They Call Trump Divisive. His Record Tells a Different Story.

Donald Trump is frequently described as one of the most polarizing and hyper-partisan figures in modern American politics. The storyline is always the same: he is portrayed as instinctively combative, allergic to compromise, and uninterested in anything resembling cooperation across party lines.

Minnesota’s Democrat governor (at least for now!), Tim Walz, has called Trump a “wannabe dictator,” while former Biden Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg warned on CNN that the country was dealing with “the most divisive president in modern times.”

It’s an easy story to tell, but it’s not an accurate one.

In practice, Trump has often been willing to work with Democrats when it serves a clear policy goal, especially when the objective is a tangible improvement in people’s daily lives rather than ideological point-scoring.

That instinct truly matters as Congress heads towards the 2026 midterms with affordability now the dominant political issue across the electorate.

Recent headlines illustrate the point.

Trump’s recent openness to a proposal floated alongside Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) to cap credit card interest rates has drawn sharp criticism from many Republicans, and not without reason. Hard caps risk shrinking access to credit, particularly for lower-income borrowers, and several conservative lawmakers have rightly urged him to take a different approach. Trump appears receptive to that pushback.

But the larger takeaway isn’t this policy dispute itself. It’s the fact that Trump was indeed willing to engage the idea of working with Democrats at all — and to do so publicly.

That doesn’t fit the cartoon version of a leader driven purely by partisan reflex.

Populism isn’t Democrat or Republican. It is all about putting consumers first.

That is Trump’s modus operandi, and it always has been.

Often, when the president does reach across the aisle, it results in concrete reforms hailed by all Americans.

Take hospital price transparency as an example. For decades, healthcare costs rose behind billing practices that left patients guessing until long after treatment.

The Trump administration forced hospitals to disclose prices in advance, empowering consumers and introducing price pressure into a sector long insulated from it. The policy wasn’t ideological; it was practical - and it survived legal challenges because it addressed a real market failure.

Criminal justice reform is another good example. The First Step Act was passed with support from both sides of the aisle. The act moved changes that had been stuck for years by changing sentencing rules and expanding rehabilitation, without weakening public safety. It brought together conservatives uneasy with an overbuilt prison system and progressives who had long pushed fairness. The emphasis was on outcomes, not slogans.

Paid family leave offers another example. Long treated as a progressive priority, the idea gained real traction under Trump, who supported paid parental leave for federal workers and signed it into law with bipartisan backing. Rather than framing the policy as an entitlement, the administration presented it as a way to strengthen families, keep people attached to the workforce, and reduce long-term economic instability.

So, yes, Trump’s record does suggest that he is willing to work with unlikely partners when it leads to real results.

With the new year now in full swing, Congress is being judged by results, not by how well they play WWE-style wrestling against their opponents across the aisle. Voters don’t want partisan lectures. They just want everyday life to cost less.

That judgment standard isn’t ideological at all. And neither, at its best, is effective governance.

Debbie Dooley is the founder of Conservatives for Energy Freedom, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting competition and consumer choice in the energy market. She is also one of the national co-founders of the Tea Party movement. Debbie was one of President Donald Trump’s earliest supporters, and her endorsement was carried as an op-ed in Breitbart in 2016.

Editor's Note: President Trump is leading America into the "Golden Age" as Democrats try desperately to stop it.

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