On a recent episode of The Daily Beast Podcast, columnist David Rothkopf predicted that Donald Trump will soon become irrelevant to the GOP, and that the president’s own realization of this bleak future will inevitably trigger acts of desperation from the soon-to-be lame duck.

After years of bowing to his every whim, Republicans have finally started to break with the president on certain issues.

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This is perhaps most notably true of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), who until now has always been one of his most fervent allies. Greene has been a vocal critic of the party’s handling of the shutdown and, along with Reps. Thomas Massie (R-KY) and Nancy Mace (R-SC), has repeatedly called on the administration to release the Epstein files. Multiple Republicans in the Senate have also voted against certain Trump tariffs.

“His political mortality is right around the corner,” Rothkopf said. “And there is going to come a moment, and I don’t know when that moment is, but there is going to come a moment where the majority of people in the Republican Party say, ‘He’s a lame duck, who’s next?'”

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More than anything else in the world, Rothkopf emphasized, Trump craves attention and relevance, so losing it will cause him to make a “desperate play.”

Trump likely knows his power is waning, Rothkopf said, which may be fueling his cat-and-mouse game over whether he will try to run for a third term unconstitutionally.

“It’s just a desperate attempt to cling to relevance,” Rothkopf explained. “It’s the policy equivalent of a trophy wife. It makes him feel younger.”

He predicted the people who may try to take Trump’s place leading the party include Vice President J.D. Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

“My guess is that you’re gonna get something different,” he said, like Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R), who is still very conservative but has shown to break with Trump and thus can market himself as a change,” Rothkopf said.

And it’s not only politicians who are getting fed up with Trump. CNN’s chief data analyst Harry Enten recently declared that Donald Trump is “doing absolutely awful in the minds of the American people,” hitting “new lows” in polls.

Enten took viewers through various polls that showed the president’s record-low net approval ratings on the economy.

And in a separate segment, out MSNBC host Rachel Maddow declared, “Donald Trump has never been more unpopular than he is right now.” She explained that his disapproval rating is “higher than it was in the immediate aftermath of January 6th.”

Citing an ABC/Washington Post Poll, Maddow added that “Americans disapprove of him on everything,” from his handling of Israel and Gaza (minus 6 points) to his approach to crime (minus 11 points) to his immigration policies (minus 13 points) to his handling of foreign relations (minus 19 points) to the economy (minus 25 points) to the handling of the Russia-Ukraine War (minus 21 points) to his management of the federal government (minus 27 points) to his tariffs (minus 32 points).”

Additionally, 48% of Americans say Trump has made America weaker, compared to 33% who feel he has made it stronger.

Maddow also cited an NBC poll that asked, “Do you consider yourself to be a supporter of the No Kings protest movement?” and was dumbfounded by the “absolutely stunning response.”

Approximately 43% said yes, which she said “means not only does the base of support for the No Kings movement absolutely dwarf the base of support for MAGA in this country, but in absolute terms it also means that support for the No Kings movement against Trump, it’s just huge.”

“I mean 43% of this country,” she mused. “That’s 147 million people. I think we’re gonna need a bigger boat.”

In contrast, 30% said they support the MAGA movement, and Maddow added that number has been “dropping hard since Trump has been back in office.”

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