2026: The Year Power Stops Obeying Trump

A new year strips away slogans and spectacle, exposing how chaos governs poorly, power erodes quietly, and consequence arrives without asking permission or caring who once controlled the noise.

Guest article by Michael Cohen. Remember to follow him on Substack for more by clicking here. Michael just hit 500,000 subscribers on YouTube! Subscribe today for free here and let’s keep the momentum going!

Editorial Credit: lev radin / Shutterstock.com

It’s January 1, 2026.
New Year’s Day.

No champagne haze. No sentimental rewind. Just the quiet, sobering clarity that comes when the calendar flips and the consequences don’t reset with it.

We’re supposed to wake up today talking about fresh starts. Clean slates. New chapters. But that’s the lie we sell ourselves every January; especially in Trump’s America, where yesterday’s mess is always tomorrow’s crisis, and accountability never makes the guest list.

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: It is the courage to continue that counts,” Winston Churchill said. Donald Trump loves quotes like that because they sound like resilience without requiring any. Courage, in Trump’s universe, means never admitting error, never conceding ground, and never acknowledging that reality exists independent of his ego.

So let’s begin 2026 the honest way.

Donald Trump enters this year weaker than he pretends, louder than he should be, and more boxed in than he has ever been; by math, by law, by history, and by time. And no amount of red hats or YMCA rally music can change that.

First, the government funding clock is already ticking. Again. January opens with another budget impasse because Trump governs the way he negotiates leases: threaten collapse, blame everyone else, and call chaos “leverage.” The January 30 deadline isn’t a policy disagreement; it’s a test of whether Republicans can govern without burning the house down. History suggests they can’t. And voters are done romanticizing shutdowns when SNAP benefits, veterans’ services, and basic government functions are used as props in a loyalty contest.

Second, health care is about to punch Americans square in the face. Obamacare subsidies expired yesterday. Premiums are doubling for millions right now, not hypothetically. Families didn’t wake up to a “new year, new you”; they woke up to higher bills and fewer choices. Republicans keep offering talking points instead of solutions, and Trump keeps pretending cruelty is fiscal discipline. It isn’t. It’s political malpractice, and it will be weaponized against them in every competitive district.

Third, foreign policy refuses to bend to Trump’s branding strategy. Ukraine doesn’t end because Trump wants a headline. Gaza doesn’t stabilize because he declares victory. Putin doesn’t compromise because Trump flatters him. Netanyahu doesn’t demilitarize Hamas with a photo op. Trump wants peace deals the way he wants trophies: fast, flashy, and disconnected from human cost. But wars don’t care about optics, and 2026 is going to expose just how thin his “strongman peacemaker” persona really is.

Fourth, Congress is barely functioning. Sixty-one laws passed last year; an embarrassment disguised as polarization. Republicans hold power by a thread, and that thread frays further every time Trump demands obedience over competence. Midterms are ten months away, and history is merciless: presidents lose seats when voters feel broke, unsafe, and lied to. Trump won’t be on the ballot, but his fingerprints are on everything; and Democrats know exactly how to frame that.

Fifth, the Epstein documents aren’t going away. They’re oozing out, batch by batch, discovery by discovery, like a slow leak Trump can’t plug. A million more files didn’t just magically appear; they were found. That word matters. Trump may not be charged with anything, but politically, the drip is devastating. Every press conference becomes a minefield. Every policy push gets drowned out by questions he can’t bully away. Transparency delayed is damage amplified.

Sixth, and this one terrifies him, the Supreme Court may gut his tariffs. The very foundation of his economic chest-thumping hangs on a legal thread. If the Court rules against him, the “LIFE OR DEATH” rhetoric collapses into impotence. If it doesn’t, the overreach still stands exposed. Either way, the myth that Trump bends institutions to his will takes a hit. And Trump cannot survive long without myths.

So what should we be doing on January 1, 2026?

We should be embracing this moment, not with panic, not with despair, but with discipline. This is the year when exhaustion works against Trump, not for him. When chaos stops looking edgy and starts looking dangerous. When voters realize the problem wasn’t a phase; it was a philosophy.

Trump’s greatest weakness has never been Democrats, judges, or journalists. It’s predictability. He always escalates. He always blames. He always doubles down. And now, more Americans than ever can see the pattern.

This year isn’t about whether Trump survives politically. He probably will; he always does. This year is about whether the rest of us finally stop confusing survival with success.

The courage Churchill talked about isn’t Trump’s to claim. It belongs to those willing to confront the mess honestly, reject the noise, and continue pushing back; not because it’s easy, but because it’s necessary.

January 1, 2026 doesn’t offer a reset.

It offers a reckoning.

And this time, we should be ready for it.

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