mace publicly rebuked the president following the attack on the Capitol but has since returned to his side as a faithful ally on Capitol Hill.
Norman might have the hardest case to make in seeking Trump’s endorsement.
As a member of Congress’ hard-right Freedom Caucus, Norman’s deficit-hawk style has at times positioned him against some White House-backed legislation that the group criticised for expanding the national debt. Perhaps worse for his fate: endorsing South Carolina’s Nikki Haley during the 2024 Republican presidential primary.
“Ralph Norman has the best record of voting with Trump of any candidate and is proud to work with him in Congress. He’d welcome the President’s endorsement but knows that the President has other friends in this race and he respects that,” Norman spokesperson Evan Newman said in a statement.
Speaking with reporters after a party fundraising event in Columbia earlier this summer, Graham said he told the president to “wait and see” before issuing an endorsement in the governor’s race. South Carolina is at least somewhat on the president’s mind, though. The president will take his first in-person dip into the 2026 midterms when he attends a fundraiser that in part is billed to Graham’s own reelection campaign, Blue Light News first reported.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the president’s conversations around a possible endorsement or whether he is communicating with any of the candidates. The lack of endorsement in South Carolina isn’t indicative of a larger trend, though. The president has already thrown his support behind Rep. Byron Donalds to succeed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis next year, and his former rival-turned-ally Vivek Ramaswamy got the coveted endorsement not long after his campaign launch in February.
Lacking a race-changing boost from the president, the candidates have touted their own fundraising as evidence of grassroots support and the campaign strength. By those metrics, no runaway favorite has yet to emerge.
The four contenders each reported raising over a million dollars since starting their campaigns, according to financial reports filed with the South Carolina Elections Commission. Evette and Norman led the pack with $1.4 and $1.3 million respectively, though both also gave their own campaigns six-figure sums.
Wilson, who launched his campaign first, has just under $1.3 million. According to a memo released by his campaign, about one-fifth of that haul includes a six-figure transfer from his state attorney general campaign account, with “still more transfers on the way.”
“They believed in him to be Attorney General and now want him to be Governor,” campaign finance chair Barry Wynn wrote.
Mace’s fundraising shows her slightly trailing her competitors, with $1.06 million raised, but other indicators bode well for her campaign. In addition to the new Winthrop poll showing her with a slight lead, she pulled in over 18,500 individual donations, exponentially more than her rivals.
In addition to the candidates’ agreement on the eminence of a presidential endorsement, the emerging issues separating them are decidedly local.
They’re aligned on the perennial sticking points that are likely to define the race: lowering taxes, and specifically eliminating the state’s income tax, and fixing the state’s aging infrastructure as it buckles under population growth.
Judicial reform has also emerged as a salient issue, with South Carolina and Virginia being the only states in the country where judges are selected by a commission and approved solely by a legislative vote. Neither the governor nor voters have a say in who serves on the local bench.
“Many of these folks have cases before these judges and then many of these attorneys fund the attorney generals and the solicitors when they’re running for office. Everybody gets paid, and nobody goes to jail,” Mace said.
The candidates don’t seem to agree on how to implement this one: as the state’s top prosecutor, Wilson helped push some recent changes through the state legislature that allowed the governor to appoint one-third of the seats on a selection committee that took effect this year.
“I believe that the governor should have all of the appointments on the [Judicial Merit Selection Committee],” Wilson said, while expressing openness to pushing a constitutional amendment that would embrace the federal advise-and-consent model.
Evette, banking on the relationship she forged with the state legislature alongside McMaster, hopes to move directly to amending the state constitution to have the state mirror federal judicial appointments.
Norman is the only candidate to call for direct election of judges in the state.
McMaster, who has focused on business development in the relatively small state, is preparing to leave his two terms in Columbia with a 46-percent approval rating, matching Trump at the top of the public figures included in the Winthrop University survey.
McMaster has so far demurred on whether he’ll endorse any of his potential successors.
Speaking to reporters recently, he said, “Elections will come and go, and endorsements will be made whenever they’re made.”
CITY HAL 9000: Amid a mad dash to try to regulate artificial intelligence, City Council Speaker Julie Menin is looking to make her mark.
The Manhattan lawmaker is planning to hold a hearing with all 51 members of the legislative body next week, and today confirmed the attendance of four major AI firms to discuss both the dangers the technology poses and a suite of Council bills that seek to protect New Yorkers.
“Leading experts and AI executives themselves are warning about the potentially grave risks of rapidly advancing AI, and governments have a responsibility to act,” Menin said in a statement announcing she issued a subpoena to SpaceXAI, the artificial intelligence company owned by Elon Musk, to compel the firm to attend.
Council hearings — even those run by lesser-known committees — are not known as concise affairs. And the notion of having all 51 members in the room to pepper AI executives with questions can only mean a marathon day with plenty of news coverage. (Remember Randy Mastro’s general counsel nomination hearing in 2024? No? You didn’t tune in for all 11 hours?)
Between the White House’s opposition to any type of AI regulation and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s desire for federal guardrails — though he has enacted an AI ban in elementary schools — a lane has opened for Menin to have her say in what has become one of the defining debates of the political moment.
Her muscular posture — her office dangled the possibility of subpoenas in front of the companies she sought for Monday’s hearing — shows she is not going to let it go to waste.
The package of bills being pursued by the Council includes a “kill switch” requirement and a new private right of action that would make it easier to sue AI companies. Menin is hoping to get input on that package Monday from artificial intelligence purveyors who agree that something needs to be done to slow the development of frontier AI models.
Google, which plans to be there Monday along with Anthropic, OpenAI and Meta, has released a white paper calling for a regulatory body that could develop safety standards along with audits for frontier AI models that are pushing the bounds of the technology. Separately, the firm has called for a regulatory framework for AI models like chatbots, which are already being used widely by the general public, and for the government to mitigate disruptions to the economy and workforce.
None of the firms have weighed in formally on the Council’s AI package, but one person with knowledge of the bills said there are early questions about how a “kill switch” activated in New York would affect a company’s services elsewhere around the globe, how the private right of action might interact with existing tort laws and whether there are downsides to retaining AI chat histories with consumers for extended periods of time.
Separately, there’s also the question of how the city’s AI bills would mesh with a separate AI regulation framework being pursued by Gov. Kathy Hochul. — Joe Anuta
From the Capitol
GATEWAY DREAMS: The long-awaited Gateway project reached a new milestone today: the start of tunnel boring under the Hudson River.
Hochul gathered with officials from New York and New Jersey to celebrate the latest stage of the development — which comes after more than a decade of planning and almost three years of construction work.
Following the “ceremonial launch” this morning, two hard-rock tunnel boring machines will be deployed this fall to construct a new rail tunnel between New Jersey and New York Penn Station. The machines are anticipated to clear about 30 feet of earth per day.
“We fought and beat efforts from the Trump administration to halt the Gateway project and today, that dream becomes a reality, with state of the art machinery operated by expert union workers starting their journey through soil and bedrock under the Hudson to Penn Station,” Hochul said in a statement. “This is a historic day for New York and a clear demonstration of our ambitions to once again be a state that dreams and builds big.”
Construction on Gateway began in late 2023, but the project previously faced a near-shutdown and temporary work stoppages after the Trump administration froze federal funds for it. The project resumed following legal action from New York and New Jersey. — Janaki Chadha
DON’T TRUST THE FILINGS: Hochul’s campaign is preemptively casting doubt on the accuracy of a disclosure report due to be filed by Republican opponent Bruce Blakeman on Friday.
If the past is any guide, the report won’t contain the definitive list of his financial activity. The campaign finance filing Blakeman submitted on July 15, for example, has since been amended on July 22, Aug. 13, Aug. 25 and Sept. 14.
As a result, a significantly different financial picture has formed compared to what was widely reported a couple months ago: Blakeman initially identified $3 million worth of contributions and $1.8 million in expenses over the spring; the latest amended version shows $4.5 million in contributions and $5 million in expenses. The total number of transactions disclosed went from 25,534 to 41,724.
Blakeman similarly resubmitted his March disclosure report four times and his January filing thrice.
“Either Blakeman wants to trick the press into reporting an inaccurate state of the race, or this guy sucks at math,” state Democratic Committee spokesperson Addison Dick said.
The Nassau County executive’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment. — Bill Mahoney
FROM CITY HALL
‘NOT IN AN INSHALLAH TIMELINE’: Mamdani said today he’ll release a plan “soon” for disbanding the controversial NYPD unit he pledged to get rid of last year as a candidate — and he’s leaving god out of it.
