Who Still Supports Trump? The Same People Who Backed The High Sparrow In Game Of Thrones

Last night we took a quick look at Tuesday's legislative special election in which a Democrat beat his GOP rival handily in a swing district that had gone heavily for Trump last year. Trump's reverse coattails have been acting as an anchor in state legislative district special elections all over the country, as independent voters growing increasingly disgusted with him and his Regime and the way congressional Republicans enable him. Vice News' report yesterday that he has instructed his team to provide him with 2 folders daily-- one at 9:30 a.m. and one at 4:40 a.m.-- is further persuading people that Trump is an ineffective buffoon and a fake president-- and the Korea crisis is emphasizing in the minds of many why that is dangerous. By the way, the silly propaganda folders are 20-25 pages of... wait for it-- "screenshots of positive cable news chyrons (those lower-third headlines and crawls), admiring tweets, transcripts of fawning TV interviews, praise-filled news stories, and sometimes just pictures of Trump on TV looking powerful."

I'm sure you've seen the dismal, sinking poll numbers-- now heading towards impeachment territory if you ascribe to the theory that once Trump's job approval is below one-third (it's now 32% in one brand new poll), significant numbers of Republicans in districts where independent voters are the key to reelection, will want to be seen opposing Trump... bigly. Yesterday Steven Shepard at Politico made the point that Trump's base has been shrinking since election day-- a direct contradiction to another couple of tweeted lies from Señor Trumpanzee that his base is "bigger and stronger than ever before." Stevens' point is that the obsessive Trumpanzee claims are "contradicted by a steady stream of recent polling showing that the share of Americans who approve of Trump’s job performance is shrinking, along with the share of Americans most enthusiastic about his presidency." Most Americans now recognize that he's a compulsive liar and that it doesn't make sense to assume anything he ever says is true.

However you measure the president’s base, it has diminished, not increased, in the seven months he’s been in office. It’s a slide he’ll need to reverse to avoid dragging down the GOP in the midterms-- and to have a more credible shot at reelection.

A new Politico/Morning Consult poll shows Trump’s approval rating slipping to the lowest point of his young presidency. While he’s confounded the polls before, it’s the trendline that should be most worrisome to the White House.

Only 40 percent of registered voters approve of the job Trump is doing as president, the new Politico/Morning Consult poll shows, down from a high-water mark of 52 percent in March. And the percentage who approve strongly-- one way to measure the size of Trump’s most fervent supporters-- is also at a new low: just 18 percent.

That fits with other surveys conducted over the past few weeks, all of which show Trump at or near the low-water marks for each pollster. And there is evidence Trump’s backslide has eroded some of his electoral base: The president has lost ground with Republicans and the independent voters that propelled him to victory.

Trump’s approval rating among self-identified Trump voters is at 81 percent, down from 86 percent last week. And among Republican voters in the new Politico/Morning Consult poll, the president is at 76 percent, down slightly from 79 percent last week.

..."Unabated by the turbulence of the last six months, there remains a core base of ardent Trump supporters," said Morning Consult co-founder and Chief Research Officer Kyle Dropp. "However, that base has unquestionably declined since the president took office. In late January, 56 percent of Trump voters strongly approved of the president, and just 1 percent disapproved. Today, 41 percent strongly approve, and 17 percent disapprove."

Trump isn’t bringing converts into his base, either, the poll shows. Among voters who say they backed Hillary Clinton last year, more than 3 in 4, 78 percent, strongly disapprove of Trump. Only 8 percent of Clinton voters even somewhat approve of Trump... The ongoing contraction of Trump’s base has accelerated over the past month. Those trends show Trump’s approval rating has fallen because certain segments of Republicans and independents have soured on him.

So who still backs him? People so filled with fear and hatred and whose lives are so dismal that they want to die-- in other words, typical cultists who are, generally-speaking, severely mentally ill. As Andy Kopsa wrote for Rewire these people believe Señor Trumpanzee is their ticket to paradise and that he will "pave the way for the second coming of Jesus Christ." Kopsa writes about a cult called POTUS Shield, whose leader claims God told him to start it "in the middle of the night and told him to gather to POTUS Shield prayer warriors and prophets, in order to cast a protective shield to surround Donald Trump... The president, it turns out, was chosen by none other than God himself."

Along with [High Sparrow Frank] Amedia, POTUS Shield is populated by right-wing religionists like Alveda King, Lou Engle, and Jerry Boykin. Its followers believe a Trump presidency has a holy mission: to pave the way for the second coming of Jesus Christ.

POTUS Shield is a unique gathering of key players in anti-choice, anti-LGBTQ, and “religious freedom” politicking of the last two decades. Groups like Engle’s “The Call Ministries” and the Family Research Council (FRC), where Boykin sits as executive vice president, have influenced national, local, and international political policies from a strictly Christian worldview-- including abstinence-only “education,” virulently anti-choice protests, and the deadly anti-homosexuality bill in Uganda. As the director of the anti-choice group Civil Rights for the Unborn, meanwhile, King uses her Uncle Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s civil rights legacy to flog anti-choice rhetoric that abortion providers are specifically targeting Black communities.

The POTUS Shield website has a “donate” button where the faithful can give to the cause. Although POTUS Shield is registered in Ohio as a nonprofit organization, it does not appear to have a record of federal tax filings as such, which makes it difficult to track where its funding is coming from. Inquiries to POTUS Shield representatives about the group’s nonprofit status were not answered.

Some individuals in the group adhere to a religious doctrine of “Seven Mountains,” a term popularized by member Lance Wallnau, who was one of a few evangelicals to predict Trump’s election. Seven Mountains’ strategic goal is for Christians to seize control of all aspects of civil and political society by whatever means necessary. This includes the media, arts, education, government, religion, business, and family. Once these believers secure all of these “seven mountains,” Christ will return. And for POTUS Shield, Donald Trump is the guy to do it.

...Trump’s arguably un-Christian history of alleged sexual assault and harassment, questionable business dealings, multiple marriages, and general vulgarity are of little apparent consequence to POTUS Shield, since God put his favor on him. Recently, however, it seems POTUS Shield and other conservative Christians found a way to make Trump palatable to those less zealous among them-- Trump is just a means to an end. Trump as president, right-wing evangelicals suggest, is akin to a latter-day Constantine. Constantine was the initially non-believing Roman Emperor who nevertheless converted the Roman Empire to Christianity. Viewed through this lens, Trump is still a tool of God and washed clean of his obvious “sins.”

Fortunately for the people of POTUS Shield, there is always true believer Mike Pence. Members of POTUS Shield (and other evangelicals) refer to Pence as a “covenant man.” This designation places the right-wing former Indiana governor in league with Bible heavyweights Moses, Jacob, and Noah. Lengthy videos by POTUS Shield and adherents explain a covenant man is obedient to God despite a corrupt and sinful culture.