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It appears some Republicans are finally beginning to see what many of us have been saying for months: Donald Trump’s political project is beginning to fail, and his political weakness is taking the GOP down with him.
In this Substack Live conversation, Danielle Moodie and I dig into the early signs of a genuine GOP fracture. Soon-to-be former congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene’s sudden decision to retire isn’t just a personal pivot. As Kevin McCarthy put it, she’s the “canary in the coal mine.” She sees the future. And the future is disaster for the Trump-era Republican Party.
What’s becoming clear is that Trump has lost the pulse of his base. From the Epstein scandal to tariffs that raise prices for his own supporters, the overreach isn’t strategic or ideological anymore. It’s erratic. It’s self-serving. And it’s politically suicidal. MAGA was always a loose coalition. Now, that coalition is cracking under the weight of Trump’s incompetence.
We also break down one of the clearest examples of this incompetence: the spectacular implosion of the James Comey and Letitia James indictments. A federal judge dismissed both cases after determining that Trump’s hand-picked prosecutor, Lindsey Halligan, was installed illegally and never had the authority to file them. The result isn’t just a legal embarrassment, it’s the first indicator of a collapse of Trump’s retribution agenda.
And this is where Project 2025’s core flaw comes into full focus.
We’re seeing the folly in Trump’s prioritization of loyalty above competence. When you replace expertise with thoughtless sycophancy, you get failure. Trump’s targeting of the guardrails that restrained him in his first term has backfired. Surrounded now by enablers instead of professionals, he’s overreached before consolidating power, a fatal mistake for wannabe authoritarians.
We also talked about how Trump is making the mistake of simultaneously failing on affordability while trying to pursue authoritarian aims. Danielle Moodie framed this part of our conversation well in her write-up of our conversation:
The frantic, ill-conceived pace of policy implementation (such as unilaterally raising tariffs with no economic goal or the constant promise of a healthcare plan that never materializes) is viewed as a sign of desperation and the total brain drain within his inner circle. Unlike smart authoritarians who build popular mandates by “feeding the people” or ensuring basic affordability (like healthcare), Trump is seen as primarily focused on personal enrichment and retribution, embodied by putting the world’s richest man with a chainsaw on stage as a visual symbol of an anti-populist oligarchy.
From there, Danielle and I zoom out to the broader political landscape: the 2025 elections that stunned Republicans, the evaporation of gains Trump made with key demographics, and the quiet but powerful shift happening as voters reject authoritarianism in real time.
Finally, we discuss how Democrats should capitalize on this moment. The fissures in Trump’s world are obvious, but exploiting them requires strategy, speed, and an understanding of modern information warfare. The people — activists, organizers, everyday Americans, journalists — are the ones primarily making the cracks in Trump’s coalition wider.
Ultimately, what Danielle and I kept coming back to is this: the cracks in Trump’s world aren’t accidental. They’re happening because people are refusing to be intimidated, refusing to be lied to, and refusing to surrender the country to a movement built on lies.
This is a rare opening in American politics. A moment when the facade of inevitability around Trump is breaking. The question now is whether we widen those fractures or let them seal shut. The power is with the people who show up, stay loud, and stay focused. If we do that, this moment becomes more than a news cycle. It becomes a turning point.
