Per a new analysis from AEI’s Nate Moore, the electoral map is on the brink of a major shake-up with far-reaching political implications.

The numbers: If current population trends hold, Republican-leaning states are projected to gain 10 electoral votes, while Democratic-leaning states are set to lose 9 after the 2030 census.

• California (-3), New York (-2), and Illinois (-1) are on track to lose House seats due to population decline.

  Texas (+4) and Florida (+4) lead the gains, with Idaho (+1) and Utah (+1) also picking up seats.

Zoom out: The exodus from blue states isn’t just a right-wing talking point—even liberal pundits acknowledge that steep living costs and flawed housing policies are major reasons Democratic strongholds are losing residents.

Chart: The Liberal Patriot

A new CNN/SRRS poll finds the Democratic Party’s favorability has dropped to a record low.

The numbers: The share of Americans who have a “favorable” view of Democrats fell to 29%, down from 44% in 2017.

Plus: New Echelon Insights polling suggests Democrats aren’t exactly fired up about the fresh blood available to them—Kamala Harris leads a hypothetical 2028 primary field, far outpacing names like Gavin Newsom and AOC.

Chart: Political Polls

Related: Support for a more moderate Democratic Party has increased by 11 percentage points since 2021, according to a Gallup poll released last month.

Chart: Gallup

Zoom in: In an effort to push back against the idea that Dems are out of touch with regular voters, California Gov. Gavin Newsom has launched a podcast featuring more moderate rhetoric and conversations with conservatives.

The early returns: According to a new survey of 1,000 California voters, Newsom's favorability with liberals dropped from 46% to 30% after the podcast launch.

• The governor’s net favorability fell 10 points, from +4 to -6 overall.

• Just 20% of voters said the podcast made them want to listen to more.

• Republicans remained skeptical, with many calling him “fake” and “pandering” despite agreeing with some of his stances.

The Newsom experiment shows the trap politicians face when they try to reach across the aisle. In today’s climate, which is swarming with partisanship and conflict, straying from the party line comes at a real cost. The question is: are there politicians willing to play the long game and endure short-term blowback from their own side in order to be more appealing in a general election? If you think about it, that’s kind of what Donald Trump did, and he’s dominated GOP politics for almost a decade now.

Protests in China surged by 21% in late 2024 compared to the same period in 2023, according to the China Dissent Monitor.

Zoom in: 7,000 protests have been recorded by the CDM since 2022.

• 75% of these protests were driven by economic issues, including unpaid wages, housing disputes, and land confiscation by local governments.

Christian Science Monitor Beijing bureau chief Ann Tyson: “China’s sluggish economy is denying its citizens the job opportunities they had been led to expect. Increasingly they are protesting, or even using violence, to express their grievances.”

The latest CDC data shows a spike in U.S. measles cases, with 300 reports in 2025 so far.

• Current outbreaks are concentrated in Texas, New Mexico, and New Jersey, with isolated cases in 12 other states including California, New York, and Florida.

The numbers: While public health officials say 94-95% of the population needs to be vaccinated to prevent outbreaks, declining vaccination rates amid a rising vaccine skepticism movement threatens these benchmarks.

• 93% of U.S. kindergartners were vaccinated last year, falling below the safe threshold.

• Some areas, like West Texas, have rates as low as 80%.

One of the main goals of President Trump’s tariffs on materials like steel and aluminum is to get the U.S. to produce more of them, but at least some evidence suggests that didn’t happen during his first round of tariffs.

The numbers: U.S. aluminum production capacity dropped 32% and steel production by 3.6% since the introduction of Trump’s 2018 tariffs.

News watchdog Ad Fontes Media has released its latest “Media Bias” chart, an attempt to map the political leanings of a wide array of publications onto the left-right axis.

• Sites like Fox News and the New York Post fall into the “strong right” category, opposite their lefty counterparts such as Vox and the web edition of MSNBC.

• Per Ad Fontes, sites like NBC News, the Washington Post and CNN are more down the middle, with only a relatively slight skew toward the left.

Ad Fontes’ takeaway: Web/print news sources are the most trustworthy and least biased, with 79% of analyzed sources landing in the most reliable category. On the other hand, podcasts and TV/video are much less reliable and more prone to bias.

Related: A new study from the left-leaning organization Media Matters has found that podcasters—especially of the right-wing variety—are absolutely crushing it.

Chart: Media Matters for America

The numbers: Of the 320 ideological programs analyzed by Media Matters, right-leaning shows have five times more followers than their left-leaning counterparts and account for 82% of total followers across YouTube, Rumble, Twitch, Kick, Spotify, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.

• Right-leaning programs are expanding beyond the political space, with 42% self-identifying as comedy, sports, or entertainment.

• In the 2024 election, Donald Trump reached 23.5 million people per week via podcasts and streams, compared to just 6.4 million for Kamala Harris.

Ad Fontes Media and Media Matters are, in a way, illustrating the very problem they’re trying to diagnose. Liberals—especially the highly educated progressives who steer the Democratic Party—are busy nerding out on charts, breaking down metrics, and trying to intellectualize their struggles to connect with voters. Meanwhile, conservatives are out there making content that actually resonates with people on a gut level. There’s nothing wrong with being data-driven—analysis is important. But voters aren’t just data points; they’re people with emotions, instincts, and personal experiences.

A worrying new analysis from Financial Times chief data reporter John Burn-Murdoch finds that people today aren’t any less intelligent, but distractions and digital habits are making it harder to apply that intelligence effectively.

Cognitive decline: OECD’s PISA test reveals that reading, math, and science scores have been dropping since 2012—often more sharply before COVID than during the pandemic.

Falling numeracy skills: 25% of adults in high-income countries (and 35% in the U.S.) now struggle with using mathematical reasoning to assess the validity of statements.

Declining reading habits: In 2022, the share of Americans who read a book in the past year fell below 50%, signaling a shift away from text-based learning.

Squint and you start to see the signs of an intellectually degraded populace everywhere—dumbed-down, lowest-common-denominator content, a political climate where debate has been replaced by tribal screaming, public spaces that feel more chaotic and dysfunctional. It’s not that people are less intelligent—we just aren’t using our intelligence the way we once did. The only silver lining, as Burn-Murdoch points out, is that our brains are still fully capable. We’re just failing to live up to that potential.

For nearly 70 years, the U.S. was the world’s agricultural powerhouse—exporting more food than it imported. That era may be over, Bloomberg opinion columnist Javier Blas suggests in a new analysis.

The numbers: The U.S. is running its third straight agricultural trade deficit in 2025, with a $50 billion gap between imports and exports.

• America has lost its top wheat and soybean exporter status to Russia and Brazil; Argentina is gaining on U.S. corn.

• Farm commodity prices have dropped 50% since 2022, tightening margins for farmers.

What happened? American farming was already facing headwinds before President Trump, but trade wars, rising costs, and aggressive foreign competition have turned up the heat.

Farmers were one of Trump’s strongest voting blocs—more than 75% of voters in rural, farm-dependent counties backed him in 2024. But his latest trade war is putting that support to the test. New tariffs on China, Mexico, and Canada—America’s top agricultural buyers—could mean another round of lost export markets and tighter margins, just like in 2018. And it’s not just farmers feeling the strain. Auto workers are watching steel costs rise, small businesses are bracing for higher import taxes, and industries reliant on migrant labor could take a hit. Trump’s coalition has weathered a lot, but policies like these could create real tensions in the groups that have backed him the hardest.

Chart: The New York Times

A few years ago, big cities were bleeding residents—now, they’re growing again, according to new Census Bureau data.

The numbers: Metro areas grew by 3.2 million people from 2023 to 2024, outpacing national growth at 1.1%.

• One major caveat: Immigration drove most of the surge, adding 2.7 million people to cities, compared to just 600,000 from births.

• The Sunbelt is still booming—9 of the 10 fastest-growing metro areas were in the South, with Florida leading the pack.

Immigration is propping up urban growth, but with a new administration cracking down on border policy, what happens if that spigot gets cut off? Meanwhile, the Sunbelt’s continued rise suggests the core reasons people left cities—high costs, long commutes, and housing shortages—haven’t gone away. Are these numbers a real rebound, or just a temporary shift?

Retaliatory tariffs in response to President Trump’s increased tariffs are already much broader in scale compared to the trade war set off in his first term, according to the Tax Foundation’s Erica York.

What’s changed? In the first trade war (2018-2020), U.S. trading partners retaliated with tariffs targeting $2.7 billion in U.S. exports from Canada and $2.9 billion from the EU. Now, in 2025, those numbers have surged to $20.7 billion and $28 billion, respectively—a more than tenfold increase in retaliation.

The upshot: Trump’s tariff strategy is a gamble—and this time, the stakes are much higher. The potential upside? If tariffs successfully push companies to reshore production, they could create new domestic manufacturing jobs and reduce reliance on foreign supply chains. But the risks are just as big. The first trade war cost U.S. agriculture $27 billion in lost exports, forced the government to bail out farmers with $28 billion in subsidies, and hit U.S. brands like Harley-Davidson and Jack Daniel’s with retaliatory tariffs. Now, with trade partners targeting $190 billion in U.S. exports, the question isn’t just whether this approach can work—it’s whether the economic pain along the way will be worth it.

The clean energy transition isn’t happening as fast as some might expect, with American Enterprise Institute senior fellow Roger Pielke pointing to JP Morgan’s latest annual energy report as evidence of its steady, rather than explosive, growth.

What’s the reality? The world has spent $9 trillion on wind, solar, EVs, energy storage, and power grid upgrades over the past decade, yet the transition remains a slow, linear climb. Since 2012, the share of global energy from carbon-free sources has inched up from 14% to just over 18%, increasing by only 0.3%–0.6% per year. If that pace continues, the world wouldn’t reach 100% clean energy until sometime after 2200.

There’s no doubt clean energy has made strides—solar and wind are expanding, EV adoption is growing, and major investments keep rolling in. But when you zoom out, the hype around an imminent green energy takeover looks a bit premature. Even after trillions in spending, fossil fuels still supply 80-85% of the energy needed for industrial production—steel, cement, fertilizer, chemicals, plastics, glass—everything modern prosperity depends on. Meanwhile, solar, a key pillar of the transition, is expected to provide just 4.5% of global energy by 2027.

According to a recent NBER study, motor vehicle and manufacturing productivity has soared since the 1930s, while construction output has noticeably stagnated.

What’s driving this? Land-use restrictions and environmental regulations surged in the 1970s—right when construction productivity stalled. Meanwhile, industries like auto manufacturing kept scaling, going from 4.8 cars per worker in 1939 to 25 in 2020. The NBER study suggests restrictive zoning keeps homebuilders small and inefficient, limiting tech investment and slowing productivity. If housing scaled like manufacturing, output could be 60% higher.

The auto and manufacturing industries have made massive productivity gains, suggesting that America still knows how to build efficiently. So why hasn’t construction followed the same trajectory? Maybe it’s just the nature of the industry—or maybe layers of regulations and red tape have made it harder to build at scale. If the rules that govern homebuilding had applied to car manufacturing, would we still be assembling vehicles like we did in the 1930s?

Per a new Pew Research Center survey, 47% of Americans say people are ruder in public now than before COVID-19, including 20% who say their fellow citizens are “a lot” ruder.

• Another 44% say behavior in public is about the same, while just 9% think people are more polite.

• 34% of Americans report frequently seeing rude behavior in public, while 46% say they see it sometimes.

Connecting the dots: The Pew survey taps into something deeper than just rising rudeness—it reflects a broader sense that America just isn’t working as well as it used to. Whether it’s crime, immigration, collapsing social trust, or just the general feeling that public life is fraying, many Americans believe the country has become more chaotic, less orderly, and harder to live in.

Intellectuals like Charles Fain Lehman argue that while traditional crime stats don’t always capture the issue, disorder—public drug use, homelessness, shoplifting, fare evasion—has become more visible and more tolerated. But the frustration goes beyond policy failures. The vibe in America is off, and the sense that things are slipping out of control has fueled political movements that promise to restore order—most obviously, Donald Trump’s return to power.

According to a new Center for Strategic & International Studies report (h/t Bruce Mehlman), “a single Chinese state-owned shipbuilder produced more commercial vessels by tonnage in 2024 than the entire U.S. industry has since World War II.”

For context: China now builds over half of the world’s ships, while the U.S. accounts for just 0.1% of global shipbuilding.

Zoom out: China’s dominance in commercial shipbuilding isn’t just about economics—it’s part of how Beijing is rapidly expanding its navy. The PRC is on track for a 425-ship fleet by 2030, while the U.S. Navy is projected to stay at around 300 ships.

Washington is scrambling to respond. The bipartisan SHIPS Act is aimed at reviving U.S. shipbuilding, but reversing decades of decline won’t be easy—especially as foreign companies keep pouring money into China’s state-backed shipyards.

A new Economic Innovation Group study finds that the Opportunity Zones enacted as part of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act spurred 300,000 new housing units at a cost of just $26,000 per unit—substantially outperforming other housing incentives.

Another impressive finding: Before being designated as Opportunity Zones, these areas were falling behind economically and becoming more isolated from thriving regions. But after they were designated as OZs, their housing growth outpaced the rest of the country.

Chart: Economic Innovation Group

What is an OZ? Being designated as an Opportunity Zone means an economically distressed area becomes eligible for tax incentives to attract investment, spur development and encourage economic growth. 

• The OZ program differs from traditional housing incentives in that it primarily uses tax deferrals and reductions on capital gains to attract private investment into lower income areas, whereas traditional programs typically rely on direct subsidies, tax credits or government grants to support the construction of affordable housing.

Connecting the dots: In a video essay that made waves this week, Ezra Klein argued that President Trump’s victory was fueled by sky-high costs in Democrat-run states, where housing and economic policies have made living unaffordable. The irony is that GOP-backed, market-driven initiatives—like the TCJA’s Opportunity Zones and Texas’ pro-development stance—have arguably been more effective at boosting affordability than so-called progressive policies.

According to the latest Congressional Budget Office projections, the deficit is growing at a faster rate so far in 2025 than it did over the same period last year.

• The deficit increased by $319 billion compared to the first five months of FY 2024.

• Revenues rose by just 2% ($37 billion), while outlays surged by 7% (when adjusted for timing shifts).

• In February alone, the government incurred a deficit of $308 billion.

But hasn’t DOGE been curbing spending? Despite DOGE’s claims of trimming $55 billion from the budget as of February, analyst Jessica Riedl of the Manhattan Institute suggests the actual savings are a mere $2 billion.

