On President’s Day 2026, we have every reason to be hopeful, but no reason to be complacent. Many commentators predicted that American democracy would not survive to this point. Instead of admitting they were wrong about the resilience of democracy, they are moving the goalposts, predicting that “Trump will cancel the midterms” or (alternatively) “If he doesn’t cancel the midterms, he will rig the outcome.” Or they claim he will declare martial law to prevent the transition of power in 2028.
The doomsaying industry continues to do a land-office business for a simple reason: It is easier to predict disaster than to lead the resistance. And when predictions of doom fail to materialize, everyone heaves a sigh of relief rather than asking the pundits why they were wrong.
In fairness, the predictions are not baseless, even though they evince a lack of faith in the American people. Trump expressed his desire to be “a dictator on day one.” He has violated the Constitution in ways that beggar the imagination. He imposed tariffs and waged wars without seeking congressional authorization. He unleashed a masked, heavily armed paramilitary force that has been immune to justice. He has perverted the mission of the DOJ from “seeking justice” to “seeking vengeance.” And now, he has threatened that “[t]here will be Voter I.D. for the Midterm Elections, whether approved by Congress or not!”
But on President’s Day 2026, Trump is historically weak and unpopular. The struggle is not over, but we are winning. The battle has been joined on dozens of fronts. Pro-democracy forces are winning more frequently than they are losing. Over time, that formula spells defeat for Trump and his MAGA agenda.
Democracy is at an inflection point as pro-democracy forces go on offense.
Polls are not elections, but they can serve as guideposts between elections. For months, the guideposts have pointed in the same direction, confirming that we are on the right path.
Trump often compares himself favorably to George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. But his comparisons are delusional. A YouGov poll on President’s Day Weekend confirms that Trump ranks near the bottom. See How Americans evaluate U.S. presidents and first ladies | YouGov (2/13/26).
YouGov used six ratings (Outstanding, Above Average, Average, Not Sure, Below Average, and Poor) to compare 20 presidents.
Grouping and sorting those averages into Positive Ratings minus Negative Ratings yields the following net favorability ranking:1
Abraham Lincoln: 71% favorable
John F. Kennedy: 61% favorable
George Washington: 59% favorable
Theodore Roosevelt: 50% favorable
Thomas Jefferson: 47% favorable
Franklin D. Roosevelt: 44% favorable
John Adams: 24% favorable
Ronald Reagan: 21% favorable
James Madison: 19% favorable
Barack Obama: 15% favorable
Jimmy Carter: 6% favorable
Woodrow Wilson: (-1%) unfavorable
Lyndon B. Johnson: (-1%) unfavorable
Bill Clinton: (-3%) unfavorable
Andrew Jackson: (-3%) unfavorable
George H.W. Bush: (-12%) unfavorable
Donald Trump: (-19%) unfavorable
George W. Bush: (-22%) unfavorable
Joe Biden: (-27%) unfavorable
Richard Nixon: (-36%) unfavorable
The YouGov poll understates Trump’s unfavorability. A Trump-friendly pollster interpreted recent polling as suggesting that if an election were held today, Joe Biden would defeat Trump in a presidential race. See Mediaite, Trump Friendly Pollster Stuns With Survey Comparing Biden And Trump’s Job Performance.
Per Mediaite,
When asked who did a better job as president, 48% answered with Biden and 40% answered Trump.
Rasmussen Reports head pollster Mark Mitchell argued that while he would likely not agree with voters who would choose Biden over Trump today, the numbers are undeniable.
“If an election were held TODAY between Trump and Biden, Biden would win,” he wrote on Tuesday on X.
As I wrote above, polls are not elections, but they can help us calibrate our progress. Given Trump’s horrible performance in polling over the last four months, his increasingly unhinged statements should be seen as signs of desperation—especially those that suggest he will unilaterally override state law to impose national voter ID requirements, “with or without congressional approval.”
The lunacy underlying Trump’s claim he will impose voter ID requirements “whether approved by Congress or not.”
Trump created a mini-panic last week by claiming that he would impose national voter ID requirements with or without congressional approval. He went on to cryptically claim that state control of federal elections was not the intent of the Framers—even though that is what the Constitution says!
Trump wrote on Truth Social,
This was not what our Founders desired. I have searched the depths of Legal Arguments not yet been articulated or vetted on this subject, and will be presenting an irrefutable one in the very near future.
So, to interpret, Trump claims that he has some “secret knowledge” of “legal arguments” about the “Founding Fathers’ desires.”
Sounds crazy, right? It may be crazier than we imagined, if Professor Steve Vladeck is right. See Election Law Blog, President Trump’s Claim of an “Irrefutable” Argument Supporting His Right to Unilaterally Impose Voter ID and Election Rules May Be Based on Insane Claim that Marriott Hotel Manager Found Secret Text in the Shadows of a Microfilm Copy of the U.S. Constitution.
