Transcript: Trump’s Pollster Drops Bomb on GOP as Midterm Panic Erupts

As GOP leaks about the elections grow more urgent, a top Democratic strategist explains what the numbers really say about the Trump-GOP collapse—and ponders what could still go wrong.

The following is a lightly edited transcript of the September 21 episode of the Daily Blast podcast. Listen to it here.

Greg Sargent: This is The Daily Blast from The New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR Network. I’m your host, Greg Sargent.

A new poll came out that offered a striking finding. The Democratic candidate has a real lead in the Senate race in Alaska. One of the pollsters behind that survey is Donald Trump’s pollster. A quality poll like this one, putting Democrats ahead in Alaska, suggests a Democratic Senate takeover has become a real possibility. Republican panic is becoming palpable in a series of new leaks, with one Republican saying the midterms will be a bloodbath. There’s still a long way to go, though. The Senate is very, very tough, and a lot can go wrong.

So we’re lucky to be talking about all this today with the Democratic pollster on that Alaska survey, John Anzalone. John, thank you so much for coming on.

John Anzalone: Thanks for having me, Greg.

Sargent: OK, so your new poll is with Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio. It’s for AARP. It’s a very good poll, and you find Democrat Mary Peltola leading GOP Senator Dan Sullivan by 46 percent to 41 percent.

Then, after ranked-choice processes run through, Peltola is up 53 to 47. John, you rarely get quality polling out of Alaska. So this is quite something. Can you tell us what struck you about what you found on the head-to-head?

Anzalone: There’s a couple things going on. First off is that, you know, Mary Peltola is a really good candidate. If you talk to people in Alaska, one of the big things about her candidacy is that they believe that she is an Alaskan, and her Alaska kind of defines her.

But what we see in the internals, for example—we see this all across the country, we just came out of the field, for example, in Texas—we see this same dynamic where, one, Mary is consolidating Democrats at a higher rate than Dan Sullivan. But the real story is with independents. She leads 58 percent to 26 percent. That’s a 32-point margin.

Peltola has a 60 percent favorable with independents, is plus 30 in the favorable, not favorable. Sullivan, again, just underwater with independents, because independents right now have left Republicans. And so Sullivan’s favorable among independents is at 26 percent, 53 percent unfavorable.

So his rating is underwater by 27 percentage points with independents. So that kind of becomes the whole story there, is what’s happening with independents.

Sargent: Well, I’ve got to think that you’re not going to see something like this with independents, this kind of Republican collapse, without Donald Trump. Trump is underwater in Alaska in your poll, at 45 percent approve to 53 percent disapprove. That’s striking. Trump won Alaska in 2024 by 54 to 41. That’s a 13-point spread. He’s now eight points underwater. That’s a big swing.

But what I saw in there is that Donald Trump in Alaska—again, a state he won by double digits—is thirty-eight points underwater with independents. I mean, that’s just crazy stuff. Let me ask you, though, John: you don’t get a Republican collapse with independents without Trump collapsing among independents. That’s what’s driving this, right?

Anzalone: Well, I think there’s two things. Absolutely correct. What’s stunning is that Trump’s disapproval is minus 38 with independents. The Democratic Party has terrible imaging; in this state, it’s underwater by 14 points. But the other thing is, the Republican Party’s image has collapsed from January, right? It’s minus seven here, not as bad as Democrats. But again, when you take a look at independents, the Democratic Party net favorable is only minus one. The Republican Party image is underwater by 34, even though statewide they have a better image—there’s more Republicans, et cetera, et cetera.

So it is a combination of Trump and the Republican Party writ large. He without a doubt has caused this problem. You’ve got the combination of tariffs and the Iran war, either increasing gasoline prices or grocery prices or utility prices, et cetera. This is expectations not being met. They thought he was the economy president. They anticipated that he would fix the economy and make it roar. And now they’re seeing........

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