The upshot: The relentless rise in government spending, despite DOGE’s headline-grabbing efforts, reinforces the idea that meaningful deficit reduction won’t come from efficiency tweaks but from addressing structural issues, such as entitlement reform.

The populist case for President Trump’s tariffs leans on the idea of working-class decline, but a major dent in that narrative—real wages are near all-time highs.

What Newsweek opinion editor Batya Ungar-Sargon tweeted on Tuesday: “In 1971, the high water mark for working-class wages, manufacturing was 25% of the U.S. GDP. Today it's 10%. Everything Trump is doing with tariffs and immigration controls is to give the American worker a shot at the American Dream again after half a century of race-to-the-bottom economics that enriched the elites. So naturally, the elites are apoplectic.”

The reaction: As a number of X users pointed out, Sargon is incorrect when she says that working-class wages peaked in 1971.

• According to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, working-class wages hit their peak more recently—in December 2024.

There’s no denying that certain economic pressures, like the soaring costs of housing and healthcare, have made life harder for workers. But at the same time, it feels like some people are so committed to a decline narrative that they always have to paint things out to be as catastrophic as possible. In my mind, this isn’t a good tendency, and it’s okay to acknowledge where things have improved.

U.S. Census and Bureau of Economic Analysis data shows the ratio of U.S. imports of machinery and transport equipment to the industry’s gross output has more than doubled over the past two decades—from 28% in 1997 to more than 60% last year.

What’s driving this? The long-term erosion of domestic manufacturing, offshoring of production to lower-cost countries and global supply chains that have made U.S. industry deeply dependent on imports.

The bottom line: You can understand why Trump wants to bring manufacturing back—after all, making more things in the U.S. sounds like a win for workers, national security, and the economy. But the problem is, U.S. manufacturers still rely on imported materials and machinery to build things here. If tariffs make those imports more expensive, it could actually hurt domestic production instead of helping it. It’s a catch-22: you want more stuff made in America, but you still need parts and equipment from overseas to make that happen. The challenge for Trump is figuring out how to unwind decades of offshoring without kneecapping the industries he’s trying to revive.

Per a new analysis conducted by The Economist, for the first time in over a decade surveys point to a slight but noticeable rebound in young people’s mental health—less depression, higher happiness, and fewer suicides.

Also: For the first time, all 50 states and D.C. have seen some recovery from the fentanyl crisis, according to a University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill analysis of CDC overdose records, which found that fatal overdoses have declined nationwide.

• Researchers are optimistic that this isn’t just a temporary dip—if current trends hold, the U.S. could see overdose rates drop back to pre-fentanyl levels.

Chart: NPR

Both The New York Times and Yahoo News just published chart breakdowns of how the pandemic changed America.

Social life: On average, we spend an extra hour and a half more at home than we did pre-pandemic.

Chart: The New York Times

Prices: Generally, economic growth has been strong in recent years as wages have gone up, and markets thrived. But inflation’s grip on consumer prices has kept many Americans from feeling the benefits.

Chart: Yahoo News

Debt explosion: What was already steep spending turned volcanic during the pandemic, with historic stimulus measures sending costs soaring.

Chart: The New York Times

Schools: Pandemic disruptions sent public school enrollment into decline, and in many states, those students haven’t returned. Instead, homeschooling and other nontraditional models have gained ground.

Chart: Yahoo News

The experts: Fumbled responses and shifting guidelines from health officials during the pandemic have given new life to anti-vaccine movements and eroded public trust in science and medicine.

Chart: The New York Times

Health: Since 2019, the number of Americans with disabilities has grown by 4 million.

Chart: Yahoo News

Hollywood: With theaters shuttered and productions frozen, annual box office revenue plunged by $9 billion, and years later, the industry still hasn’t fully bounced back.

Chart: Yahoo News

Five years on, we’re still figuring out new ways that the pandemic affected us. But contrast that with how fast the news cycle moves these days. The media’s attention span is bizarre: A candidate nearly takes a bullet to the face, and within days, the press moves on. But some random guy’s bad tweet? That’s a multi-week spectacle. The lesson is that if you want to make sense of what’s happening, tuning out the noise and keeping the long view is a necessity.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has repeatedly framed the administration’s trade policies as a win for “Main Street over Wall Street,” but do small business owners actually see it that way?

The big statistic: Per FedEx’s Small Business Trade Index survey from March 2024, 88% of small business and medium-sized firms rely on imported goods either “a lot” or “some.”

• So, we can expect that the high tariffs the administration is placing on foreign imports will impact these “Main Street” American businesses.

Bessent during a CNBC appearance this week: “I think if you want to buy things from other countries and you wanna bring it into America, then the price is gonna rise. But if you make it here, then, of course, the price won't won't rise. … There's no tariff if you make it here.”

A study from the Skeptic Research Center found that those who trusted mainstream media the most were also the most likely to downplay the financial toll of BLM protests, guessing the damage was under $1 million—when in reality, it exceeded $2 billion.

This isn’t meant to take shots at mainstream media respecters (who, polls suggest, tend to lean left). In fact, research shows that conservative audiences—Fox News viewers, for instance—have their own knowledge gaps. The more interesting food for thought isn’t who’s right or wrong, but how our media diets influence what we see and what we miss.

A new Gallup poll found Republican satisfaction with the state of the nation jumped 58 points, from 10% in January to 68% in February—the largest recorded increase since Gallup started tracking party shifts in sentiment.

On the flip side, Democrats are absolutely devastated, with just 5% feeling good with the way things are going in the country. Independents’ positive vibes about the U.S. have ticked up modestly since Trump took office, with 30% saying they like what they’re seeing.

I think this tracks pretty nicely with President Trump coming out like Rambo to open up his second term. If you’re on the team, you love it. If you’re a critic, you hate it. And if you’re indifferent, you’re feeling cautiously optimistic.

President Trump has yet to deliver on his campaign vow to conduct the “largest deportation program in American history,” but it’s probably not for lack of trying.

The numbers: In the past month, ICE made nearly 23,000 arrests and carried out 18,000 deportations.

• Arrests are up significantly, with ICE detentions peaking at 872 per day in late January before falling to under 600 per day in mid-February (This is a sharp increase from 255 daily arrests under Biden).

• But deportations aren’t keeping up with arrests: ICE deported an average of 600 people per day in mid-February, down from 750 daily deportations in the previous year.

Why? Trump is at least partially a victim of his own success—having managed to lockdown the border means fewer migrants are being arrested and transferred to ICE.

The vibes: An Axios-Ipsos poll from January found 66% of Americans support deporting immigrants who are in the country illegally.

Chart: The New York Times

In a new video for The New York Times, columnist Ezra Klein says if Democrats want to offer Americans a viable alternative to Donald Trump and populist politics, they need to admit “where the governments they run have gone wrong.”

Klein cites bureaucratic dysfunction (like the ballooning cost of California’s high speed rail project in the chart above), as well as housing affordability problems in blue states and cities, which have lost residents to red areas that offer lower costs of living, cheaper child care and less stressful commutes.

• California lost 268,000 residents in 2023.

• New York lost 179,000 residents in 2023.

• Illinois lost 93,000 residents in 2023.

The ongoing exodus from blue states could also cost Democrats politically, with Kamala Harris’s 2024 strongholds on track to lose House seats and Electoral College votes …

Chart: The New York Times

… while many red states won by Trump are set to gain seats and votes.

