Trump’s Week: Poor Jobs Numbers, High Gas Prices And Noem’s Ouster

Donald Trump won reelection on the promise of restoring the economy and eliminating illegal immigration.

But in the last week, both issues have threatened to turn into liabilities: A stagnant labor market and soaring gas prices amid the Iran conflict are hammering the economy, and the ouster of Kristi Noem from the Department of Homeland Security has cast new light on the administration’s increasingly unpopular immigration agenda. The economic backdrop has grown ominous — Wall Street analysts are warning that surging oil prices could lead to stagflation — and the blitzkrieg of bad news has jeopardized the GOP’s ability to keep voters focused on Trump administration policies that were designed to help with the rising cost of living.

“If you combine an economy that people don't like with a prolonged war that you know nobody in his base believes they voted for, that's a toxic problem,” said one Trump ally granted anonymity to speak freely. While Trump isn’t on the ballot this year, his party needs the president’s poll numbers to improve to keep the House and Senate.

“Don't drag this war out,” the person said. “That's my best advice for the administration. The country is in no mood for a prolonged war.”

The Iran conflict has put immense upward pressure on oil and gas –- prices at the pump have climbed by more than 11 percent in a week. Now, with employers shedding payroll and Trump pressing reset on who’s leading his immigration agenda, the president is on the backfoot on the two issues he needs to own for his party to win the midterms.

Affordability was a dominant concern even when gas prices were low, said Stephen Moore, a former Heritage Foundation economist who’s been an unofficial adviser to Trump over the years. The spiraling conflict in Iran has pushed oil above $90 a barrel — which is broadly expected to keep inflation high in the near term — and “Trump definitely needs those prices to come down as quickly as possible,” Moore said.

The president, meanwhile, is also struggling with what was once his strongest and most defining issue — immigration. While the number of people crossing the southern border has fallen significantly, in part due to Trump administration efforts, the widely shared images of aggressive enforcement actions across the country have left even some of his supporters wincing. Other conservatives, still, are unhappy that those efforts have not gone far enough, falling short of the “mass deportations" he promised on the campaign trail.

Polling underscores the erosion of support. A recent NBC News poll found that 49 percent of adults strongly disapprove of Trump’s handling of border security and immigration, up from 38 percent last summer. Nearly three-quarters of the poll’s respondents said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement should be reformed or abolished.

Trump’s Thursday dismissal of Noem came after months of increasing frustrationinside the White House with how she ran the department.

The president’s allies are optimistic that Noem’s departure will signal to the public a return to immigration policies that were generally popularin the early days of his second term. And they remain bullish that his Iran gamble will pay off and that a short-term increase in oil prices won’t last.

Administration officials — including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent — have noted that the administration is taking action to address oil prices, including by providing risk insurance for tankersin the Strait of Hormuz and offering Indian fuel-makers temporary relief for sanctions on Russian oil. Other allies insist that the fruits of his so-called One Big Beautiful Bill will pay off in the coming months, dismissing the February jobs numbers as a blip among employment reports that have otherwise shown gains.

“People don’t like the price of gas going up and they’re anxious about the war,” said Trump pollster John McLaughlin. “We probably need a little bit more time for our men and women in the military to succeed and be safe again. Once that happens, we’ll be fine and back into the midterm elections.”

White House spokesperson Kush Desai said that the administration’s “aggressive, robust, and nimble approach has delivered results – from a secure border to accelerating, private sector-led economic growth.”

Even so, the job market has continued to show signs of distress throughout Trump’s second term. While unemployment is low, hiring stalled over the last year as employers grappled with a headspinning combination of immigration and trade policies that weakened the supply of workers and suppressed demand for labor.

On Friday, the Labor Department said payrolls contracted by more than 90,000 jobs — a huge downside surprise — with losses reported across both the government and private sectors. The White House has chalked up some of the weakness to a labor dispute that sidelined 30,000 health care workers in California and Hawaii last month — as well brutal winter storms that weakened hiring in the Northeast. But that’s cold comfort for GOP leaders who are struggling to break through to voters on affordability issues that will define the upcoming campaign.

“We are a year into the Trump presidency, and it seems as if everything has changed but the economy,” said Matthew Bartlett, a Republican strategist and former Trump State Department appointee in the president’s first administration. “Now, as we head into the midterms, our only message on the economy is, ‘You should thank us for the One Big, Beautiful Bill.’ That's always going to be a challenge.”

But the GOP’s megabill, even including consumer-friendly tax relief, has done little to address languishing consumer confidence. Americans are less likely to spend if they’re uncertain about the labor market. What’s more, the rapid escalation in oil prices brought about by the Iran conflict has raised the likelihood that the Trump administration may soon have to contend with stagflation — a politically toxic combination of lower economic growth and higher inflation.

“Sticky inflation has been a risk that we have noted even before the war in Iran,” U.S. Bank Chief Economist Beth Ann Bovino told reporters on Friday. “A stagflation scenario cannot be ruled out at this point in time.”

Some GOP operatives across the country are concerned that the war in Iran is distracting the president from the affordability message they want him to convey to allay Americans’ fears and boost turnout. For months, Republican officials have privately raised fears that the president was focusing too much on foreign policy and not enough on domestic issues.

And while the president has at times tried to hammer home that message — taking to the campaign trail in states like Michigan and Iowa to sell his affordability agenda — it continues to be overshadowed by his foreign adventures, including the January ouster of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and an attempt to annex Greenland that roiled markets.

"Focus just on the local shit, stop focusing on the world,” said one Republican operative working on midterms races, also granted anonymity to speak candidly. “Even if you obviously can't bring prices down, just do everything you can to make the people feel like the economy is getting better.”

Sophia Cai and Jessica Piper contributed to this report.