It's a Rarity for Trump: 'Political Physics'

On the day of the House vote on the Jeffrey Epstein files, there's an unmistakable theme in coverage in major outlets that President Trump will not enjoy. A slew of stories suggest that the president's once all-powerful grip on his party is slipping. Coverage:

• Politico runs through "7 signs Trump is losing his groove," as the headline puts it. Among them: Republicans refused to back down on the Epstein vote, the GOP in Indiana defied him on redistricting, the Supreme Court seems poised to overrule him on tariffs, and his pressure on the Senate to scrap the filibuster went nowhere.

• Axios also senses "political mortality" at play with the Epstein vote. Trump gave his blessing only when it was clear the vote would pass, and the reversal made him "look the weakest he's been since the inauguration." The piece stops short of calling president a lame duck, however. "Trump isn't a weak president," writes Marc Caputo. "He wields unprecedented influence in his party, which controls Congress. The GOP base loves him." But even Trump now looks susceptible to the "laws of political physics."
• The Wall Street Journal cites Trump's inability to get Rep. Lauren Boebert to change her mind on Epstein as "one of several recent signs that Trump's ability to bend the Republican Party to his will is weakening." Mike Madrid, former political director of the California GOP, puts it this way: "There's an unprecedented split in Donald Trump's base. It's a sign that even Donald Trump is not immune to the physics of politics, which is that a lame-duck leader is going to start to see people abandon him."
• The Washington Post points out that Trump was virtually unstoppable during the first 10 months of his second term. "But the president now finds himself in a weakened position: Polls show his lowest approval ratings since returning to office; some in his political base are calling for more to be done to ease a continued affordability crisis; and now, House Republicans have dared to buck his directives on an issue that advisers say has exasperated him."
• A New York Times analysis joins the chorus, suggesting the Epstein vote has "raised questions about Mr. Trump's ability to impose his will on Republicans and the nation, suggesting a slip in his iron grip on his party amid his falling polling numbers, rising prices and rifts within his political coalition."
• Of course, Trump's political enemies have predicted his demise many, many times, only to be proven wrong. One longtime Trump official tells the Post: "While the outside world is panicking, everybody internally knows we will do what we've always done when challenges come—you pull yourself up from your bootstraps, you huddle together, you devise a plan, and you execute on that plan." Trump, the official added, has been in far worse political predicaments before.