Chart: The New York Times

Klein with a brutal assessment of his fellow libs: “Liberals spent a generation working, at every level of government and society, to make it harder to build recklessly. They got used to putting together coalitions and legislation that gave everyone a bit of what they wanted, even if it meant the final product was astonishingly expensive or was decades late or perhaps never found its way to completion at all. They explained away government’s failures instead of fixing them. They excused their own selfishness, putting yard signs out saying no human being is illegal, kindness is everything, even as they fought affordable housing nearby and pushed the working class out of their cities.”

I think Klein is right that progressive sanctimony and a suffocating bureaucracy set the stage for the aggressive deregulatory push we’re seeing with DOGE, Trump and Elon Musk—one that, to some observers, has gone too far.

In a new analysis for the American Enterprise Institute, senior fellow James Pethokoukis connects the dots on U.S. consumer attitudes toward revolutionary new technologies.

The upshot: Americans are getting more comfortable with AI, but seem to be souring on electric vehicles somewhat. According to Deepwater Asset Management’s 2025 Frontier Tech Survey, 25% of Americans use AI daily, up from 15% last year—a 66% increase. Meanwhile, concerns that AI will take over jobs dropped by 4 percentage points.

Chart: Deepwater Asset Management

Per Deepwater, there’s been a 5 percentage point drop in Americans planning to buy an EV. On the other hand, gasoline vehicle preference increased by 6 percentage points.

Pethokoukis: “Amid the customary hand-wringing about technological dystopia that has pervaded our society for a half century, a more nuanced reality seems to be emerging. Americans aren’t so much rejecting as recalibrating their relationship with AI. Job anxieties are subsiding even as daily AI interactions are increasing. So, for now, neither a wholesale embrace nor a fearful recoil that pessimists predicted—but rather something refreshingly human: a measured adaptation that bodes well for our ability and willingness to harness these increasingly clever machines to amplify our human potential.”

If nothing else, this underscores how public enthusiasm for emerging technology ebbs and flows. EVs once seemed poised to dominate the market overnight, but adoption has slowed as practical realities emerge. AI, the latest transformative force, is now riding its own wave of hype and hysteria.

LGBTQ identification in the U.S. has risen to nearly 10%, per the latest Gallup polling. As Survey Center on American Life founder Daniel Cox and his colleagues noted in a recent analysis, much of the increase has been driven by young women, a third of whom now identify as LGBTQ.

In 2015:

• 10% of young women identified as LGBTQ.

• 6% of young men identified as LGBTQ.

In 2024:

• LGBTQ identity among young women increased by 21 percentage points.

• LGBTQ identity among young men increased by only 6 percentage points.

Nearly a 20-point gap now exists between young women and young men in LGBTQ identification. Sociologists aren’t exactly sure what’s behind the divide—although Cox and co. offer up a few possible explanations, including social media, rising societal acceptance and wokeness. Zooming out, I think it’s another data point to add to the list of ways that young men and women are diverging from each other — be it on politics, religion, education or the labor market.

A new analysis from Financial Times data guru John Burn-Murdoch hammers home how MAGA has weakened right-wing Americans’ sense of allegiance toward “the West” and liberal democracy.

The cliff’s notes: World Values Survey data shows Trump’s America is an outlier from Western Europe and the Anglosphere. Unlike U.S. Republicans of 20 years ago, Trump-era Republicans are closer to Russia and Turkey than to the UK, France, or Germany. In fact, Trump and his supporters are “misaligned even with most western conservatives.”

Related: A new YouGov poll underscores just how far Trump’s America has drifted from its traditional Western European allies.

Chart: YouGov

Burn-Murdoch: “The next four years and beyond will be a bumpy ride come what may, but it will be more navigable after accepting that the world has fundamentally changed. For decades, the US was the champion of western values. The America of Trump, Vance and Musk has left them behind.”

I have mixed feelings about MAGA’s attitude toward the West and liberal democracy. But it’s simplistic to claim Trump’s Republicans have strayed from Ronald Reagan’s ideals or aren’t “true conservatives” without acknowledging decades of U.S. foreign policy missteps, rising domestic discontent and the fact that today’s geopolitical landscape is nothing like Reagan’s era.

After briefly surpassing 50% of global market value, the U.S. stock market has since retreated, with the S&P 500 now underperforming relative to international counterparts.

Bloomberg executive editor Simon Kelly: “Having been elected with a ‘pro-growth’ plan, President Donald Trump’s erratic tariff agenda, aggressive posture towards Ukraine and push to slash government payrolls are uniting with an already weakening economy to ignite investor fears of stagflation and perhaps even recession.”

Related: The most telling thing about President Trump’s response to being asked this weekend if he expected a recession in 2025—he didn’t say, “no.” 

OK, but: Trump’s allies, like the venture capitalist hosts of the “All-In Podcast,” believe there’s a method to the apparent madness.

What the argument basically boils down to:

• Trump’s economic focus is shifting away from Wall Street and toward Main Street.

• Policies will deprioritize stock market performance and favor working-class and middle-class Americans, small businesses, and pro-innovation industries.

• Stock market deflation could be an intentional strategy to curb inflation by reducing excess cash flow that fuels consumer spending.

More from “All-In’s” Chamath Palihapitiya:

X/@chamath

(Note: Palihapitiya is incorrect when he says Trump is more popular with young people. It’s true that young men swung toward Trump in 2024, but Kamala Harris still won 54% of voters under 30.)

Here’s a roundup of new charts, news items and data points that caught our eye.

The People (Kind of) Like DOGE

CNN/Harry Enten

According to a new CBS News poll, DOGE is relatively popular, with 54% of Americans saying Elon Musk and DOGE should influence government spending and operations. More Americans see Musk’s spending cuts as a crackdown on waste (42%) rather than a loss of necessary programs (36%).

Bubba’s Two Cents: The media is in overdrive when it comes to Trump, DOGE, and Elon. That doesn’t mean their every move is brilliant, but it’s worth keeping in mind that the press often sees the world very differently than the average American.

The Price of Deficits

Chart: Andrew Lautz

Per the latest Congressional Budget Office projections, every $1 trillion increase in deficits results in $192 billion in added interest costs over a decade, meaning that a $4.5 trillion increase in borrowing would lead to $860 billion in additional interest payments by 2035.

Bubba’s Two Cents: The national debt has surpassed $36 trillion, growing faster than the economy itself, which threatens long-term financial stability. If deficits aren’t controlled, the U.S. risks higher inflation, rising interest costs and a potential fiscal crisis that could undermine the dollar’s global standing. The bottom line is the current status quo is unsustainable.

The New GOP Voter

Chart: Echelon Insights

A new Echelon Insights poll reveals a significant ideological shift among Republicans, with a majority favoring the "New Right" approach over Traditional Conservatism on key issues such as immigration, economic policy, social challenges, and government intervention, indicating a growing preference for nationalism, cultural conservatism, and economic populism.

Bubba’s Two Cents: Some conservatives—particularly those who follow outlets like The Dispatch—still seem caught off guard when GOP voters back policies that break from traditional small-government ideals. While I respect that principled perspective and even share much of it, at some point, we have to acknowledge that today’s Republican Party isn’t the same one from 2016. I think it’s time to move on from this fight.

Political Consultants

Yale News

A new study from Yale suggests that the so-called experts in political strategy are no more skilled than everyday Americans at picking out winning campaign messages.

