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Domestic politics and the prospect of Republicans losing their monopoly over government in Washington are likely to take up more of U.S. President Donald Trump’s attention this year. That will give him more to worry about than the early days of 2025, when he and his allies confidently proclaimed they had received a strong mandate by American voters for sweeping change.

At the same time, Trump’s years of self-aggrandizing his abilities as the dealmaker-in-chief are running into the harsh reality of some of the world’s most intractable conflicts. In the Gaza Strip, Palestinians, Israelis, and their foreign interlocutors are at an impasse over how to implement phase 2 of Trump’s vaunted 20-point peace plan. And Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to refuse to accept any credible security guarantees for Ukraine as part of a hoped-for peace deal.

Domestic politics and the prospect of Republicans losing their monopoly over government in Washington are likely to take up more of U.S. President Donald Trump’s attention this year. That will give him more to worry about than the early days of 2025, when he and his allies confidently proclaimed they had received a strong mandate by American voters for sweeping change.

At the same time, Trump’s years of self-aggrandizing his abilities as the dealmaker-in-chief are running into the harsh reality of some of the world’s most intractable conflicts. In the Gaza Strip, Palestinians, Israelis, and their foreign interlocutors are at an impasse over how to implement phase 2 of Trump’s vaunted 20-point peace plan. And Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to refuse to accept any credible security guarantees for Ukraine as part of a hoped-for peace deal.

All of this adds up to what could be a particularly difficult year for Trump and his foreign-policy ambitions. Here are some of the biggest challenges he faces heading into the second year of his second term.

JUMP TO TOPIC

Voters cast their ballots on the eve of the 2022 U.S. midterm elections in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on Nov. 7, 2022.Jeff Kowalsky/AFP via Getty Images

The reality of Trump’s—objectively historic and noteworthy—2024 electoral victory is that although he won the popular vote, he did so by a much smaller margin than other recent U.S. presidential winners. But despite not technically winning a majority of the popular vote (he won 49.81 percent), Trump governed in his first year in office as if he had been given a clear directive from a significant majority of Americans to overhaul the country’s governance, economy, alliance systems, politics, media and culture, and rights and liberties.

Now Trump’s already-lengthy second administration track record of unilaterally imposing massive changes—including on things such as tariffs, immigration policy, withholding or impounding large sums of congressionally directed taxpayer funds, and unauthorized military offensives in places such as Venezuela and Iran—will very much be on the ballot in November, even if the president himself is not.

While the U.S. midterm elections are still nearly a year away, Trump’s mediocre public approval ratings have hovered between the high 30s and low 40s for many months now. Meanwhile, in generic congressional ballot questions, Republicans have consistently trailed Democrats. And while Republicans are currently projected to maintain their hold on the Senate, Democrats are seen as having a narrow advantage to win back the House of Representatives.

The broad unpopularity of some of Trump’s signature policies in areas such as trade, immigration, and the economy comes amid growing signs that notable numbers of Capitol Hill Republicans are more willing to speak out or vote against the president’s wishes on issues from military action in Venezuela to bullying Denmark over Greenland to health care funding.

All signs point to a more turbulent year for Trump domestically—to say nothing of what might come in 2027 should Democrats manage to break Republicans’ power hold in Washington.—Rachel Oswald

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