Tamara Keith and Amy Walter on the pushback against Trump policies

Amna Nawaz:

President Trump is starting to face some pushback on several fronts, including from within his own party.

To discuss that and more, we turn now to the analysis of our Politics Monday duo. That is Amy Walter of The Cook Political Report With Amy Walter and Tamara Keith of NPR.

Great to see you both.

Amy Walter, The Cook Political Report:

Hi.

Tamara Keith, National Public Radio:

Good to be here.

Amna Nawaz:

So let's talk about Liz Landers' reporting earlier on that push Republicans are making in Indiana for redistricting.

Tam, as you well know, the president has been very vocal about it. He's basically strong-armed this effort, threatened political retribution. But, as Liz reported, Republicans there aren't even sure that they have the vote. So what's at stake for the president and Republicans there?

Tamara Keith:

Well, there's a lot at stake for the president. He does not want to lose the House next year. And as we saw in a series of off-year and special elections that we have seen this year, Democrats have outperformed by about 13 points.

If you take all of the Republicans that won by less than 13 points, that's a lot of Republicans in the House. So there's a very real problem. This is part of why President Trump is trying to sort of change the rules of the game.

But it also creates challenges. When you change the lines in the middle of the decade, you're messing up districts for incumbents. And some people don't want that to happen. You're also taking really safe seats and making them somewhat less safe, so that you can in theory get more seats.

And it also then set off what we have seen in California. There's now talk in Virginia about redrawing the lines there once Abigail Spanberger goes into — gets into office in January. So there is — essentially, by opening this Pandora's box…

Amna Nawaz:

Yes.

Tamara Keith:

… now it's not clear that the president actually comes out that far ahead.

Amy Walter:

Yes, I think that's exactly what happens is, in our calculations at The Cook Political Report, even if the Indiana map passed, after all of this and all of the push by Republicans and the president to draw more seats, Republicans are likely to net no more than two seats.

If Indiana doesn't pass, then it's even. It's basically a wash. So, to me, the issue isn't so much of how desperate he is to get two more seats. It was much more about — to show that he still is in charge, that this idea that people are going to push back on him, if they do, there will be consequences, hence the TRUTH Social posts, the threats to be primaried.

All the heavy pressure is really, I think, much more about the president, one, needing a win psychologically, much more than what he needs to keep control of the House, and, two, to send a signal to other Republicans that if they stray from the president's wishes, there will be consequences for that.

Amna Nawaz:

Speaking of Republicans who strayed from the Republicans' — or the president's wishes, rather, we saw Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene speak out for the first time since saying she will step down from office in a 60 Minutes interview.

Tam, as you know, she's gone from a MAGA loyalist, publicly breaking with the president. She spoke in that interview about the difference between how some of her Republican colleagues speak about the president behind closed doors versus in public. Take a listen.

Lesley Stahl, CBS News:

Behind the scenes, do they talk differently?

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA):

Yes.

Lesley Stahl:

How?

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene:

Oh, it's — it would shock people.

Lesley Stahl:

Well, let's shock people.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene:

OK.

I watched many of my colleagues go from making fun of him, making fun of how he talks, making fun of me constantly for supporting him, to, when he won the primary in 2024, they all started, excuse my language, Lesley, kissing his (EXPLETIVE DELETED) and decided to put on a MAGA hat for the first time.

Amna Nawaz:

Tam, as you know, hours after that air, President Trump railed against Greene on TRUTH Social — TRUTH Social, rather, calling her a rotten apple and a dumb person. How are you looking at all this?

Tamara Keith:

And "Traitor Greene."

So this is a story as old as time or as long as Trump has been on the political stage. You have heard Republicans talk about how privately it's different than what people say publicly. And she has — she's taken it out into the open. She is openly expressing frustration with him.

And that is leading to him lashing out. She says that she's gotten threats and all of these other things that many people have experienced, doxxing and swatting and all of these things that many people involved in politics who've gotten on the wrong side of Donald Trump have experienced.

She decided to just sort of, like, pull the parachute and quit Congress early, which actually creates far more problems for the president and his party in the House than if she stuck around and took the beating and had a primary and won or lost or whatever.

So, in a way, she's actually hurting him more by leaving Congress than by staying there.

Amna Nawaz:

How do you see this playing out?

Amy Walter:

I thought also it was interesting in this interview, when Lesley Stahl pushed her on, do you consider yourself a MAGA Republican, she said, I consider myself an America first candidate.

Amna Nawaz:

Yes.

Amy Walter:

And what's going to be fascinating, especially as we start to get post-midterms and we start talking about the presidential race and who's going to run for president in 2028, you can see this possibility of there being two lanes.

Who's the MAGA president — presidential candidate, i.e., the person who maybe has Trump's blessing, and who's going to try to run in a different lane, perhaps one that they call America first or something? So it's not going to be an anti-Trump lane as much as it's going to be something that looks not as aligned with Donald Trump himself or some of his policies.

Amna Nawaz:

Tam, in terms of what we have seen from the president when it comes to messaging on one of the biggest issues for voters, that is affordability, we now have him going to Pennsylvania tomorrow to speak about this. The whole affordability concerns is something President Trump has called a fake narrative created by Democrats.

There was a recent poll from FOX News, I should point to, that says 46 percent of voters say the president's economic policies have hurt them; 15 percent say they have helped him — helped them, rather. How do you look at the president's decision to speak on this now?

Tamara Keith:

This is long overdue.

In fact, President Trump has held a lot of events at the White House where he's held court in the Cabinet Room or the Oval Office and taken questions on a wide range of things. But he and his administration — well, administration officials have gone out on the road, but nobody notices because President Trump takes all the attention and all the oxygen.

But President Trump himself, I went back through his travel throughout this year as president. He has done less than half-a-dozen messaging-related events. Only a couple of those have been about the economy in terms of going out on the road, selling his policies to the American people, going into a swing state and a swing district, which is what he's doing tomorrow.

He's done so little of that. He's been to more sporting events than he's held events to sell his policies on the economy or sell the One Big Beautiful Bill out in the country. And so this is a shift. A senior White House official tells me there will be much more of this, but they have been telling me that for a month.

So we will see what gets added and where President Trump is welcome, because, with his approval rating as underwater as it is, there will likely come a time when there are Republicans who are in difficult seats who say, thank you so much, I would love to not have you be here.

Amna Nawaz:

Amy?

Amy Walter:

Well, and underlying all of it is this challenge that, just as we saw with this piece on soybeans, that his policies themselves, voters believe, are causing a rise in prices.

So it's not just that they believe that he as president has been doing certain things or not doing certain things. It's that the one thing that is so important to the president, this issue of tariffs, is a big weight. And without that weight or unless that weight is lessened, it's going to be very hard to sell affordability.

Amna Nawaz:

Amy Walter, Tamara Creith — Keith, rather, always great to see you both. Thank you so much.

Amy Walter:

You're welcome.

Tamara Keith:

You're welcome.