Bubba’s Two Cents: The idea that political strategists are no better at predicting voter behavior than regular people taps into a much bigger theme—whether in media, public health, or government, the public is increasingly skeptical that so-called experts actually know best.

Big Job Cuts

Chart: CNBC

Layoff announcements surged in February, hitting 172,017—the highest level since July 2020—with more than a third coming from Elon Musk’s push to cut federal jobs under Trump's directive to shrink government.

Bubba’s Two Cents: The economy isn’t necessarily in bad shape, and the Trump administration does seem to have an economic plan—even if it’s a controversial one—but their moves are undeniably putting pressure on people and fueling uncertainty. Tariffs are expected to be inflationary (as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent acknowledged this week), mass layoffs from DOGE are hitting the labor market and Trump’s unpredictable shifts on economic policy are rattling the stock market. Even if these policies have a long-term strategy, they’re already making Americans nervous in the short term.

One Media Insight

Gavin Newsom

In a surprising exchange during the debut of his new podcast, Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom spoke with conservative activist Charlie Kirk and acknowledged that Republicans dominate the media landscape, saying they “are flooding the zone with content, policy, and messaging — every. single. day.”

Bubba’s Two Cents: The media battleground has been transformed. Once dominant in Hollywood, culture, and the traditional press, Democrats have seen their grip on mass communication unravel. President Trump’s strategy—leaning on podcasts and a powerful social media influencer network—hasn’t just leveled the playing field; it’s put Republicans in the driver’s seat. Newsom’s admission reflects a reality that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.

Disaster Mayor

X/@Brandon4Chicago

In a since-deleted tweet, embattled Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson—who has an approval rating of 7%—touted his administration’s $11 billion investment to build 10,000 affordable housing units. That breaks down to a staggering $1.1 million for each unit of “affordable” housing.

Bubba’s Two Cents: A growing wave of frustration with big-city leadership is showing up in voter attitudes. Concerns over crime and disorder have ticked up, and the 2024 election showed a clear shift toward Trump in urban areas as Americans look for alternatives.

The data points and headlines below paint a picture of a second Trump term shaped by economic uncertainty, voter skepticism and a media landscape in flux. While Americans worry about inflation, President Trump’s policies and rhetoric are sparking fresh debate over the direction of the country—and who gets to define it.

The public reaction to Trump’s latest address to Congress:

How the reaction compared to his past speeches:

CNN

How the reception compared to other presidents:

CNN

Trump’s marathon address was exactly what you’d expect—boastful, combative and laced with self-congratulation over his administration’s rapid-fire policy moves.

Bubba’s Two Cents: It’s tempting to overanalyze the moment. But at the end of the day this whole affair—Trump’s boasting, Democrats resisting—is more spectacle than substance. The real takeaway from the polling is that, despite all the momentum his administration seemingly has right now, Trump is still a polarizing figure, especially when stacked against past presidents.

An Oil Trend

Chart: Reuters

Per a new American Enterprise Institute analysis, 2024 was “another banner year” for U.S. energy. For the seventh year in a row, the U.S. led the world in oil production, setting yet another record in December 2024. Natural gas followed suit, surging 45% since 2014 and notching its fourth consecutive year of record-breaking output.

Bubba’s Two Cents: The big picture here is that the United States has steadily reshaped the global energy balance, cutting into OPEC’s dominance and loosening the grip of oil-rich but politically volatile nations. As American production soars, reliance on Russia and Middle Eastern suppliers has waned, shifting the power dynamics of the energy market. Drill baby, drill?

New “Chart of the Century”

Chart: Mark J. Perry

Economist Mark J. Perry is out with his latest "Chart of the Century," which tracks price changes in U.S. consumer goods and services from 2000 to 2024, revealing a sharp divergence—while essentials like healthcare (+256%), college tuition (+188%), and housing (+104%) have far outpaced overall inflation (87.3%), consumer goods like TVs (-98%), toys (-74%), and software (-74%) have become dramatically more affordable.

Bubba’s Two Cents: Few things illustrate the tensions at the heart of the U.S. economy better than Perry’s chart—why do TVs and software keep getting cheaper while hospital visits and college degrees skyrocket? Is government intervention the culprit? Should we be bringing more manufacturing back home? Or is this just the way modern economies evolve? One visual, endless opinions.

NYT Writers on Trump’s First Month

Chart: The New York Times

A new chart from The New York Times ranks issues from Trump’s first month based on how important and impactful Times columnists and opinion writers think they are, with Ukraine seen as the most significant and topics like trans issues and the Eric Adams case as least consequential.

Bubba’s Two Cents: If you ever needed proof that The Times still sees itself as the gatekeeper of political discourse, this chart delivers. But, as conservative activist Christopher Rufo has noted, here’s what’s actually interesting: even their hand-picked commentators are conceding that DEI’s time has passed. When the consensus starts shifting in their circles, you know the tides have turned.

Trump’s Priorities

Chart: CBS News

A new CBS News/YouGov poll reveals what Americans believe should be top priorities for Donald Trump’s presidency. The economy (82%) and inflation (80%) dominate the list, reflecting ongoing financial concerns. Meanwhile, the federal workforce, which has been a primary focus for Trump and DOGE, ranks comparatively lower.

Bubba’s Two Cents: I don’t think we should be panicking about the economy right now. But the fact is the unemployment rate is starting to tick up and consumers are cutting spending. The new administration has deflected criticism so far by saying this is still Joe Biden’s economy. I think that’s a totally fair argument right now, but it won’t be forever.

University Bloat

Chart: American Enterprise Institute

A new analysis from American Enterprise Institute senior fellow Preston Cooper captures the scale of administrative bloat at American colleges and universities. The top 20% of colleges with the highest staff-student ratios have 366 noninstructional staff per 1,000 students—more than one staff member for every three students.

Bubba’s Two Cents: With DOGE charging full speed ahead on slashing inefficiencies, it’s no surprise that bloated institutions—especially those propped up by government funding—are in the crosshairs. Sure, the Trump administration’s cost-cutting moves have—in some cases justifiably—ruffled feathers, but there’s a real case to be made that administrative excess isn’t just a government problem—it’s ballooned across universities, public schools and even healthcare.

The Bias Meter

The Los Angeles Times

This week, the Los Angeles Times rolled out its new AI-powered "Bias Meter," which analyzes and labels articles along the political spectrum while also providing alternative viewpoints and summaries of each piece. The move comes as part of new owner Patrick Soon-Shiong’s efforts to combat perceptions of bias in the mainstream press and to restore the declining credibility of the industry.

Bubba’s Two Cents: I applaud the effort but ultimately I don’t think this is the right solution because the large majority of the U.S. public is under no illusion of where the mainstream media’s sympathies lie. If it’s even possible to fix things (currently nearly 70% of Americans say they have zero or very little trust in mass media), the reforms are going to have to be much deeper and take place at a fundamental level.

Stocks fell Monday after President Trump’s new tariffs went live, prompting immediate retaliation from Canada and China and raising fears of an escalating trade war.

1. Markets reeled Monday as Trump's new tariffs sent shockwaves through Wall Street, causing the S&P 500 and Dow to tumble before staging a partial rebound.

Chart: The New York Times

2. Stocks in industries that would be hit hardest by Trump's tariffs have dropped significantly since late January, while the broader S&P 500 has remained steady.

