When Donald Trump first became a presidential candidate, I wasn’t on the Trump Train, and I had my reasons. Mostly, they were rooted in doubt about his conservative credentials and discomfort with this rather brute style. I’ve long since come around, and let’s be honest, I’m not alone. Lots of Trump skeptics have been converted, and there are very good reasons for that.
In fact, Trump’s support is truly historic. You know how soon after Trump took office in 2025, the narrative that left-wing influencers and media personalities pushed was that Trump was bleeding support from his base? It’s all a lie.
CNN's Harry Enten broke it down Thursday morning, and the findings are striking. When you line up 21st-century presidents and look at how their own party supporters viewed them at this same point in a second term, the comparison is stark. George W. Bush sat at 77% approval among Republicans. Barack Obama also clocked in at 77% among Democrats. Then there's Trump.
"Eighty-six percent of Republicans approve of the job that Donald Trump is doing at this point," Enten said. "That is higher than either Obama or Bush had within their own party at this point. Trump's magic touch has not seemed to wear off yet when it comes to the Republican base."
That alone is a remarkable figure, but there’s more to it.
Anchor John Berman asked the obvious follow-up: What kind of approval are we actually talking about here? And it’s a great question, because what really makes these numbers significant isn’t just the quantity of the support, but the quality of that support.
"Okay, so we're talking about overall approval here. How about the strongly approve? The strongly approve. Not just like, but love," Enten said.
The love numbers are where things get really interesting. Looking at strong approval among party bases at this point in a presidency, both Obama and Bush fell short of a majority — Obama at 48%, Bush at 47%. Trump? Fifty-three percent.
"Trump is the only one who gets a majority at this point in their presidency," Enten noted. "Not as high as his overall approval rating, but still getting a majority of the Republican base, at least in the average of polls, to say that they still really, really, really like him."
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More than half of the Republican base doesn't just approve of Trump — these people strongly approve. That's a level of fervent, dug-in loyalty that neither Bush nor Obama ever achieved within their own coalitions at a comparable moment. I think it goes without saying that Biden never had that.
The GOP isn't just Trump's party in name. The data confirms it in a way that's hard to argue with.
CNN: "Republicans love Donald Trump more than any president's own party's supporters loved them at this particular point." pic.twitter.com/QYTlmQifEl
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) March 5, 2026
So what explains it? As a former Trump skeptic, I think I can explain it. Part of the answer is almost certainly Trump's unapologetic style — the refusal to soften, hedge, or retreat no matter how loud the media gets. Republican voters have watched their politicians fold under pressure for decades, offering concessions and apologies in hopes of good press coverage that never came. Trump does the opposite. He knows the press hates him. He knows the Democrats hate him. Instead of kowtowing to them, he calls them out, fights back.
Where previous Republican presidents deluded themselves into thinking they could find common ground with the left by making major concessions, Trump treats political opposition like actual opposition — fighting back, punching hard, and never giving an inch when he thinks he's right. Republican voters who spent years frustrated by leaders who seemed afraid of their own shadow have found in Trump someone who apparently isn't afraid of anything. That's a powerful thing, and those poll numbers reflect it.
