Independent voters have shifted “massively” against President Donald Trump, especially on the Iran war, and are now part of what CNN data analyst Harry Enten calls Trump’s “decaying coalition.”
Enten pointed to Wednesday’s House vote on a war powers resolution directing Trump to end U.S. military action in Iran without congressional authorization. Four Republicans crossed the aisle to join Democrats in what NPR called “the clearest rebuke yet of President Trump’s handling of the conflict.”
Majorities of Democrats, independents, and Republicans want the Iran ceasefire to hold, Enten reported — calling it a “rare trifecta” of cross-party consensus set against steep disapproval of the war.
“The most unpopular war at the start of a war that I could ever find, ever, has become even more unpopular,” Enten explained. “That’s what those Republicans in the House are seeing.”
“Net approval rating of the Iran war,” he continued. “At the start, it was underwater minus nine points. Now it’s down there with the Strait of Hormuz. Look at this: minus 23 points. This is a war that has become more unpopular even as President Trump and his administration has tried to sell it.”
“And among independents, it’s gone from 23 points underwater to get this: 40 points underwater with independents,” Enten continued. “So those Republicans who are, in fact, did not vote with the renegade Republicans, they are helping to put that Republican majority — which was already at great risk in the House — in even more risk.”
Turning to the need for a president to obtain congressional approval before going to war, Enten said, “63 percent overall are against the idea that, in fact, you can — the president could just go willy-nilly without congressional approval. How about independents? 72 percent, 72 percent. More than two in three independents are against the idea that the president can, in fact, use military force without congressional approval.”
“So the American people, independents very much with that House vote yesterday with the ideas, hey, the president actually has to come to Congress to use military force. And independents, especially.”
Enten noted that independents went from minus 23 points to minus 40 points on Trump’s military action in Iran.
“Independents, of course, have been such an important part of the president’s decaying political coalition,” Enten observed. “They were pretty much even in the 2024 election, and they have shifted massively against him, and especially on this war.”
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