Chart: Bloomberg

3. The Atlanta Fed’s latest projections predict the economy will shrink by 2.8% in early 2025, the biggest drop since the pandemic, sparking fears of a "Trumpcession" as concerns grow over the administration’s trade policies.

Chart: Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta

4. Trump’s 25% universal tariff on all imports from Canada and Mexico, as well as 20% tariff on Chinese products, will impact 43% of all U.S. goods.

Chart: Apricitas Economics

5. Economist Joseph Politano argues that because North American supply chains are so interconnected, tariffs on Canada and Mexico could ripple through the U.S. economy—hurting manufacturing, raising gas prices and squeezing food supplies.

Chart: Apricitas Economics

5. Consumers have rushed to purchase vehicles and durable goods in anticipation of tariff-induced price increases, mirroring patterns seen during Trump’s first term.

Chart: Apricitas Economics

6. Compared to its closest trade allies, the U.S. has traditionally maintained lower tariffs, according to data from the WTO.

Chart: Southern AG

7. The U.S. trade deficit has been growing since the 1970s, driven largely by a surge in imported manufactured goods, which hit a record $1.31 trillion in 2022—five times higher than in 1992.

Chart: Visual Capitalist

Bubba’s Two Cents

In a new analysis for the Manhattan Institute, economist Joshua Hendrickson tries to “make sense of the Trump tariffs.”

Why Trump wants tariffs: To maintain but reduce the financial burdens of the U.S.’s role as the world’s monetary leader, curb national debt and rebuild American manufacturing.

What’s wrong with the current system? The U.S. dollar is the world’s go-to currency, which keeps it overvalued. That makes foreign goods cheaper but pushes jobs overseas and encourages government overspending because global demand for dollars lowers borrowing costs.

How tariffs help: The thinking is that tariffs could pressure other countries to negotiate policies that weaken the dollar, making U.S. exports more competitive and domestic manufacturing more viable. The goal is short-term pain aimed at long-term economic stability.

I think also helpful in understanding Trumponomics is this tweet from a prominent pro-Trump X user:

“…there will be an initial severe overreaction in the economy – this economy propped up with debt (generating asset bubbles) and artificially suppressed wages (as a result of illegal immigration). Markets will tumble. But when the storm passes and everyone realizes we are on sounder footing, there will be a rapid recovery to a healthier, sustainable economy.”

I have a hard time buying this strategy. In general, market driven choices are better at correcting imbalances than government-imposed fixes, and tariffs feel like playing with fire. Maybe they’re really playing 5-dimensional chess and we just don’t understand their genius, but history suggests economic storms don’t always pass the way policymakers predict.

In President Trump’s State of the Union address just now, he said we may see “a little disturbance” in the economy. Let’s hope that’s accurate, or else their administration will have touched a hot stove.

While MAGA generally rejects government meddling in personal choices, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s health-focused movement is pushing for restrictions on junk food in food-aid programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps. (WSJ)

Chart: Cato Institute

The latest: Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders is leading an effort to prevent SNAP recipients from using their benefits to buy soda, candy and desserts.

• The state is preparing a waiver request to the USDA, which, if approved, would allow Arkansas to restrict certain food items from SNAP purchases.

• Republican lawmakers in Arizona, Indiana, Kansas, Texas and Wyoming have introduced similar bills.

• Brooke Rollins, recently appointed as Secretary of Agriculture in the Trump administration, has signaled that the USDA is open to approving state-led restrictions on SNAP purchases, specifically targeting soda, candy, and other sugary or highly processed foods.

• Historically, USDA has denied similar requests for over 20 years, arguing that such restrictions would be too difficult to enforce.

The visual: According to USDA data, soda ranks as the most frequently bought item with SNAP benefits.

Chart: The Wall Street Journal

The numbers: A USDA study analyzing 2011 data found that approximately 23% of SNAP households' food purchases were for sugary drinks, desserts, salty snacks, candy, and sugar, collectively categorized as "junk food."

• Within this category, sweetened beverages alone accounted for about 9.25% of total purchases by SNAP households.

• More than $23 billion of SNAP funds—nearly a quarter of its $100 billion budget—goes toward junk food like soda, candy, chips, and desserts each year.

• A 2018 study analyzing diet trends from 1999-2014 found that while overall diet quality improved among U.S. adults, SNAP participants consistently had worse diets and did not meet healthful diet recommendations.

Chart: Cato Institute

The resistance: President Trump, a Diet Coke fan, is hesitant about soda bans, citing their unpopularity among his base.

• The American Beverage Association found that nearly 60% of Trump voters support allowing soda purchases with SNAP benefits.

• Walmart, where 94% of SNAP recipients shop and which accounts for over 25% of SNAP spending, is opposed to restrictions.

• Meanwhile, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo are lobbying against restrictions, arguing they alienate Trump’s working-class voters.

Trump 1.0 Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue during a House Agriculture Committee hearing in 2017:

Bubba’s Two Cents

The MAGA coalition has become an uneasy fusion of ideological factions, and the soda debate exposes its internal cultural tensions. Trump’s ability to appeal to a wide spectrum of groups means MAGA is constantly negotiating its identity. For instance, the president embodies the blue-collar, Big Mac-loving, Diet Coke-drinking image of the movement, yet MAGA has also attracted health-conscious RFK Jr. supporters and Silicon Valley biohackers who take wellness very seriously. These competing visions of personal freedom and government responsibility are now colliding in ways that weren’t as visible in earlier iterations of MAGA.

At the core, this isn’t really about junk food—it’s about the evolving role of government in the conservative movement. Where the Tea Party once rejected government interference, today’s right is increasingly willing to use state power to enforce its priorities. Similarly, the GOP’s old guard would have balked at regulating food choices, but today, intervention is no longer seen as inherently bad—it just depends on who’s wielding the power and to what end. Another way to think about it—does the modern right lack principles or is it simply pragmatic?

President Trump has vowed not to make cuts to Medicaid, but Congressional Republicans’ latest move may open up the path to doing exactly that. (NYT)

The latest: The latest House Republican budget resolution, narrowly passed Wednesday by a 217-215 vote, proposes significant spending cuts totaling $2 trillion.

• While the resolution does not explicitly detail reductions to Medicaid, it instructs the House Energy and Commerce Committee to identify at least $880 billion in cost savings over the next decade, with Medicaid expected to be a primary target for these cuts.

The options: Possible measures to trim Medicaid spending include—

• Work requirements for certain adults (~$100 billion savings).

• Stricter eligibility checks, requiring more paperwork (~$160 billion).

• Limiting state hospital taxes, which currently help states increase federal Medicaid funding (~$175 billion).

• Reducing funding for Medicaid expansion, potentially forcing states to drop coverage (~$560 billion).

The message: Speaker Mike Johnson stressed that the House GOP bill does not explicitly mention Medicaid but hinted in a CNN interview with Kaitlan Collins that changes to the program could still be on the table.

Johnson:

Bubba’s Two Cents

The new Trump administration has been feeling itself. With little of a GOP “establishment” left to resist him, the president has made bold—arguably unprecedented—moves that have royally pissed off his opponents and thrilled his supporters. His first term, in hindsight, looks almost restrained.

To some, this is exactly what America needs: a wrecking ball smashing through Washington’s stale, bipartisan status quo. This is what voters wanted, what they demanded.

