President Donald Trump has had a tough November, but how much of his present difficulties will carry over into 2026?

It’s been a big month in US politics, and some political observers are asking whether the MAGA movement is finally losing steam. A year after President Donald Trump’s stunning comeback, Republicans face fresh blowback following the end of a record-breaking government shutdown, renewed, coalition-splitting public scrutiny of the “Epstein Files,” and major electoral defeats on November 4.

What do the election results mean for the Democrats and Republicans going into the 2026 midterms? Which party emerged victorious from the resolution of the government shutdown on November 12? And how has the release of the “Epstein files” impacted President Trump’s political prospects?

This week, The National Interest editor Jacob Heilbrunn joins Paul Saunders, president of the Center for the National Interest, to discuss the recent tumult in US politics. 

Listen now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

About the Speakers: Paul Saunders and Jacob Heilbrunn

Paul J. Saunders is president of the Center for the National Interest and a member of its board of directors. He is also the publisher of The National Interest. His expertise spans US foreign and security policy, energy security and climate change, US-Russia relations and Russian foreign policy, and US relations with Japan and South Korea. Saunders is a senior advisor at the Energy Innovation Reform Project, where he served as president from 2019 to 2024. He has been a member of EIRP’s board of directors since 2013 and served as chairman from 2014 to 2019. At EIRP, Saunders has focused on the collision between great power competition and the energy transition, including such issues as energy security, energy technology competition, and climate policy in a divided world. In this context, he has engaged deeply in energy and climate issues in the Indo-Pacific region, especially US relations with Japan and South Korea. His most recent project at EIRP is an assessment of Russia’s evolving role in the global energy system.

Jacob Heilbrunn is editor of The National Interest and is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center. He is the author of They Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the Neocons, which The New York Times included on its 100 notable books of the year in 2008, and America Last: The Right’s Century-Long Romance with Foreign Dictators. He has written on both foreign and domestic issues for numerous publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, Reuters, Washington Monthly, and The Weekly Standard. He has also written for German publications such as Cicero, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, and Der Tagesspiegel.

Image: Noam Galai / Shutterstock.com.

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