The White House has scored some wins this year, but it’s come at a cost if you ask top leaders on K Street and Capitol Hill. And the numbers related to the economy really tell the story.
We’ve asked our Canvass respondents all year long what they’ve thought of President Donald Trump’s economic agenda. The results have been a consistent stream of anxiety from Hill staffers and downtowners.
That’s striking, because voters have long favored Trump’s positions on the economy in theory. But affordability — a defining boondoggle for the Biden administration — has proven to be an enduring obstacle for Trump. The labor market has slowed, inflation has remained stubbornly elevated and Trump’s approval rating has taken a significant hit.
This is a fear Washington has held since the beginning of the second Trump administration, with 81% of K Street respondents in January saying they were concerned about the president’s plan to impose a host of new tariffs. Just 10% of our survey takers said they were unconcerned.
Capitol Hill wasn’t feeling much better. Just over two-thirds of respondents were worried about tariffs in January — a number that swung up to 71% in April, when the tariffs were introduced.
There’s been widespread agreement that the Trump approach to tariffs will lead to Republicans paying a heavy price in the midterms, Capitol Hill and K Street respondents have predicted for months.
The jury is not out on the impact since then. In September, 73% of Capitol Hill staffers declared Trump’s approach to tariffs to be ineffective. On K Street, 69% agreed with that assessment in October. Even more Hill staffers said the president had been ineffective at addressing inflation — a total of 77% as of September.
Immigration. Another key pillar of Trump’s 2024 appeal to voters was his restrictive stance on immigration. But Washington has long been concerned about the potential for overreach.
Several sectors of the U.S. economy run on immigrant labor of all kinds. And Washington was clear-eyed about the risks right from the start of our 2025 polling.
Back in January, nearly three-quarters of respondents said mass deportations would harm the economy. Only about a quarter of Republican respondents thought deportations would boost the economy.