But as the Medicaid shake-up signals, there’s danger in unchecked power. So far, Trump has skated by without serious grassroots blowback, but that could change. Signs of public discontent—falling approval ratings, economic jitters—suggest the tide might not stay in his favor forever.

Has the demise of American religious life been overstated? (Pew Research Center)

Chart: Pew Research Center

The latest annual Pew Research Center Religious Landscape Study: Over the past few decades, Christian identification in the U.S. has fallen sharply, but in the past few years it looks to have stabilized, or even ticked up slightly.

• In 2023-24, 62% of U.S. adults identified as Christian, down from 71% in 2014 and 78% in 2007, but the share has remained between 60-64% since 2019.

• 7% of U.S. adults identify with a religion other than Christianity, up from 4.7% in 2007.

• 86% of Americans believe in a soul/spirit beyond the body, and 83% believe in God or a universal spirit.

OK, but: The slowing of religious decline in the U.S. may be temporary, as deeper trends continue to pull people away from faith.

• The ranks of Americans unaffiliated with any religion grew from 16% in 2007 to 29% in 2023-24.

• For every 6 people who leave Christianity, only 1 converts to it.

• Younger generations are less religious, with 43% of adults aged 18-24 identifying as unaffiliated, compared to 13% of those 74+.

The vibes: There does seem to have been a conscious push to revive Christianity and religion in intellectual, political and cultural life.

• Prominent figures once indifferent to religion—like Joe Rogan and Elon Musk—are now voicing support for Christianity, mirroring a spate of high-profile religious conversions, like those of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. running mate Nicole Shanahan and actor Russell Brand.

• Once dominated by outspoken atheists like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, the intellectual world is now reconsidering religion, a trend Free Press journalist Peter Savodnik has closely documented.

Savodnik:

Bubba’s Two Cents

Christianity’s trajectory in the U.S. is full of contradictions—its decline has slowed, yet secularization marches on. At the same time, political and cultural forces are amplifying religious identity, with overt pro-Christian messaging from figures on the right, including influencers and politicians.

But these self-conscious displays could actually be a symptom of Christianity’s weakened cultural footing—once an unspoken pillar of American identity, it now requires deliberate reinforcement.

Meanwhile, widespread dissatisfaction with how digital our everyday lives have become has sparked a search for deeper meaning. It’s no surprise then that faith is experiencing a resurgence even amid a broader secular shift.

A wave of recent findings help illustrate why President Trump and the DOGE crew feel emboldened to dismantle centralized government authority.

The study: Amid widespread concerns about government waste and fraud, a new study has found that federal grants fuel corruption at the local level.

• Between 1990 and 2022, federal grants to local governments ballooned nearly ninefold, reaching $1.2 trillion.

• According to researchers, these funds are associated with a 28% spike in corruption cases against public officials in the grant recipient areas.

The analysis: Per a new analysis by Hoover Institution senior fellow John Cochrane, DOGE’s mission to streamline and cut down on regulatory red tape in the U.S. could pay huge dividends for the economy.

• As he notes, deregulation in Argentina led to 30% price declines in textiles, logistics, and agricultural products.

• Meanwhile, removing rent controls in Buenos Aires resulted in 30% lower rents due to increased supply.

• Cochrane suggests were DOGE to undertake similar measures in the U.S., it could lead to as much of a decade of 3% extra GDP growth per year.

The quote: In a new interview with Ezra Klein, political analyst Martin Gurri suggests the era of Obama-style governance—where experts and technocrats rule the day—is giving way to Trump’s more democratic approach, where expertise takes a back seat to raw intuition.

Gurri: 

Bubba’s Two Cents

DOGE is imperfect, but attempts to characterize it as an authoritarian “coup” misunderstand the wider political context. DOGE is a symptom of the broad unraveling of trust in centralized power—whether in government budgets, regulatory frameworks, or elite control. Across the board, institutions are seen as bloated, ineffective, and corrupt, and people are increasingly demanding alternatives.

Let’s take a look at recent political history. Obama’s era was about governing through experts, stability, and global cooperation. Trump’s rise is a direct revolt against that—prioritizing instinct, disruption and raw power. I predict this appetite for shrinking government, scrapping regulations, and challenging the elite isn’t going away. It’s not just a Trump-era trend; it’s a long-term shift in the political landscape.

Ironically, while Trump has ostensibly weakened the centralized power of the government by going after the bureaucracy, he’s also expanded executive control—dismantling institutions while consolidating authority in the presidency. A contradiction at the heart of his administration.

Recent developments suggest the new media status quo faces challenges of its own.

Chart: Pew Research Center

A new Pew Research Center report: More than 1 in 5 Americans now get their news from social media influencers, but the amount of attention garnered by any single personality is small.

• 425 different names were mentioned when respondents to Pew’s survey were asked to identify a news influencer.

• The most frequently named influencer, Phillip DeFranco, racked up only 3% of responses.

• Meanwhile, Tucker Carlson and Ben Shapiro, two of the biggest names in news media, managed only 2% each.

Related: A 2023 WPA Intelligence survey revealed that despite their online prominence, right-wing media figures like Tim Pool and Jack Posobiec remain relatively unknown to most Republican voters.

• 75% of Republicans said they were unfamiliar with Posobiec, and 74% said the same about Pool.

Semafor media reporter Maxwell Tani on the fragmented nature of the current media landscape:

Bubba’s Two Cents

Lately, I’ve been thinking about how news businesses today produce content in one of three categories: viral content, journalism, or programming (think habit-forming newsletters or podcasts).

In the past, mainstream media operated under the guise of journalism, but it ultimately collapsed under its own bias—not just in what it covered, but how it covered it.

Now that the media landscape has splintered, that vacuum isn’t being filled with real journalism. Alternative media has disrupted the status quo, but it often prioritizes entertainment over reporting.

Few of the new players seem interested in building true news organizations. Instead, they’re chasing business incentives, which, from a tactical media perspective, don’t require real reporting. Reporting is difficult, expensive, and valuable when done well—but it’s a lot easier to produce hot takes. The new media environment is flooded with people reacting to existing reporting, whether through viral X posts or long-form commentary in podcasts.

But the real antidote to the “fake news” conservatives have long criticized isn’t just countering narratives—it’s putting authentic, rigorous journalism at the center of them.

Right now, what’s rising up instead seems to be anything but.

With an all-out assault on the federal bureaucracy taking center stage, Trump 2.0’s first month was a calculated storm of disruption, norm shattering and overhauling of government institutions.

The EOs: As political analyst Bruce Mehlman pointed out in the latest edition of his excellent “Six-Chart Sunday” series, the 70 executive orders President Trump has signed in 30 days “exceeds those in the first 100 days of every President since 1933.”

Chart: Financial Times

Zoom in: This handy Axios chart breaks down the president’s executive actions from Inauguration Day to Feb. 19, revealing a strong focus on restructuring the government, foreign policy and immigration.

Chart: Axios

The economy: As Mehlman noted, Trump sees a healthy stock market as proof of his economic success, but fears that trade wars and deportations will hurt profits have dragged down tariff-exposed stocks since his inauguration.

Chart: Bloomberg via Bruce Mehlman

Inflation: Voters prioritized inflation and the economy in 2024, but Trump’s efforts so far haven’t moved the needle, with prices climbing higher than expected last month.

Chart: Financial Times

Immigration: Illegal border crossings plunged in the first few weeks of Trump’s new term, building on a downward trend that began under Joe Biden.

