As I write this (February 2, 2026), Donald Trump’s approval rating on the Economist approval tracker is sitting at 38%, with 56% disapproving.
There have been various (optimistic) pundits who are watching Trump’s polling, generating conjectures and predictions about his potential to lose power and influence. There are signs of skittishness among some Republican electeds, but we appear to be far from the tipping point where the GOP abandons their president.
Where is the tipping point?
When Richard Nixon resigned the presidency on August 8, 1974, his approval rating was 24% positive, 66% negative. The day before Nixon resigned, House Minority Leader John Jacob Rhodes (R-AZ), Senate Minority Leader Hugh Scott (R-PA), and Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater (R-AZ) went to the White House to inform the president that he didn’t have the votes in the senate to survive impeachment.
Richard Nixon resigned three months before the 1974 midterms, which were a disaster for the Republicans. Democrats had a net gain of 45 House seats, 4 Senate seats, and gained 4 governorships. Clearly the tipping point in 1974, when Senate Republicans were prepared to remove Richard Nixon, came after Nixon inflicted significant damage on his party’s midterm prospects. It came too late to prevent the blue midterm tsunami. Why did the Republican legislative leadership wait so long to remove Nixon? The extent of the damage may have been concealed from folks living in the Republican bubble, as 50% of Republicans maintained a positive view of their president on the date of his resignation.
Texas State Senate: Leigh Wambsganss v. Taylor Rehmet
Yesterday (January 31), Democrat Taylor Rehmet defeated Republican Leigh Wambsganss in a special election runoff for a Texas state senate seat. In 2024, the ninth district leaned about two points more Republican than the state as a whole, with Donald Trump defeating Kamala Harris by a 17.4 point margin (58.0%-40.6%). In the special election, Taylor Rehmet defeated Leigh Wambsganss by a 14.4 point margin (57.2%-42.8%), a 31.8% swing away from the Trump margin in 2024.
According to the Texas Tribune, this 31.8% Democratic swing in a (usually) solid red district “injected a fresh and urgent sense of a panic into the GOP from the Texas Capitol to the White House heading into November’s midterm elections.” The usual pundits (left and right) are spinning the results; most are centered around at least a thread of truth.
We begin with the statement from Leigh Wambsganss. “Mr. Rehmet and I will face each other again in November, and I fully expect the results to be different. The dynamics of a Special Election are fundamentally different from a November General Election. I believe the voters of Senate District 9 and Tarrant County Republicans will answer the call in November.”
Yes, strange things happen in special elections. Scott Brown won a US Senate seat from Massachusetts in a special election. The unusual Saturday special election might have had some effect on the race, but it didn’t cause a 31.8% Democratic swing.
We can’t look at the Scott Brown senate race without examining the question of candidate quality. Scott Brown came off as likable, while Democrat Martha Coakley struggled with her public image. Ms. Wambsganss advertised herself on Facebook as “ULTRA MAGA.” She promoted her endorsement by Donald Trump. When she placed second (behind Mr. Rehmet) in the November election, she eliminated a more moderate Republican and set the stage for the January runoff. Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick wrote on his Facebook page (November 4, 2025), “Congratulations to Leigh Wambsganss for her huge victory in the SD 9 special election tonight!” He continued by saying Ms. Wambganss “absolutely crushed her moderate Republican challenger. But the fight isn’t over!
She will defeat the Democrat in the runoff, and then win the March 2026 primary and the 2026 general election next November. Both President Trump and I, along with conservatives in Tarrant County, gave her our full support.”
Last November, Mr. Rehmet received 47.6% of the vote, Ms. Wambsganss received 35.9% of the vote, and the “more moderate Republican,” John Huffman, received 16.5% of the vote. Seems reasonable to think that Mr. Huffman’s voters crossed party lines and flocked to Mr. Rehmet. But why?
Ms. Wambsganss was a polarizing figure in several communities in the senate district. She was co-founder of Southlake Families PAC, which ran and funded “hard-line conservatives” for school board seats. Baptist News Global reported that “Wambsganss led the charge in the fight against the ‘woke’ liberals attempting to address racism,” and her candidates prevailed in several districts. Perhaps she was too “hard-line” for the moderate Republicans and independents in this red district.
There are other, more universal factors that are cited as potential influences in the result. This senate district is described as 51.2% Anglo, 28.8% Hispanic, 12.3% Black, and 6.8% Asian. The Texas Tribune reported that many of the district’s Hispanic voters are abandoning Donald Trump and the Republicans, with a swing of 50 points in some Fort Worth neighborhoods; a consequence of the aggressive immigration tactics that are often directed at other Hispanics.
Perhaps the non-Anglo voters in general, and the Hispanic voters in particular, were turned off by the image and reputation of Ms. Wambsganss as a White Christian Nationalist. Or maybe it is something more global and troubling for Republican officeholders and strategists in Texas and beyond.
The Texas Politics Project has shown that, over the past presidential elections, Latinos moved toward Donald Trump. According to exit polling, Donald Trump’s share of the Texas Latino vote increased from 34% in 2016, to 41% in 2020, and to 55% in 2024. If the ninth district results are indicative of a more global shift of Hispanics toward Democrats, this could have a significant influence in Texas, Arizona, Nevada, and Florida.
Donald Trump’s Decline
We can’t look at the Tarrant County results without placing them into the context of Donald Trump’s declining approval rating across the nation. This discussion started with an examination of the “tipping point,” where the sitting president has a large enough drag on the rest of the party that down-ballot officeholders want him gone. With Richard Nixon, the tipping point came long after the electoral damage was done.
Has Donald Trump done irreparable damage to the Republican Party’s chances in November? It’s too soon to tell. Donald Trump vigorously endorsed Leigh Wambsganss on Truth Social before the runoff, then denied any knowledge of the race after Ms. Wambsganss lost. It’s a long way to November, and we have laid out a collection of other contributing factors to the outcome of the election. It sounds like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is worried, when he wrote, “A swing of this magnitude is not something that can be dismissed. Republicans should be clear-eyed about the political environment heading into the midterms.”
Which is why the questions of the day are pretty simple. How low does Donald Trump’s approval rating need to go before the Republicans separate themselves from their president? Will they wait until the approval rating drops into the 20s? Will they try to ride out the storm? Will they walk away from elected office to spend more time with their families?
Only time will tell.
Stay tuned.