This followed roughly four months of Trump castigating Republicans and Democrats alike who had criticized his administration’s handling of the case, including a public breakup last week with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), dubbed “Marjorie Taylor Brown (Green grass turns Brown when it begins to ROT!)” in a series of Truth Social Posts.

Meanwhile, Trump, despite claiming that affordability was not the defining factor in Democrats’ massive 2025 election wins, has announced policies aimed at lowering costs for consumers and delivered multiple televised speeches touting his economic accomplishments. Furthermore, he hosted Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House on Tuesday, and the leaders will co-host a U.S.-Saudi investment forum in Washington on Wednesday.

And the president even sought to lower the temperature in a polarizing debate waged within conservative circles over Tucker Carlson’s recent interview with online provocateur and antisemite Nick Fuentes.

While traveling back to Washington, D.C., following a weekend trip to Florida, Trump backed Carlson’s decision to sit down with Fuentes, who had dragged Trump into a public relations crisis of his own back in 2022 following a shared meal at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s private club.

“You can’t tell him who to interview,” he told reporters flatly. Fuentes later shared the clip on social media, thanking Trump for his support.

Senior administration officials and Trumpworld insiders, granted anonymity to discuss internal matters, generally defended the president’s actions and words over the past week, even while tacitly acknowledging the uphill battle the party faces next year.

“President Trump consistently speaks about the economy — both the enormous successes, like pulling in more than $20 trillion in foreign investments through the use of tariffs, but also the areas where the administration needs to do more to undo the damage done by [former President Joe] Biden,” one longtime out-of-government adviser to the president told the Washington Examiner. “It’s the media and Democrats who want to pretend like ‘affordability’ is some gotcha issue now, and voters can see right through that.”

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A senior White House official additionally wrote in a statement that “President Trump’s tariffs are resetting global commerce, securing manufacturing investments, and safeguarding our national and economic security – and they’re also raising billions in revenue for the federal government.”

But despite Trump’s messaging push, it remains to be seen if the president can actually right ship and help Republicans maintain their congressional majorities next November. 

As of Tuesday, Trump’s disapproval rating was north of 54%, a 15-point drop since January and the worst marks of his second term, according to the Real Clear Politics polling aggregate.

On Epstein, a Morning Consult poll published Tuesday found 60% of respondents answering that they believe that Trump was aware of Epstein’s crimes, with an additional 38% who believed he was somehow involved. Just 15% of respondents said they thought that Trump was fully in the dark about Epstein’s abuse.

A veteran Republican strategist, who worked in the first Trump White House and maintains close ties with the second-term staff, told the Washington Examiner that it will be difficult for Trump to cut through the “negative noise” and reassure voters if he keeps “falling off the wagon.” 

“I think one of the most surprising things, at least for people on the outside looking in, was just how buttoned up this White House has been. There haven’t been any real scandals. There isn’t this deluge of leaks to the press. The president has been on message, and policies are being implemented,” that person explained. “But we’re starting to see some of the — let’s call them midnight tweets. He’s lashing out at reporters. We know President Trump can play the part, because he’s been doing it since January, and I’d like to see him, to be totally blunt about it, just lock in and knock it off with the own-goals, so to speak.”

Toward that point, Trump, who tried to play it cool on Monday when pressed on the Epstein files, lost it Tuesday when asked about the vote for a release at the White House on Tuesday.

“I think you are a terrible reporter,” he told a correspondent for ABC when asked why he couldn’t greenlight the Epstein release without Congressional authorization. “People are wise to your hoax.”

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“Your crappy company is one of the perpetrators,” he continued. “I think the license should be taken away from ABC because your news is so fake and so wrong.”