When President Donald Trump ordered precision strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, a familiar chorus of so-called “conservative” and “populist” influencers rushed to declare doom. The strikes, they insisted, would shatter Trump’s coalition.
Tucker Carlson raged about “forever wars.” Steve Bannon warned of national unraveling. Candace Owens fretted about betrayal. They weren’t the only ones; not by a long shot. The message was clear: Trump had gone too far, and his base would revolt.
They couldn’t have been more wrong.
Despite the media theatrics and influencer outrage, actual Republican voters—especially those in Trump’s core MAGA camp—stood firmly behind him. According to a CBS News poll conducted June 22–24, 2025, a staggering 85% of Republicans approved of the strikes. Among self-identified MAGA Republicans, that number soared to 94%. Only 6% disapproved.
The disconnect is striking. What these influencers failed to grasp—and what many continue to ignore—is that Trump’s support does not hinge on foreign policy purity tests. His base was never defined by a rigid non-interventionist ideology, nor did it elect him as a libertarian pacifist. What propels Trump’s enduring appeal is far simpler, and far more potent: economics.
That’s not speculation. It’s how I was able to accurately forecast the 2024 presidential outcome using my Five-Point Forecast, a data-driven model focused primarily on economic indicators and historically proven voter behavior patterns.
While political influencers speculated endlessly about Trump’s Iran decision and its consequences, I knew his base would hold. Why? Because, last year, I focused on the variables that consistently move votes: inflation, wages, employment perceptions, energy costs, and consumer confidence. The model didn’t rely on subjective claptrap like Allan Lichtman’s 13 Keys—it correctly predicted that Trump would defeat Kamala Harris. Not just in the overall result. My Five-Point Forecast got every single swing state right.
The model’s foundation was simple. Americans vote their wallets.
Under the Biden-Harris administration, inflation peaked at 9.1% in June 2022. Though it eventually cooled to 3.7% by September 2023, many voters continued to feel squeezed at the pump, the grocery store, and during rent negotiations.
Yes, unemployment fell to 3.8% by August 2023, but real wage growth was sluggish. In a 2023 Gallup poll, only 31% of Americans said they were better off financially than a year before. That matters. Historical precedent shows that even with strong GDP or job numbers, perceived economic stagnation can sink incumbents—just look at George H.W. Bush in 1992.
Energy prices told a similar story. After spiking in mid-2022, they stabilized somewhat in 2023, but volatility had already shaken consumer confidence. The Energy Information Administration notes that consumer sentiment dips sharply with rising energy costs—a trend that rarely bodes well for the ruling party.
Meanwhile, Pew Research found that 60% of Americans in 2023 believed the federal government was doing too much to support the economy—suggesting that fiscal restraint, not expansion, resonated with voters heading into 2024.
Trump understood these dynamics. He ran not as a foreign policy theorist, but as a man who could make life cheaper, wages stronger, and the economy freer. That economic message—not a devotion to isolationism—is what motivated his base. The strikes on Iran, while jarring to some influencers, didn’t violate Trump’s core promise: to prioritize American prosperity and security.
Yet the influencer class clung to its narrative. Tucker Carlson publicly clashed with Senator Ted Cruz, calling the strikes a betrayal of “America First.” Steve Bannon warned the action could “tear the country apart.” Charlie Kirk flip-flopped—first opposing the strikes, then backing them. Meanwhile, fringe voices raised concerns about the strikes’ constitutional legitimacy.
But voters didn’t care. The data couldn’t be clearer. Trump’s supporters didn’t flee—they rallied.
This gap between online narrative and on-the-ground reality is dangerous. It breeds misinformation and overestimates the influence of self-styled gatekeepers who claim to understand “the base” but consistently misread it.
If people want to understand what drives Trump’s movement, they should stop listening to pundits chasing clicks and start paying attention to hard data. That’s why I wrote Why Trump Won—to explain how real-world economics, not social media outrage, determined the outcome of 2024.
The lesson of the Iran strike episode is as clear as the polling numbers themselves: The base is not held together by ideology. It's fundamentally bound by economics—by hope for a better paycheck, cheaper gas, and less government in their wallets. Trump delivered that message clearly, and the voters responded.
The influencers didn’t see it coming. But my forecast did.
Dr. Joseph Ford Cotto hosts and produces News Sight, speaking the data-driven truth about economic and political issues that impact you. During the 2024 presidential election, he created the Five-Point Forecast, which correctly predicted Trump's national victory and the outcome in all swing states. The author of numerous nonfiction books, Cotto holds a doctorate in business administration and is a Lean Six Sigma Certified Black Belt. During 2014, HLM King Kigeli V of Rwanda bestowed a hereditary knighthood upon him. It was followed by a barony the next year.
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