This Week, Even Trump's Own Side Stopped Covering for Him
Five fresh losses, and the theme this week is betrayal from the inside — his own pollster, his own judge, his own party. Pour something cold and enjoy watching the home team defect.
1. Fox News Ran Its Own Poll on Trump's Iran War. Even Fox News Couldn't Make the Numbers Nice.
A Fox News poll released July 23 found just 34% of voters approve of Trump's handling of the Iran war — his worst marks on the conflict yet — while 56% oppose the military action outright and 66% disapprove of how he's running it. His overall approval sits at 39%, tied for his worst mark in the poll, with 49% saying they "strongly" disapprove, also a record. The steepest collapse came from inside his own party: support among non-MAGA Republicans has fallen 13 points in a single month, from 70% at the start of his second term down to 51%.
When the pollster is Fox News and the verdict still reads "worst numbers yet," there's no spin room left — just the numbers, sitting there, judging him.
2. The Trump DOJ's Voter-Roll Crusade Just Went 0-17. A Trump-Appointed Judge Delivered the Latest Loss.
A federal judge appointed by Trump himself dismissed the Justice Department's lawsuit demanding Kentucky's unredacted voter rolls on July 23, ruling that federal law grants the government no such power — the DOJ's 17th consecutive courtroom loss in a nationwide push for private voter data that has now failed everywhere it's been challenged, including 11 rulings from Republican-appointed judges. Kentucky Lantern reported that Kentucky's Republican secretary of state said the state's elections — and voters' personal information — remain secure regardless. The DOJ is now appealing across eight federal circuits at once, hoping volume succeeds where the arguments haven't.
Seventeen judges, zero wins, and the only thing padding that record is the number of circuits now lining up to make it eighteen.
3. An FBI Agent Served an NYT Reporter a Subpoena Mid-'Sheep Detectives.' The DOJ Folded Days Later.
The Justice Department withdrew grand jury subpoenas demanding phone records and testimony from three New York Times reporters on July 23, after a federal judge grilled government lawyers over records requests that also swept up a reporter's mother and two spouses. A DOJ attorney called the sweep "inadvertent" and insisted "no one was trying to pull a fast one," but Judge Arun Subramanian wasn't in a forgiving mood — pointedly noting that one journalist had been served by an FBI agent while home watching the movie "Sheep Detectives." The Times' chief counsel called the reversal "an important affirmation of our country's commitment to a free press," adding, "we will not be deterred in the face of tactics like these."
The government spent real manpower ambushing a man mid-cartoon-sheep-murder-mystery, then folded the moment a judge asked follow-up questions. The sheep, it turns out, were the more competent investigators.
4. The House Told Trump to End the Iran War. Again. For the Second Time in Two Months.
The House narrowly passed a war powers resolution on July 22 calling on Trump to end the war in Iran, 214-208, with four Republicans crossing over to join Democrats — the second time in two months the chamber has delivered the same rebuke. The White House urged lawmakers to vote no, arguing Trump has "the Constitutional authority" to keep striking Iran, but Democrats pointed to polling showing most Americans, including a meaningful share of Republicans, don't think the war has been worth fighting. Trump has previously branded the Republicans who vote for the resolution "GRANDSTANDERS" who "would rather have our Country fail" than hand him "another... victor[y]."
A non-binding resolution can't end a war, but it can end the fiction that this one's popular — twice now, in writing, with a roll call attached.
5. A Judge Called Trump's Mail-Voting Crackdown 'Unconstitutional.' His Lawyers Wanted the Case Thrown Out. It Wasn't.
A federal judge in Massachusetts refused to dismiss a lawsuit challenging Trump's executive order targeting mail voting, ruling July 22 that the order is likely "unconstitutional" and that, left standing, "disenfranchisement as to the upcoming election is plausibly likely and imminent." Democracy Docket reported that U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani rejected the administration's argument that the case was premature, writing plainly that "the President plays no role in the regulation of elections." The order directs the Postal Service to refuse mail ballots that lack a special barcode tied to a government list — something Talwani has now told Trump's lawyers, more than once, that Congress never authorized him to do.
He's 0-for-2 in front of the same judge on the same order, and the case hasn't even reached trial yet. That's not litigation, that's a rerun.
Now go back to doomscrolling. You've earned five minutes of not-doom.