• Border arrests at the U.S.-Mexico border fell to 29,000 in January, down from 47,000 in December, and declining from a peak of 250,000.

Chart: The Wall Street Journal

The vibes: Per FiveThirtyEight’s polling aggregator, Trump’s net approval rating remains positive.

• However, his approval numbers have slipped in recent days while disapproval ratings have trended up, suggesting Americans may be starting to sour on the president.

• According to a CNN/SSRS poll, 55% support Trump’s deportation policies or want him to go further.

• On the other hand, 62% of Americans say Trump has not done enough to lower prices.

Chart: FiveThirtyEight

Bubba’s Two Cents

How should we judge President Trump’s first month? Well, It depends.

I’ve noticed that supporters fixate on the big picture while overlooking flaws in the details. They point out widespread dissatisfaction with the status quo and note that “this is what people voted for.” I’d caution them on getting overly confident. For instance, reports suggest some Republican lawmakers are privately “starting to freak out over the likely impact of severe cuts on their own states.” Elon Musk is clearly taking a chainsaw—not a scalpel—to the government. So I wouldn’t be too surprised if at least some of the administration’s aggressive cuts end up being unpopular once the dust clears.

X/@elonmusk

On the other hand, many of Trump’s critics seem to be incapable of objectively evaluating the president. To them, acknowledging anything positive about Trump’s policies is the same as endorsing everything about him. They can’t understand how anyone could support the man. I’d caution them that a similar lack of sensitivity toward their fellow Americans is a big reason why Trump got elected—twice.

As always, it’s complicated.

While streaming was once hailed as a revolutionary alternative to cable, many of the same pitfalls—rising costs, increasing ads, and content dilution—have made it, in some ways, an even worse experience.

Chart: Genuine Impact

The latest: Last week, the streaming service Hulu sent an email to subscribers announcing that even its ad-free plans would contain some ads.

• In a comment to the AV Club, Hulu clarified this would apply only to sports and live events.

• As the AV Club’s Emma Keates noted, this is a continuation of the industry consensus that “streaming is reinventing cable.”

Zoom out: In recent years, streaming has overtaken cable as the most widely used TV viewing service.

• Streaming services now make up roughly 40% of total TV consumption in the U.S.

Chart: Axios

The costs: “Cord-cutting” was supposed to be a way for consumers to get away from cable packages that had become expensive and bloated with channels they never watched.

• The average cable bill in 2013 was around $65.

• Today, bundling multiple major streaming services often surpasses that figure.

• The average U.S. consumer now spends $61/month on video streaming, up from $48 in 2023.

Bubba’s Two Cents

A big part of the reason we launched Bubba News was to counter the short-sighted incentives we saw in media—news outlets churning out clickbait for traffic, and streamers like Netflix flooding the market with content just to keep subscribers hooked.

Sure, business metrics matter, but when the focus shifts from quality to pure monetization, you lose sight of the actual product. These short-term tactics may boost numbers, but it's still not meeting audiences where they want in the end.

I try to break media down into production and distribution, and a smart person I know framed it well: “Content is king, but distribution is the queen, and she wears the pants.”

This gets at the tension media companies face, and after working in a handful of startup media companies that (for lack of a better term) whored themselves out, I just happen to think that compromising audience satisfaction is a bridge too far. Media companies would be better served to really think about audience first and balancing that with the distribution demands that successful business requires.

Here are some of the more interesting charts, quotes and insights we’ve seen recently.

In a new interview with the Free Press, Tablet editor-in-chief Alana Newhouse tries to make sense of the current political moment by differentiating between “brokenists” and “status-quoists.”

The Free Press

I think a lot of the more well-educated people in America still underestimate how dissatisfied the masses are with the status quo…

Some prominent media voices believe the online right, emboldened by Trump’s victory, is repeating the left’s mistake—getting too extreme and pushing away middle-of-the-road Americans.

Check out Thomas Chatterton Williams in The Atlantic…

The Atlantic

…and River Page in the Free Press.

The Free Press

Related: The latest polling shows the president’s approval rating is slipping.

X/@ForecasterEnten

According to DOGE’s official website, it has already saved Americans an estimated $55 billion. But per a new NPR analysis of “verifiable work completed so far,” the savings add up to just $2 billion.

Chart: NPR

Others have pointed out apparent issues with the methodology DOGE is using to calculate its savings figures, such as including the full price of a canceled contract even when some or most of the money has already been spent.

Last week, we wrote about how Congress has been deferring its power to the executive branch, and cited the 118th Congress passing only 274 laws as one example.

As Bruce Mehlman, a friend of this newsletter, pointed out in an email to me, while laws may be fewer in number, they’re much longer in length. Bruce cautioned, “The notion that “Congress never gets anything done” is wrong and risky for those who fail to engage.” Bruce never fails to make good points.

Chart: Mehlman Consulting

Trump was swept into office amid an undeniable backlash against Democratic and progressive governance, but recent polls suggest the U.S. as a whole leans toward the political middle.

Exhibit A: 60% of Republicans want GOP lawmakers to push back on Trump when they disagree, according to a new CBS News survey.

Exhibit B: A new Gallup poll has found the share of Democrats who want their party to move toward the center has risen by 11 percentage points since 2021.

• Over the same period of time, the percentage of Republicans who think the GOP should be more moderate has increased by just 3%.

• However, the share of GOP voters who think the party needs to become more conservative has dropped 12%.

Chart: Gallup

Exhibit C: Nearly 6 in 10 Americans think the U.S. needs a third major political party, and the share of Americans who have unfavorable views of both the GOP and Democratic Party has spiked in recent years.

Chart: Axios

Trump so far: In general, Americans seem pretty okay with the Trump admin’s actions, thus far.

• 70% of Americans believe the president is doing exactly what he campaigned on, per a new CBS News/YouGov poll.

• Meanwhile, Trump’s approval ratings have never been better, with 53% of Americans saying they like the job he’s doing as president.

Mixed reviews: When you get down into the nitty gritty, support for Trump’s specific executive orders has more variance.

• According to a new Marquette Law School poll, 63% of voters support the administration’s order mandating that the government only recognize two sexes—male and female—and 60% support expanding oil and gas production and deporting illegal immigrants.

• But per the same poll, 65% oppose Trump’s pledge to "take back the Panama Canal,” and 71% oppose renaming the Gulf of Mexico.

• A new Ipsos poll found 56% support freezing U.S.-funded foreign assistance and declassifying records on JFK, RFK and MLK Jr.'s assassinations.

• But 62% oppose freezing federal funding for U.S. government grants and services, and 55% oppose barring transgender individuals from military service.

Bubba’s Two Cents

Over the last decade-plus, Democrats channeled their power into reshaping culture, speech norms, and policy (think DEI, gender politics, big spending). But the tide turned, and now, with a thin House majority, Republicans are seizing their moment, racing to remake government and society.

As CNN senior writer Zachary Wolf wrote, “Add together Trump’s many large policy goals — mass deportation, a much smaller bureaucracy, a why-bother attitude toward climate change — and he could leave behind a much different country than the one he took over from President Joe Biden.” 

Would incremental change be more effective in the long run than a sweeping overhaul designed to remake government in the en vogue party’s vision? Is that even possible? The question is not if but when the pendulum will again swing back, but maybe that cycle of overreach-to-backlash is an essential feature of our politican system that keeps American politics in balance.