Trump Accidentally Admits He Screwed MAGA Voters as Economy Dips Again

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump unleashed a strange Truth Social rant declaring straight out that farmers are getting hurt because China is not buying soybeans. Of course, Trump’s own trade wars are the reason for this, so he in effect admitted that his own policies are badly screwing one of his core constituencies. This comes as the ADP National Employment Report finds that the economy lost 32,000 jobs in September, suggesting job losses could now get worse. All this bad economic news is piling up just as we’re entering a bruising government shutdown fight, which will make the economy even worse. So are Trump and Republicans in a weak enough position for Democrats to hold the line in the shutdown fight? We talked to New Republic senior editor Alex Shephard, who has a good new piece analyzing the standoff. We discuss how Trump is increasingly shafting his own voters, how it’s making him more vulnerable on the economy, and why all this should persuade Democrats to hang tough in the shutdown standoff. Listen to this episode here. A transcript is here.