Trump’s top adviser said I’m ‘full of s***’ after I dared to expose the president’s worst nightmare. But my GOP insiders have all confirmed the truth… the wheels are coming off this White House, and here’s proof: MARK HALPERIN

My latest column for the Daily Mail caused quite a stir.

Last week, I reported that based on my conversations with Republican officeholders, candidates and strategists – including some MAGA loyalists – the midterm outlook for Republicans continues to darken, less than 40 days from the election.

The article went viral, propelled by my tweets that tallied more than 6 million views.

On Friday, I wrote on X: ‘As of now, I’ve heard from 17 additional Republican strategists and all of them confirm what I’ve been told is accurate… and none have contacted me to complain or dispute my reporting.’

Hours later, President Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign co-manager Chris LaCivita responded.

‘I have received 18 calls all saying the same thing,’ he wrote, ‘@MarkHalperin is full of s**t,’ he wrote.

My offense seems to have been stating the obvious and I have yet to be convinced otherwise. I am not an oracle, just a journalist and an analyst. My description of Republican electoral prospects is not based on the public polls about which many citizens are understandably skeptical; I am not reporting what I think or guess might happen or making a prediction.

Instead, I am reporting what I am told by literally scores of Republican strategists and candidates across the country involved in midterm races and who have access to high-quality private polling data and many qualitative and quantitative information that has them in a dark mood.

Maybe Senator Susan Collins will win in Maine. Maybe Republicans hang on in Iowa, Michigan, Alaska, Ohio and even Texas.

Maybe Donald Trump spends the closing days of the campaign doing what he has done better than almost anyone in modern politics: commanding attention, exciting his voters and turning the election into a referendum on the unpopular ideas of the Democratic Party.

Maybe Republican advertising, opposition research and turnout programs will descend like locusts on Democratic candidates.

Maybe.

I know serious Republicans who believe every one of those things is possible. And I write as someone who has argued for more than a decade that Trump is, after Bill Clinton, the most gifted political athlete of the past 40 years. Underestimate his stamina, instincts or shameless willingness to try absolutely anything at your peril.

But after observing the last few news cycles, I see something else.

I see the wheels starting to come off a White House that faces the prospect of a Democratic wave election.

This is not happening because Democratic leaders have suddenly become political geniuses. It is happening because unpopular wars and high prices are a dreadful combination for a governing party in a midterm election.

Voters do not need a briefing book to understand that groceries, gas and electricity cost too much and they typically blame the current occupant of the Oval Office and his party.

Trump’s job approval numbers are dreadful, with especially alarming erosion among young men, women, hispanics and independents. These are not incidental groups. They include many of the voters who propelled Trump to victory in 2024.

Then there is the electoral map. Republicans are not merely defending difficult seats in traditional battlegrounds. They are being forced to worry about places where a Republican campaign ought to be able to leave the front door unlocked, like Florida and Kansas.

Every dollar spent and presidential visit expended plugging a leak in a red state is a resource lost.

Trump is now even reportedly considering holding a rally in Alabama.

Alabama!

This is the political equivalent of sending Barack Obama to Vermont in the homestretch.

The White House’s recent attempt to ban CNN, Politico and MS NOW from its grounds was another spectacular own goal. A Trump-appointed judge ordered the administration to restore access, finding the ban likely unconstitutional. The episode accomplished nothing except generating days of negative coverage, uniting major news organizations (including Fox News) against the White House and making the president look distracted and vindictive.

Now, Republican candidates are beginning to distance themselves from Trump, which produces damaging headlines and raises the obvious question of whether the president will tolerate their disloyalty, even when it is necessary for the party’s survival.

On Saturday evening, we got our answer.

The President reposted more than a dozen Truth Social posts criticizing Florida Republican Maria Elvira Salazar, a Cuban-American three-term incumbent, who finds herself in a tight race against her Democratic opponent in a district that Trump carried by 15 percentage points in 2024.

She dramatically broke with the administration last week, accusing the President’s deportation policy of ‘going too far’ and alienating hispanic voters.

No doubt, Salazar, a 20-year fixture in her South Florida community, identified immigration policy as a political vulnerability and moved to address it.

One of the messages amplified by Trump on Saturday read: ‘We need a NEW Republican to replace Salazar.’

The President’s behavior suggests that he’d rather hurt Salazar’s electoral chances and potentially sacrifice another Republican seat in Congress than accept her criticism.

It’s just another move from this White House that is maddening to the Republicans I speak to, including some from districts similar to Salazar’s, which, only weeks ago, were presumed to be safely in GOP hands.

Meanwhile, Republicans are grumbling that Trump’s political operation may be sitting on too much of its enormous cash reserves, instead of spending whatever it takes to save endangered candidates.

The party does have a substantial financial advantage and that could matter enormously. But money in a bank account does not persuade a single voter.

Abroad, the White House appears to be searching for the kind of breakthrough that could change the subject. Though, a last-minute agreement with Iran looks more like a mirage than a plan.

The Washington summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping may have produced grand ceremony, flattering photographs and sweeping presidential adjectives. But what is far less clear is how it lowers gas prices and makes voters feel better.

There are larger economic dangers as well. Interest rates, the bond market, the exploding debt and deficit and the vast sums of money pouring into artificial intelligence should worry anyone aware of how quickly economic confidence can vanish.

Trump’s full-speed embrace of AI and giant data centers may prove visionary. It may also become a symbol of an administration that is more interested in billionaires and machines than families staring at another ugly utility bill.

None of this means Republicans are doomed. Trump has escaped more tight situations than MacGruber. Democrats remain fully capable of overreaching, choking in debates and frightening away persuadable voters.

But the burden of proof has shifted. Republicans now need nearly everything to go right, while Democrats need economic conditions to stay the same or deteriorate.

At the moment, the prospects for improvement in the next few weeks are dim.

And the President, in the view of many of his long-time supporters in Republican politics, does not appear to be doing much of anything to help the cause.