Expert notes GOP's next big problem: 'Where Trump has really been falling short'

Larry Sabato is not questioning whether Donald Trump still owns the Republican Party. He thinks the party should just go ahead and put the president's name on the door.Speaking with Alex Witt on MS NOW Saturday, the University of Virginia political scientist and Crystal Ball editor said Trump remains firmly in control of the GOP, which Sabato suggested be renamed the Trump party. He tied that grip directly to the movement around the president, calling it part and parcel of the cult, the MAGA cult. Trump does not win every primary fight, Sabato allowed, but his endorsed candidates stay competitive and he can often shove them over the line.Then came the part Republicans should worry about.A MAGA base, Sabato argued, tops out at roughly 35 percent of the electorate, and no one wins a general election on that alone, no matter how fired up the turnout. That's where Tump has really been falling short, he said. The president is unpopular with Democrats, which surprises no one, but Sabato zeroed in on a group that actually decides elections: independents. They usually break close to evenly, he noted, around 55-45 at most. Trump, in some surveys, is carrying an unfavorable or poor job-approval rating of 65 to 70 percent with that group. That's where it's going to hurt republicans this fall, he said.The conversation turned to Georgia, where Rep. Mike Collins won the Republican Senate runoff with a late push from Trump and will now face Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff. Sabato pointed to a Politico framing that Democrats had landed the opponent they wanted, and he did not hedge on it. Ossoff is clearly the favorite, he said, and the race is not a toss up.Sabato did not pretend the outcome is sealed. Things can go sideways, he acknowledged. But he described an Ossoff who is making an impression well beyond Georgia, recounting a recent non-political gathering where people kept telling him they were impressed and wanted to see Ossoff run for president. He paired that with the senator's campaign war chest, then turned to Collins, who he said was the weaker choice and has some rough edges, and that's putting it kindly. Suburban Republicans, in his read, are not exactly thrilled to vote for the man.The bigger picture is what should keep GOP strategists up at night. Asked where Senate control is heading, Sabato reached back a year, when almost no Democrat and zero Republicans believed the chamber would even be in play. Now, he said, it is genuinely competitive. Democrats still need a lot to break their way, with Alaska, Ohio, Iowa, Texas, and possibly other states all in the mix, but he insisted the path is real and visible in a way it simply was not twelve months ago.His parting warning was aimed at Democrats as much as Republicans. To matter in the Senate, where every state gets two seats regardless of size, the party cannot keep itself penned into blue enclaves. The opening Sabato sees is wide enough to run through this fall. Whether Democrats are built to do it, this cycle and beyond, is the question he left hanging Saturday.