MAGA voters back Trump on Iran and reject isolationism
As President Donald Trump was making his final decision to launch a U.S. strike on Iran’s nuclear program, Washington has been abuzz over suggestions that his MAGA movement is “splintering” over his determination to stop Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Sorry, but that is fake news.
As the president put it in the Oval Office last week, “My supporters don’t want to see Iran have a nuclear weapon.” As usual, Trump understands his base better than both his critics and sycophants. A new poll from the Ronald Reagan Institute, taken just before the U.S. and Israel launched military strikes on Iran, shows that 90 percent of self-identified MAGA Republicans say that “preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon is important to U.S. security” — including 74 percent who say doing so matters “a great deal.”
Only 8 percent disagreed.
That’s not all: 86 percent of MAGA Republicans say the security of Israel is important to U.S. security; 81 percent want to either continue or increase U.S. support for Israel’s military campaign against Hamas and Hezbollah; and 64 percent support Israel carrying out airstrikes to destroy the Iranian nuclear facilities.
In other words, there is no MAGA schism over Trump’s attack on Iran. To the contrary, there is deep-seated MAGA unity behind Trump and Israel. What we are seeing is not an uproar from Trump’s base, but the whining of a loud but tiny cabal of right-wing isolationists — epitomized by the likes of “kooky” Tucker Carlson, as the president has characterized him, and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) — who tried to hijack MAGA to push their own Fortress America agenda. They are completely out of step with Trump and the larger MAGA movement. With Trump’s decision to strike Iran, over their vocal objections, they are quickly finding out, to their shock and surprise, that Trump is not an isolationist — and neither are his supporters.
In fact, the opposite is true. As I pointed out in a column last year, the Reagan Institute’s 2024 polling showed that not only do MAGA Republicans reject the isolationists, but they are also more hawkish and supportive of U.S. leadership on the world stage than establishment Republicans.
This year’s poll suggests they have become even more so, and not just when it comes to Israel and Iran. On virtually every metric measured — from support for Taiwan and NATO to concerns about democracy, human rights, China and U.S. leadership — self-identified MAGA Republicans are more supportive of strong, principled American leadership on the world stage than their non-MAGA GOP brethren.
Rejecting isolationism
Last year’s poll found that a 51 percent majority of MAGA voters said the United States should be “more engaged and take the lead” on foreign policy, while just 39 percent said the United States should be “less engaged and react to events.” This year, the number that said the United States should be more engaged skyrocketed to 73 percent — a stunning 22-point increase. Indeed, MAGA Republicans are more supportive of U.S. global leadership than voters overall (64 percent) and Democrats (65 percent).
This year, 74 percent of MAGA Republicans said that “U.S. involvement with international affairs is mostly beneficial for the U.S.” (compared with just 60 percent of non-MAGA Republicans), including 92 percent who said U.S. leadership was “essential for promoting trade and boosting the U.S. economy” (compared with just 78 percent of non-MAGA Republicans).
Not only do MAGA Republicans want America to lead, but they also want a U.S. foreign policy centered on American values. When asked in 2024 if “the U.S. has a moral obligation to stand up for human rights and democracy whenever possible in international affairs,” 73 percent of MAGA Republicans agreed that we do. In 2025, that number rose to 84 percent — an 11-point increase. (In contrast, last year 69 percent of non-MAGA Republicans agreed, which rose slightly to 71 percent this year.)
Last year, a 93 percent supermajority of MAGA voters said that “a strong U.S. military is essential to maintaining peace and prosperity, both at home and abroad,” while 90 percent of non-MAGA Republicans agree. This year, the number rose slightly to 96 percent among MAGA Republicans, and fell slightly to 85 percent among non-MAGA Republicans.
That said, Americans of all political persuasions say that politicians should prioritize problems at home over foreign affairs, the Reagan Institute poll finds — including both MAGA Republicans (68 percent, down slightly from 70 percent last year) and non-MAGA Republicans (66 percent, down from 68 percent last year).
NATO
MAGA Republicans also strongly support the principle of collective defense enshrined in Article 5 of the NATO Charter. When asked last year if they would support “the U.S. responding with military force if a NATO ally in Europe was attacked,” fully 69 percent of MAGA Republicans said they would (vs. 63 percent of non-MAGA Republicans). This year, that number rose slightly to 71 percent among MAGA voters, while it slightly fell to 61 percent among non-MAGA Republicans.
Last year, a 53 percent majority of MAGA Republicans said they held a favorable view of NATO, slightly higher than non-MAGA Republicans (50 percent). This year, that favorable view fell slightly among MAGA voters to 48 percent, but rose among non-MAGA Republicans to 59 percent. And if Trump decided to withdraw from NATO, 57 percent of MAGA Republicans would back such a move, while 51 percent of non-MAGA Republicans would oppose it. But 56 percent of MAGA Republicans would support increasing the U.S. military presence in Eastern Europe to counter Russian aggression, compared with 51 percent of non-MAGA Republicans.
