Trump’s Disastrous War Comes Home to Roost

Three big risks threaten that things will only get worse

As unpopular as Donald Trump’s ill-conceived, incompetently managed war was when it began, it is now more unpopular with a key segment of voters. “Trump’s net approval of -20 for handling the situation in Iran represents a drop from last week’s poll. Then, 39% of Americans approved of how Trump was handling Iran and 52% disapproved — a net approval of -13,” The Economist/YouGov reported last week. While Democrats and Republicans have not changed their minds about the war much, “opinion among Independents of how Trump’s handling Iran fell to 24% approve / 63% disapprove (-39 net) this week from 30% approve / 53% disapprove last week (-23 net).”

The longer the war drags on, and the higher gas prices go, the worse those poll numbers will look for Trump and his pusillanimous enablers in Congress. In every war since WWII, as NPR’s Domenico Montanaro recently recounted, approval of the conflict has decreased dramatically over time. George W. Bush lost 71 points in his approval by 2007 (from his high in the aftermath of 9/11). LBJ’s debacle in Vietnam (which the open-ended Iran quagmire has begun to resemble) cost him 43 points and another run for re-election. In Trump’s case, further decline in support may be even more acute for a war that the public never favored.

Several factors increase the likelihood that Trump’s support will crater.

First and foremost, a decomposing president, plainly out of his depth, is on display as the public increasingly grasps that this debacle was predictable and entirely avoidable. While Trump claims not to have known (“no one expected”!) Iran would close the Strait of Hormuz or attack Gulf allies, news reports and lawmakers briefed by high-ranking career military say this is simply untrue. (He was even briefed on this in his first term.)

Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) explained the depth of Trump’s blunder in this exchange with me about Trump’s decision-making:

I will not guess what went through that man’s mind. But I’ll say this: senior military and intelligence planners have for decades predicted that whenever Iran felt they really had their back to the wall and it was existential that they closed the Strait of Hormuz, they would strike regional allies of the United States, and they would use some of their many tools — ballistic missiles, drones, cyber-attacks, and a global network of distributed terror cells. We’re seeing all of that come true now. And whether Trump ignored them, didn’t believe them, or just wasn’t focused, I think his national security advisor and secretary of state, Marco Rubio, certainly was well aware of these challenges. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs certainly was well aware of the challenges. … But it was willful blindness to historical analysis.

Voters’ anger may well rise as they learn more about Trump’s stupidity and Republicans’ refusal to challenge him.

Second, even if Trump wants to, it will become obvious that he has lost control of the timeline and the ballooning cost of the war. Iran learned the lesson of Ukraine (and Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan—not to mention decades of regional battles) about asymmetric warfare. Experts suspect Iran has an almost limitless reserve of cheap drones (not to mention stored up missiles) that can continue to strike our military facilities, the Strait of Hormuz, and the Gulf states’ oil facilities. The Economist explained, “time is on Iran’s side,” because “America and Israel will gradually run out of useful targets to strike from the air, or run low on interceptor batteries to see off Iranian weapons” while Iran has plenty of drones and missiles (and continues to produce more).

One day, Trump declares he is considering “winding down” the war. The next, Trump is threatening to blow up all Iranian power plants if it does not open the Strait of Hormuz in 48 hours. With each breathless, erratic pronouncement, he advertises his own panic and confusion.

As if to underscore the magnitude of his blunder, Trump apparently will seek a stunning $200B in more funding, a stupefying amount suggesting the war could go on for months. Unsurprisingly, Republicans are petrified to take sole responsibility for the war. Few, if any, Democrats will vote for it (leaving the Senate well short of 60 votes); if Republicans use the reconciliation process, they may not even have a majority of Republicans. Moreover, they would have to find a way to “pay” for the massive expenditure within the 10-year budget window.

This funding dilemma of their own making (made inevitable when they voted down a War Powers Act resolution giving Trump a green light for open-ended war) reinforces voters’ perception that Trump and MAGA are focused on the wrong things. Republicans splurge on wars and tax cuts for the rich, while scrimping on items critical for average Americans, such as healthcare coverage. Voters, regardless of party, understand that MAGA control of government is ratcheting up their pain; meanwhile, the rich get richer while Trump’s grift machine rakes in billions.

Third, unlike the Iraq War (when George W. Bush urged Americans to go to the mall to shop) or Trump’s first attack on Iran, virtually every American already has felt — or will soon feel — the war’s impact. The price of oil won’t come down anytime soon. “Increasing attacks on energy infrastructure in the Persian Gulf could significantly hurt the already strained global supply of oil and natural gas, pushing fuel prices much higher,” the New York Times reported last week. “The escalating attacks will make it much harder for energy producers in the Gulf to repair and restart their oil and gas operations when the war ultimately ends.”

Also, the war will continue to drag down economic growth. The World Trade Organization downgraded global trade growth to 1.9 percent in 2026, and it may dip further due to rising costs of energy, food, and service, “due to travel and transport disruptions.” With job creation essentially at zero, the prospect of stagflation looms large. As Paul Krugman remarked:

“There’s definitely a whiff of stagflation in the air — a whiff that is entirely caused by Trump administration policies.”

Specifically in red America, the war’s significant impact on fertilizer supplies will hit the already weak farm economy. Coming on top of more frequent extreme weather events, soaring healthcare insurance costs, and rural hospital closures, rural America may face a disproportionate amount of pain.

In sum, the war is a human, geopolitical, and economic disaster, but it may also be a political calamity for Trump and his MAGA stooges. Thanks to Trump’s vivid blunders, the price and duration of a war he insists has been won, and the financial gut punch to Americans (already staggering in Trump’s economy), MAGA may be in for an historic shellacking at the polls. Trump can lie and blame others all he likes, but voters will have their say in November.