How Trump’s poll numbers stack up: From the Politics Desk

Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, an evening newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign trail.

In today’s newsletter, Adam Edelman and Scott Wong take a look at New York Democrats’ attempts to respond to Texas Republicans’ redistricting effort — and how it illustrates the lack of options at the party’s disposal ahead of the 2026 midterms. Meanwhile, Steve Kornacki looks at Trump’s first- and second-term approval ratings and what they mean in terms of setting up the next election.

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— Scott Bland

New York Democrats unveil their own mid-decade redistricting scheme, targeting future elections

By Adam Edelman and Scott Wong

As Texas Republicans slowly move forward with plans to redraw congressional maps mid-decade, Democrats in New York on Tuesday plowed ahead with their own scheme to counter any GOP redistricting efforts.

But the effort faces a long, arduous path forward and wouldn’t be scheduled to go into effect for years, illustrating the limited options at Democrats’ disposal as they hunt for ways to counter the GOP redistricting play in Texas.

Legislative Democrats in the blue stronghold unveiled a bill that would allow state lawmakers in Albany to conduct mid-decade redistricting — but only if another state were to do it first.

The proposal would, if enacted, effectively set up the prospect of a national redistricting tit-for-tat between Republicans and Democrats, with control of the House of Representatives in Washington potentially on the line.

However, there are key differences between what’s happening in New York and what’s happening in Texas, including the timing of any actual map changes. Texas Republicans are looking to immediately enact new district boundaries for the 2026 elections.

The bill in New York, which is technically a legislatively referred constitutional amendment, would allow the Legislature to redraw congressional districts if another state engages in mid-decade redistricting.

It would have to pass the Legislature in two consecutive sessions — and then still be approved by voters in a ballot measure. In theory, that means that whatever new maps that would be created wouldn’t be in place until the 2028 elections.

Read more from Adam and Scott →

Where Trump stands in the polls, and how that compares to his first term

Analysis by Steve Kornacki

Like the first Trump presidency, the second one is playing out in a polarized political atmosphere. But while it isn’t massive, there is a key difference thus far in how the public perceives Trump’s leadership.

Our running average of independent public polling finds that the president’s job approval rating is at 43%. This is a low number historically — but it is also a notch higher than at this point in 2017, the first year of Trump’s first term: