Karl Rove has a warning for President Donald Trump, troops on American streets may juice a few tough-on-crime headlines, but it is likely to backfire where it counts, with voters. On Fox News’ Journal Editorial Report, the GOP strategist walked through fresh polling and concluded that President Donald Trump’s push to deploy National Guard units into Democratic-led cities, even over governors’ objections, is “going to end up being a loser.”
A new Reuters/Ipsos survey finds 58 percent of U.S. adults say the president should deploy troops only in response to external threats, not to police domestic unrest. That posture commands 72 percent support among Democrats and a narrow majority among Republicans, 51 percent. Just 37 percent of respondents say presidents should be able to send troops into a state “even if its governor objects,” a view driven largely by Republicans, while independents lean against it. In other words, the bigger the standoff with blue-state leaders, the worse the politics get with the middle.
“If a governor objects, though, the partisanship starts to be felt,” Rove said, noting that independents tend to side with Democrats on the question. He allowed that some crime-concerned voters might credit Trump for “taking action,” but still judged the overall play as negative. “This ultimately, I think, will tend to be a loser,” he said, sketching out the same risk Republicans faced in 2020 when federal force became the story rather than the solution.
Judges in multiple jurisdictions have slowed or stalled deployments, and in the Chicago area, the legal fight collided with optics when several Texas Guardsmen were quietly sent home and replaced after a viral backlash over fitness standards. The administration insists the Guard is there to protect federal facilities and Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel, but the courtroom calendar, not the cable-chyrons, now dictates the tempo.
Axios’ roundup of public surveys mirrors the Reuters/Ipsos findings, with broad discomfort over domestic military missions and a strong consensus that the armed forces should remain politically neutral. Task & Purpose, summarizing the same poll, underscores that sentiment, noting overwhelming support, 83 percent, for keeping the military out of politics. That neutral-ground instinct is exactly what Rove is tapping, the idea that voters may tolerate a “surge” for a true emergency, but will punish a president who makes troop deployments feel routine.
Even where deployments continue, they’re narrow and heavily litigated. Local officials have sued to block Guard operations in and around Chicago, while broadcast reports in Illinois emphasize that units are largely staged to protect federal sites pending court rulings. In Portland, similar challenges have forced a stop-start posture as judges evaluate the limits of federal authority. The incrementalism blunts the White House’s made-for-TV show of force, while keeping the “overreach” storyline alive for Trump’s critics.
If protests escalate into nightly violence, the president looks more justified, the strategist argued. If they don’t, and scenes look more like tense but ordinary demonstrations outside government buildings, the deployment risks reading as theater, not security. That is a dangerous place for a law-and-order brand, particularly when swing voters are telling pollsters they want the military focused on external threats and kept far from the partisan fray. Right now, the data says the latter, and that is why one of the GOP’s most famous tacticians is calling this gambit what he thinks voters will: a loser.