“I will fulfill that promise. The only question is the timeline of it … It’ll be not in an inshallah timeline, but an actual one,” he told reporters at a press conference in Manhattan, using the Arabic phrase for godwilling. “The critical point of it is just how to ensure we’re doing so while protecting New Yorkers’ rights and keeping New Yorkers safe, and that’s something that we’re going to share more information about soon.”
Mamdani made the comments after Playbook asked what’s causing the holdup on breaking up the NYPD’s Strategic Response Group, especially in light of the unit being deployed Thursday to arrest activists, including politicians close with the mayor, protesting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
As a candidate last year, Mamdani was adamant that he would, if elected, abolish the SRG over concerns about its heavy-handed responses to protests.
But since taking office in January, the mayor has dragged his feet on the pledge. When asked about the status of it, he’s typically just said he’s continuing conversations with NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch — making today’s comments stand out.
A spokesperson for the NYPD declined to comment on Mamdani’s remarks. But the spokesperson did note that video posted to social media showed the SRG officers who effected arrests at last week’s anti-Netanyahu demonstrations acted peacefully and were joined by NYPD Community Affairs personnel who informed protesters they would be detained.
A political moderate, Tisch has defended using the SRG, once even cracking a joke that seemed aimed at highlighting the static between her and the mayor on the topic.
The fate of the SRG is among a number of issues Tisch and Mamdani have clashed on. They also hold divergent views on the issue of the NYPD’s gang database, with Mamdani promising last year to abolish it while Tisch calls it a critical tool that her department uses “every day.” — Chris Sommerfeldt
FROM THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL
FIRST IN PLAYBOOK: Hochul picked up an endorsement today from Planned Parenthood’s PAC in her bid for a second term.
In receiving the endorsement, Hochul touted her work in declaring the state as a “safe haven” for reproductive health care, creating a first-in-the nation paid prenatal leave program and increasing the child tax credit. Planned Parenthood Empire State Votes PAC Chair Robin Chappelle Golston said that the governor “understands what is at stake during relentless federal attacks.”
The group also backed Hochul, the first female governor of New York, when she ran for a full term in 2022.
Hochul’s opponent, Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, has described himself as a “pro-choice Republican.” — Madison Fernandez
IN OTHER NEWS
— ZOHRAN’S SHADOW: Hochul is counting on Mamdani to stump for her reelection campaign, but the governor’s advisers are still figuring out the best way for him to do that. (The New York Times)
— SEX ED: A new study from the New York Civil Liberties Union found that many school districts have selected an abstinence-only sex education curriculum. (Times Union)
— JOB HUNT: As New York City government continues to reel from staff vacancies, Mamdani is opening a walk-in municipal jobs center to speed up hiring. (amNewYork)
Missed this morning’s New York Playbook? We forgive you. Read it here.
Battleground Republicans across the country are on defense as ICE operations keep finding their way into local headlines.
A flurry of ICE activity in four rural Kansas towns this week prompted businesses to shutter and public schools to urge families to identify who could pick up children from schools in case their parents were detained. Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kansas) — a normally staunch MAGA defender who finds himself in a tougher-than-expected election — took to social media to say he was “closely following” the situation, signaled his displeasure that ICE wasn’t working more closely with local law enforcement, and said he had phoned Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin.
Later, he complained that ICE’s failure to communicate with local law enforcement caused “mass disruptions to local communities and businesses.”
“We must keep our communities safe, but it has to be done in a responsible and secure manner,” he said in a statement Thursday evening.
Mullin took over DHS in March with a mandate to keep immigration enforcement out of the news following a public outcry over the killing of two Americans by immigration agents during enforcement operations in Minneapolis. No subsequent incidents have generated the same type of national attention — but ICE’s recent record-high arrest rate is still landing hard in some communities.
“It does cause quite a disruption in the community,” said Scott Fischer, the GOP chair in Ford County, one of the counties where ICE activity was reported this week. “We don’t want our community disrupted.”
In Florida, local officials are warning about the impact of ICE raids on businesses, and a Republican incumbent is on air with a Spanish-language ad denouncing Trump’s crackdown. In Michigan, Democrats are calling for an investigation after a man crashed his car and died while fleeing ICE. In Maine, the fallout from a fatal ICE shooting of a 25-year-old from Colombia continues to loom over GOP Sen. Susan Collins’ reelection race. In Texas, last week’s nonfatal shooting of a Venezuelan in Austin is just the latest of several highly publicized ICE operations that have fueled wall-to-wall media coverage.
“There’s already been some blowback associated with what people feel is a little bit of a heavy hand when it comes to immigration enforcement,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas). “Obviously, border security is critical, but I think the administration maybe has miscalculated a little bit. … It is going to be one of the factors people are weighing in the election.”
The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that the department “is focused on delivering the most HISTORIC mass deportation campaign in American history—exactly as President Trump promised.”“The men and women of ICE are enforcing the laws passed by Congress. We do not pick and choose which laws to enforce or where to enforce them,” the statement continued. “We will continue to enforce our nation’s laws and remove illegal aliens from American communities. Under President Trump and Secretary Mullin, if you break the law, you will face the consequences. Illegal aliens are not welcome in the U.S.”
The Trump administration’s deportation spree is not widely popular. A new Blue Light News Poll finds that a plurality of U.S. adults, 49%, think the mass deportations campaign is “too aggressive,” while 26% find it “about right” and just 14% think it is “not aggressive enough.” And in an election cycle where cost of living is atop voters’ list of concerns, ICE enforcement has become an economic issue too: Immigration raids are affecting workers, from construction sites in Texas to meatpacking plants in Kansas, frustrating business leaders.
In Kansas, where Democrats aim to win a U.S. Senate seat for the first time in nearly a century, ICE’s activity this week has provided another political opening.
“This is not how Washington should be treating Kansans,” Adam Hamilton, the Democratic nominee for Senate, said on social media Wednesday.
“It impacts these operations economically,” said Matt Teagarden, CEO of the Kansas Livestock Association, whose organization released a joint statement Thursday noting the “massive chilling effect” of ICE enforcement on “the legal, documented, skilled workers that put beef on the table and keep the cattle supply chain moving.”
“We’re all for getting the bad actors out of our communities,” Teagarden said. “The method by which they do that has an impact. We’ve seen it.”
Mullin said in a statement Friday that “ICE is not conducting worksite operations in Kansas” but “operations targeting heinous criminals including murderers, rapists, and drug traffickers and illegal aliens with final orders of removal.”
Some of Marshall’s allies downplayed the possibility that the immigration activity could have political ramifications.
“Senator Marshall has nothing to do with when ICE decides to do a surge, and I think most people understand that,” said Danedri Herbert, chair of the Kansas Republican Party.
But others winced at the way ICE conducted itself, even those who say enforcement is necessary to remove criminals.
“I’d sure ask that we go back to some of the concepts of working with local law enforcement who actually know the area better, and I think that might have improved things tremendously,” said Kansas State Rep. Jim Minnix, a Republican who represents Scott County, where some of the ICE activity occurred.
Texas has become the epicenter of ICE activity: One in five ICE arrests nationwide this year has occurred in the Lone Star State. Sunday’s Austin shooting came on the heels of a fatal ICE shooting in July. In South Texas, local news is consumed with a story of two teenagers who were stopped by ICE agents en route to a military recruiter’s office, one of whom was beaten on the side of the road. After17-year-old Luis Ochoa spoke out to say he was pepper sprayed and detained, his mother was quickly deported.
Bobby Pulido, the Democrat running in Texas’ 15th District, said his campaign has received more than 80 requests from South Texans asking for immigration help. The campaign passes those requests to pro bono attorneys, he said.
“Every single day we’re having people reach out. And it’s very frustrating, because we can’t help everybody,” Pulido said. “I’m not a congressman.”
His opponent, GOP Rep. Monica De La Cruz, has attempted to separate herself from the administration’s immigration crackdown: She hit the airwaves with an ad this month featuring a woman touting De La Cruz’s work getting her husband, who had legal status, released from immigration custody.
“I have been very direct with the White House, with leadership, that enforcement policy should be focused on the criminals and on the cartels that are terrorizing our communities,” De La Cruz said during an appearance on a conservative radio show Thursday. “They should not be on hardworking immigrants that are navigating the immigration process.”
Maine Democrat Troy Jackson has made Duran Guerrero’s death a key focus of his Senate campaign, hosting a town hall in the city where he was killed earlier this month and frequently criticizing Collins for voting to fund the Homeland Security Department. In response, Collins has emphasized she supports guardrails for ICE officers like body cameras and deescalation training.