China and Taiwan
MAGA Republicans are more hawkish about China than non-MAGA Republicans. This year’s poll finds 81 percent of MAGA supporters concerned about a potential war between China and Taiwan (compared with 73 percent of non-MAGA Republicans). And 73 percent of MAGA Republicans said that they supported “taking military action to defend Taiwan” if China was to attack or blockade the island, compared with just 62 percent of non-MAGA Republicans.
MAGA voters are also extremely concerned about China’s human rights violations, including its treatment of Hong Kong and the Uyghurs (78 percent); China’s expanding influence in South Asia, Africa and South America (83 percent); China holding $760 billion in U.S. government debt (85 percent); China developing artificial intelligence technology more advanced than that of the United States (85 percent); China overtaking the United States as the world’s No. 1 superpower (86 percent); China purchasing U.S. farmland near military bases (90 percent); China’s theft of U.S. technology (91 percent); and China spying on the United States with satellites and air reconnaissance (91 percent).
Trump has a clear mandate from the MAGA movement to take a hard line with Beijing and stand up to any aggression against Taiwan.
U.S. territorial expansion
Far from supporting isolationism, MAGA Republicans embrace manifest destiny and strongly back Trump’s plans for U.S. territorial expansion. Eighty percent support making Greenland part of the United States “to provide the U.S. with critical minerals and increased access to the Arctic” (compared with just 50 percent of non-MAGA Republicans) and 89 percent support taking back the Panama Canal “to protect a strategic transit route and counter Chinese influence over the Canal” (compared with just 57 percent of non-MAGA Republicans).
A 54 percent majority of MAGA voters support even Trump’s proposal to take over the Gaza Strip and “transform the region into a hub for tourism and economic growth” (just 29 percent of non-MAGA Republicans support such a plan, while 62 percent oppose it).
The poll did not ask how many supported making Canada the “51st state.”
Promoting freedom and democracy
MAGA voters believe in a moral foreign policy. When asked whether “funding programs and organizations designed to advance freedom and democracy abroad” is “generally beneficial to the U.S. and its interests” or “not worth the expense,” a 54 percent majority of MAGA voters said they were beneficial (compared with just 48 percent of non-MAGA Republicans), while just 36 percent said they were not worth the expense.
They are more ambivalent about specific organizations that Trump’s U.S. DOGE Service, or Department of Government Efficiency, has put on the chopping block. Sixty-five percent supported cutting funding for the National Endowment for Democracy, compared with 45 percent of non-MAGA Republicans; and 69 percent supported cutting funding for Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, compared with 50 percent of non-MAGA Republicans. (Disclosure: I serve on the board of RFE/FL.) But, after hearing arguments in favor of funding those groups, including that they “help combat extremism and authoritarianism abroad,” MAGA support rose to 68 percent.
Protectionism and tariffs
MAGA Republicans overwhelmingly back tariffs as an appropriate instrument of coercion to advance U.S. interests: 86 percent agree that tariffs should be used as a “tool of foreign policy” (compared with just 56 percent of non-MAGA Republicans). And they disproportionately support Trump’s decision to impose tariffs on specific countries, including U.S. friends and allies: More than 7 in 10 MAGA Republicans support tariffs on Canada, Mexico, Japan, South Korea, Britain and the European Union, while only about 4 in 10 non-MAGA Republicans do. The one exception: Both MAGA (77 percent) and non-MAGA (65 percent) Republicans support tariffs on China.
But MAGA voters are not protectionists. When asked whether “the U.S. should favor more of a free market approach with temporary and selective tariffs” or if they support “more of a protectionist approach with broad, long-term tariffs,” 61 percent said they supported the free market approach, while just 29 percent supported the protectionist approach. MAGA voters want Trump to use tariffs to force other countries to take down trade barriers and open their markets to U.S. exports, but do not agree that permanent tariffs are the best long-term strategy to raise revenue and grow the U.S. economy.
What can we learn from these numbers?
First, the GOP isolationists criticizing Trump’s decision to join Israel’s assault on Iran are themselves a tiny, isolated faction that has little support. They don’t actually represent what MAGA Republicans believe about foreign policy. And they don’t represent what Trump believes. This is a president who drove the Islamic State from its caliphate — and killed its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi; bombed Syria (twice) for using chemical weapons on its people; armed Ukraine with Javelin anti-tank missiles; and killed Iranian Revolutionary Guard Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani. Anyone who thought the man who took out Iran’s terrorist mastermind would be unwilling to take out Iran’s Fordow nuclear fuel enrichment plant did not know Donald Trump.
Bottom line: There is no schism in the GOP between so-called “neocon warmongers” and isolationist Trump supporters. The division inside the GOP is between the MAGA supermajority that supports Trumpian U.S. world leadership and a pathetic neo-isolationist minority that could hold its meetings in a phone booth — if they could find one.