In short, a Marriott Hotel manager claims he has discovered a “secret message” on a “shadow” in a microfilm copy of the Constitution that contains additional language not visible in the copy in the National Archives. But the “secret language” comes from a 1995 Supreme Court opinion rejecting the power of states to change the qualifications for serving in Congress—something clearly outside the “time, place, and manner” procedures committed to the states by the Constitution.
In short, the “Legal arguments not yet articulated” as the basis for national voter ID laws are literally delusional. But those lunatic arguments appear to have made their way to the Oval Office. That is how desperate Trump is. He is weak and cornered. He is grasping at shadows that exist only in the fever dreams of conspiracy theorists.
Marco Rubio’s speech at the Munich Security Conference
A speech by Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Munich Conference over the weekend has been getting a lot of press. What, exactly, did Rubio say, and why was it notable? First, he attempted to play the “nice cop” to JD Vance’s “bad cop.” (Vance gave the speech last year at the Munich Conference.)
Rubio tried to reassure Europe, but as The Atlantic notes, Rubio’s speech was notable for what it did not say. See The Atlantic, Marco Rubio Doesn’t Get It | The Trump administration continues to lambast friends and empower foes.
Per the Atlantic, the big news is that Rubio failed to mention the real threats against the US: China and Russia:
The big geopolitical story of this moment, aside from Trump, is the growing alignment and cooperation among Russia, China, and North Korea. Beijing and Pyongyang are now actively involved in a major war in Europe. . .
This authoritarian alignment is the most profound threat that the United States and its allies, in Europe and the Indo-Pacific, face. Yet there was no mention of Russia or China in Rubio’s speech.
More perniciously, the Trump administration wants to readmit Russia to the G7 and has asked Russia and China to join Trump’s Board of Peace (Russian leader Vladimir Putin said yes, China said no).
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz spoke before Rubio, reminding the US that the NATO alliance was beneficial to all parties, including the US. See Time, Germany Issues Warning to United States Amid ‘Deep Rift’.
Switching to English as he addressed American “friends,” Merz nodded to Trump’s contentious relationship with NATO, insisting that “being a part of [the alliance] is not only Europe’s competitive advantage. It’s also the United States’ competitive advantage.
The culture war of the MAGA movement is not ours,” Merz continued. “Freedom of speech ends here with us when that speech goes against human dignity and the Constitution. We do not believe in tariffs and protectionism, but in free trade. . . . We stick to climate agreements and the World Health Organization (WHO) because we are convinced that global challenges can only be solved together.
While Rubio is trying to “play nice” with NATO allies, it will take more than one conciliatory speech to convince our friends that the US is a reliable ally. And Chancellor Merz accurately described the obstacle to stronger relations: “the culture war of the MAGA movement.”
Concluding Thoughts
Jill and I are still on the road for the next two days, so I will sign off here. But there is a significant story that I haven’t mentioned: the partial government shutdown. The slow materialization of shutdown effects is keeping the story under the radar. But it will become a major test for Democrats, despite Trump’s claims of retreat from Minneapolis. Retreat is not enough. Killers must be brought to justice, violent agents must be prosecuted, and leaders who violated their oaths to the Constitution must be impeached, fired, and indicted.
None of that can happen unless Democrats hold firm.
Talk to you tomorrow!
Pro-democracy protest photos.
[Send photos to rbhubbell@gmail.com. Please include the City and State of the photo in the body of the email. No photos including minors, please. The best photos are not “poses” of smiling protesters, but instead show how protesters appear to the public. Thanks!]
Sat. Feb 14, Indivisible Resisters of Contra Costa, partnering with Immigrants Protection Services
Attached is a photo from an action from today, Saturday February 15th in Ottawa, Ontario. Two groups, Indivisible Ottawa and Anti-Trump Protests Canada collaborated with a political theater artist and called it an “Anti-ICE skate” which happened on the Rideau Canal,
Peterborough NH 54
Rockland ME
Photos of Resist with Love Standout in Watertown, MA Feb. 14th (photos by my friend Josh Touster).
Randolph, VT
Eatontown, NJ
Ocean Pines, MD
The Bridge Brigade in the Central Valley, Kings County, CA.
The Castillo de San Marcos was the site of our St. Augustine Valentine’s Day protest sponsored by St. John’s County Indivisible.
Newcastle and Damariscotta, ME
Croton on Hudson
Colville WA
Concord, CA (I altered the photo to remove minor.)
I used Claude Pro to calculate this ranking from a list generated by YouGov at https://today.yougov.com/politics/articles/54109-how-americans-evaluate-us-presidents-and-first-ladies. Use the following prompt to test and replicate my results:
Prompt:
“Using the attached image (from YouGov, first chart) showing presidential ratings across six categories (Outstanding, Above Average, Average, Below Average, Poor, Not Sure), calculate a net favorability score for each president by subtracting the combined unfavorable ratings (Below Average + Poor) from the combined favorable ratings (Outstanding + Above Average). Then rank all presidents in descending order by net favorability, showing each president’s net favorability percentage.”
From Today’s Edition Newsletter via this RSS feed
You must log in or # to comment.