In South Florida, public pressure is growing this week against policing partnerships with ICE as businesses report a dropoff in sales. GOP Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar released an ad — in both English and Spanish — that criticized the Trump administration for going “too far” on immigration. In the ad, she claims that half of the people detained in July “had no criminal record” and says Hispanics who backed Trump in 2024 feel “betrayed.”
Liliam López, president of the South Florida Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and the U.S. Hispanic Women’s Chamber of Commerce, said that her communities “are really, really hurting” from the ICE crackdown.
“All elected officials of the Republican Party that think that their constituents are being affected in an adverse manner should speak up, like Congresswoman Salazar did,” she said. “You can’t do what this administration is doing because it doesn’t work. It just doesn’t work.”
The concerns from vulnerable Republicans come as Mullin seeks to balance pressure from immigration hardliners with public backlash. When he took over the department in the spring, the administration moved to make its arrests of unauthorized immigrants more discreet, but the dip in visible deportation operations — coupled with messaging missteps wherein Mullin seemed to indicate an openness to some legal pathways for would-be immigrants — prompted considerable pushback from some of the loudest anti-immigration voices in Trump’s coalition.
DHS then recalibrated its messaging to highlight increased deportations and project continued operational toughness, in an effort to shore up support from that section of the president’s base.
The reported lack of body camera footage in the Austin shooting in particular has frustrated even some of Mullin’s defenders, given consistent pledges from DHS that the technology would be deployed and operational by the end of September.
“If the public report is accurate, that’s unacceptable,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said. “Markwayne needs to pull these folks in and say, every piece of equipment you have, whether it’s a camera, a handgun or a mace canister, you show up to work with it every day or you’re failing to do your job.”
Voters’ concern seems to be building again with the election looming.
“Obviously for Hispanics, but I think just all voters in general right now, their main issue is overreach. They feel that there’s been abuse of power from everywhere,” said Sofia Kinzinger, a former DHS deputy assistant secretary during the president’s first term, and the wife of Trump-critical former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.). “Either you speak firmly against it, or you try to justify, which right now is the opposite of what people need.”
Jessica Piper contributed reporting.
Not everyone thinks there’s an affordability crisis.
While many Americans say the cost of living is the top issue facing the U.S. more than any other, President Donald Trump’s MAGA base does not always agree, according to a new analysis of The POLITICO Poll. Just 28 percent of voters who self-identify as part of the MAGA movement say expenses have become less affordable since Trump took office.
In fact, MAGA voters are more likely to say things have gotten better rather than worse.
That’s a stark break from the rest of the country, including the voters who backed Kamala Harris in 2024 and those who voted for Trump but do not identify as part of the MAGA movement.
The Blue Light News Poll results reveal a complicated challenge for Republicans: In an election all about the economy, cost of living concerns are reinforcing partisanship divides — entrenching Democrats’ opposition to Trump — while also driving a wedge among Republicans’ own base. Now, GOP candidates are facing frustrated voters from all sides.
Harris voters are far more likely than Trump voters to say groceries, gas and other expenses have gotten more expensive since the president took office, despite facing similar increases in household costs, according to a Blue Light News analysis of cost of living data.
Democrats hope to ride that frustration to victory in November, and have made affordability their top messaging issue this fall. They’re poised to benefit from the backlash to Trump’s economic agenda — from his unpopular tariffs to an Iran war that’s raised gas prices — which politicians and strategists widely agree are helping motivate Democratic voters.
“Those Democrats are definitely going to go vote,” said Michigan-based GOP strategist Jason Roe. “And we’ve got some voters that are a little harder to get to the polls, and when they are mad, frustrated, disappointed, disillusioned, in disagreement, and we don’t have them motivated, that’s going to be a problem.”
Many of those disillusioned Trump voters, The Blue Light News Poll suggests, are the ones who don’t identify as part of the MAGA base.
Consider the 52% of non-MAGA Trump voters who say the cost of living in their area is the “worst” it has ever been: Nearly half say they either wouldn’t vote for a Republican in the midterms or are still making up their minds.
But what is a boon to Democrats today could be a problem for them later. Partisanship also shapes how Americans remember the economy in years past, the poll results show.
Harris voters have a more favorable memory toward Democratic presidents and Trump voters have a more favorable memory toward Republican presidents, each saying life was more affordable when their party held the reins.
Democrats and Republicans simply don’t share an understanding of the economic reality — and without a common frame for the past, nor whether things are improving in the present, any party in power stands to lose its grip against an increasingly frustrated opposition when the economy is the key issue.
