New polling: Trump is underwater in 135 GOP House and Senate seats
New local polling estimates show Trump is unpopular even in deep red districts, as calls for war powers reform and impeachment swirl in DC
On Tuesday morning, April 7, 2026, President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social: “A whole civilization will die tonight.” Trump gave Iran until 8 p.m. Tuesday to reopen the Strait of Hormuz or face the “complete demolition” of every bridge and power plant in the country. On Easter morning, he posted “Open the F---in’ Strait, you crazy b-----ds, or you’ll be living in Hell! Praise be to Allah.” At publication, it is still unclear what form the threatened use of force would take.
The president’s posts have caused a predictable backlash among Democrats, but even Republicans are calling him out now. On Tuesday, Marjorie Taylor Greene called for invoking the 25th Amendment: “Not a single bomb has dropped on America. We cannot kill an entire civilization. This is evil and madness.”
Tucker Carlson, arguably one of the most influential media figures in Trump’s rise, called Trump’s Easter post “vile on every level” and characterized the threatened destruction of Iran’s civilian infrastructure as a war crime. “It’s vile. It begins with a promise to use the U.S. military to commit a war crime,” Carlson said. “Those people who are in direct contact with the president need to say, ‘No. I’ll resign. I’ll do whatever I can do legally to stop this, because this is insane. And if given the order, I’m not carrying it out.’”
Alex Jones — yes, that one — favors the 25th Amendment route to remove Trump.
But it is worth remembering that Congress does not have to take any of these improbable routes to stopping Trump’s crazed moves in Iran. Legislators could simply pass a war powers resolution that outlawed action in Iran. Democrats in Congress already tried this: On March 4, the Senate took up a motion to discharge S.J.Res. 104, a War Powers Resolution that would have required Trump to withdraw forces from Iran unless Congress authorized action. It failed, 47–53. The next day, the House voted 212–219 to stop Trump’s moves in Iran. Two Republicans — Thomas Massie and Warren Davidson — voted yes, while 4 Democrats crossed over in support.
Polling shows these senators and representatives who are voting with Trump are putting themselves in electoral danger. New estimates I’ve produced show that Trump’s approval rating is below 50% among registered voters in 135 Republican-held congressional seats — 104 in the House and 31 in the Senate. And his approval is below 45% in jurisdictions represented by 44 Republican members of Congress — 34 in the House and 10 in the Senate.
Almost every one of the members who opposed the effort to restrain Trump’s war authority in March represents voters who disapprove of his job performance in general and of the war in Iran in particular. The argument of this piece is simple: Trump is unpopular even in a lot of red seats, but Republicans vote with him because party and interpersonal incentives are currently stronger than district incentives. But the electorate is demanding change and reform, even from Republican lawmakers.
Put differently, this data suggests that House and Senate Republicans who stick with Trump are putting themselves in electoral jeopardy in November.
You won’t find district-level Trump approval data like this anywhere else — it’s original research I produce exclusively for Strength In Numbers subscribers. If you want me to be able to continue publishing data like this, become a paying member today.
135 anti-Trump GOP-held House and Senate seats
These district-level approval estimates come from a multilevel regression and post-stratification model that I’ve been running on the Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll data collected over the last year. MRP is a statistical technique that combines survey data with official Census demographics and election results to produce estimates of Trump’s approval among registered voters at the hyperlocal level. These local estimates are then aggregated into every congressional district and state. (You can explore the full interactive and read the methodology here.)
Here are the full data on Trump’s estimated net approval in the 135 House and Senate seats that are (1) currently held by Republicans and (2) where voters, on net, disapprove of Trump’s handling of the presidency:
Some Republican incumbents stand out. Start with the front-line seats: In Arizona’s 6th district — which voted for Trump by just 1 point in 2024 and is held by GOP Rep. Juan Ciscomani — Trump sits at 38.1% approval. Brian Fitzpatrick’s PA-01 is at 38.5% Trump approval. New York’s 17th (Mike Lawler) is at 39.0%. In California’s 40th, represented by Young Kim, Trump’s approval is at 39.7%.
In total, there are 16 House seats and 2 Senate seats currently controlled by Republicans, where Trump’s approval rating among registered voters is below 42.5% (net rating below -15) and where Trump won by less than 10 points in 2024. (Sixteen seats is more than enough for Democrats to take back control of the House majority in November.)
But voters in even some pretty red seats now disapprove of Trump overall. Texas’s 21st District — a seat Trump won by 24 points and that is currently held by Chip Roy — is at 46.9% Trump approval. Dan Crenshaw in Texas’s 2nd, also Trump+24, is at 49.9%. Elise Stefanik in New York’s 21st, Trump+21, is at 46.7%. Lauren Boebert in Colorado’s 4th, Trump+18, is at 49.0%. These are deep-red seats where Trump is now underwater.
And Trump is currently underwater in nearly a dozen GOP-held Senate seats. Maine (Susan Collins) is at 41.2%. Pennsylvania, which voted in Dave McCormick in 2024, gives Trump 41.3%. Trump’s at 43% in North Carolina (Ted Budd and Thom Tillis). And both Texas senators — John Cornyn and Ted Cruz — represent anti-Trump electorates, giving him just a 44.1% approval rating.
Do you want to vote for Trump or get re-elected?
Of course, not all anti-Trump voters are Democratic voters — and these estimates are based on the current congressional map, some of which have been redrawn for 2026.
But these are the strongest data I’ve seen on just how unpopular Trump is at the state and district level. These are the geographies that matter to Republican politicians.
And the historical parallels for the 2026 midterms are already brutal. In 2006, George W. Bush sat at roughly 38% approval as Iraq dragged on. Republicans lost 30 House seats and 6 Senate seats, and both chambers flipped. In 2018, Trump was at about 41% approval and lost 40 House seats. Presidents below 50% approval lose an average of 30 House seats in the midterms. Trump is 11 points below that threshold. And the out-party typically gains about 5 points on the generic ballot between spring and Election Day. Democrats are already at D+5 or D+6 — just a few points behind where they were at this point in 2018, before the 2018 blue wave.
So the question Republican politicians should be asking themselves in light of these data is: Do you want to win re-election, or do you want to keep backing your party leader who is threatening to “end civilization” in an unpopular, unsuccessful, unnecessary overseas war? Because these data suggest you can’t do both.
Our April Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll will test support for Trump’s impeachment. Other polls have shown voters split over the question, but those data were gathered before Trump started his war in Iran. Subscribe to get those results in your inbox. Here’s the full House and Senate approval data if you want more.
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This confirms my view that IA-02 is in play, along with IA-01 and IA-03 (widely considered to be among the top Democratic pickup opportunities).
IA-02 is an open seat with Ashley Hinson running for Senate. The likely GOP nominee, Joe Mitchell, has no roots in northeast Iowa, having just moved their last September, days before he announced his Congressional bid.
We’re approaching Dr. Strangelove territory . . .