This year, that will be a major challenge for Republicans.
MAGA vs. Non-MAGA vs. Democrats
The Blue Light News Poll asked adults across America last month about affordability in their area, including about local prices and their memory of when prices were more affordable in the past.
Across the board, Harris voters outpaced Trump voters in their pessimism about the economy. And among Trump voters, non-MAGA voters outpaced their MAGA counterparts.
For example, 70% of Harris voters and 52% of non-MAGA Trump voters say the cost of living is worse than they can “ever remember it being.” MAGA Trump voters disagreed — a 43% plurality said the cost of living today is bad, but they could “remember times when it was worse.”
The results are a warning sign about the Trump coalition: In question after question, the president’s most loyal base is still sticking with him, but among the non-MAGA voters he convinced to back him in 2024, their frustration more closely resembles how Harris voters feel.
“There will be voters who voted for Donald Trump in 2024 who know he’s made life more expensive and won’t vote for his party this time,” said longtime Democratic strategist Jesse Ferguson. “Some will vote for a Democrat, some won’t vote. But they won’t cast a ballot for a Republican who they blame for the high cost of living.”
Of the non-MAGA Trump voters who say the cost of living is the worst they’ve seen, just 53% say they would vote for a Republican if the midterms were held tomorrow. More than 25% would vote for a Democrat or third-party candidate. The rest say they would stay home or have not yet made up their minds.
Changes to family budgets are similar on average among those that voted for Trump and those who voted for Harris, according to a Blue Light News analysis of data from the Living Wage Institute, a nonpartisan public benefit corporation that produces cost of living data. Across the country, family budgets have increased by 2.5 percent on average from early 2025 to early 2026, according to the Living Wage Institute.
But it is the concept of who is to blame that creates division among each voting bloc. Though each group is concerned about affordability — the cost of living is the most common concern for each — only MAGA Trump voters remain sympathetic to the current administration.
Young voters — and young men in particular — have also grown disillusioned with the Trump administration amid cost of living concerns, a warning sign for the GOP. Among those under the age of 25 who say the cost of living is the worst it’s ever been, 56% say they trust Democrats to bring down the costs. Just 20% trust Republicans to do the same.
“Young people feel like the system isn’t working for them,” said Joe Mitchell, a Republican running for Iowa’s open and competitive 2nd District. Mitchell, who is 29, would be the second Gen Z member to join the House if elected. “You see them being attracted to some of these DSA candidates like Zohran Mamdani. And they’re going to be attracted to these candidates if we don’t figure something out for them now.”
Partisanship even drives memory
Partisanship also colors how Americans see the past, making it difficult for any incumbent party to convince voters of plans for the future.
The Blue Light News Poll asked respondents whether it was easier or harder to afford everyday items in years past compared to today in one of two ways: In one, they were asked about a specific calendar year, and in another, the presidential administration in power at the time.
For each question framed around a calendar year, Trump and Harris voters gave similar answers. But when asked to compare how easy or hard it was to afford things during a particular presidential administration compared to today, their answers split along party lines.
For example, just over a third of both Harris and Trump voters said it was “easier” to afford everyday items in 2024 compared to today. But when asked the same question about the “end of [former President] Joe Biden’s term,” 55% of Harris voters said everyday items were easier to afford, compared to 39% of Trump voters.
The results show that Americans lack a common frame of reference on the issue most people care about — the cost of living — creating a massive hurdle for politicians hoping to win over new voters who may not be willing to listen.
The same effect happens among Trump voters looking back on a Democratic administration. When asked about costs in 2010 compared to today, 63% of Trump voters said everyday items were easier to afford then compared to now. But when asked about costs during the “middle” of former President Barack Obama’s first term — or 2010 — only 36% of Trump voters said the same.
It’s only when a political party is attached that Americans’ version of the truth changes.
When Blue Light News asked whether it was easier or harder to afford everyday items “just before the Covid-19 pandemic” or in “2019,” majorities from both parties said things were easier to afford then, and in both framings.
The challenge for both parties is that voters don’t know “who has a better plan for the future,” GOP communications strategist Kevin Madden said. “Instead, what you’re seeing is a gap — or a canyon — emerge between the rest of the country and Washington.”
He added: “When you see that gap emerge, watch out if you’re an incumbent.”
Alisa Vasquez and Andrew Howard contributed to this report.
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