A prominent conservative journalist declared on Friday that President Donald Trump is "crashing out," arguing that the president's latest meltdown comes as his plans fall apart.

National Review senior political correspondent Jim Geraghty laid out his case on X (original post):

"In the last 24 hours," posted Geraghty, "Trump has shared on Truth Social a chart declaring he is the greatest president, above George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and, er, Woodrow Wilson; posted an AI-generated image of him walking arm-in-arm with Dolly Parton; declared the Strait of Hormuz 'U.S. territory' again; and enthusiastically announced that 'the U.S. Geological Survey has officially designated the former Lake Ontario to be renamed as Lake America in all official USGS electronic documents.'"

The Strait of Hormuz reference carries particular weight: the narrow waterway between Iran and Oman is one of the world's most important chokepoints for oil shipments, and past U.S.–Iran tensions there have repeatedly moved global markets and raised fears of wider conflict in the region.

Based on this, Geraghty reached a straightforward conclusion: "He is, as the kids say today, 'crashing out' — raging, fuming, lashing out, flitting from one concern to the next, frustrated that so many of his efforts have come to naught."

Contradictory Presidential Rankings

As Geraghty noted, Trump had posted a chart ranking presidents with himself at the top. At the bottom, the chart declared that presidential "failures" included Joe Biden, Barack Obama, Jimmy Carter, Warren G. Harding, and Ulysses S. Grant — the last of whom famously led the Union Army to victory over the Confederacy during the Civil War.

Trump later posted another image declaring five presidents who "built" America (including himself) and five who "broke" it. Woodrow Wilson appeared on the "broke" tier, despite the previous chart listing him among the "great" presidents. The posts stand in contrast to long-running scholarly surveys of presidential leadership — such as the Siena College and C-SPAN rankings, which poll historians and place Trump far from the top — though such polls have themselves become partisan flashpoints.

The Dolly Parton Post

The president also shared a fake image of himself walking with the recently deceased Dolly Parton, whom he claimed "really liked me." In reality, Parton was careful to maintain a nonpartisan stance, twice turning down Trump's offer of the Presidential Medal of Freedom — the nation's highest civilian honor. She famously supported causes such as LGBTQ rights and spent money out of her own pocket to fund coronavirus vaccine research, helping back the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine through her $1 million contribution to Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

Further Posts and Midterm Comments

Trump went on to post taunts at Canada and Iran, photos of horse statues being coated in gold, a smattering of other photos relating to his D.C. vanity projects, and an article with the headline, "Trump's chilling five-word response when asked if he'll declare national emergency to control midterm elections."

In that article, Trump revealed his thinking on whether he would declare an emergency to seize control of the midterms, saying, "Stranger things have happened." Any such move would be politically explosive heading into the 2026 midterms, where control of Congress will shape the remainder of Trump's term.

Conservative Backlash

Other conservatives voiced their disgust amid Trump's latest social media outburst. The criticism came largely from the "Never Trump" wing of the movement, longtime critics of the president within the right-leaning media.

"He routinely abuses power in cruel, vindictive, and self-enriching ways," said Gregg Nunziata, a former Marco Rubio staffer (original post), slamming the president's "childish and historically illiterate buffoonery on the world stage."

Jonah Goldberg, editor-in-chief of the conservative outlet the Dispatch (original post), took issue with "the fact that the sitting president — during a war, in the lead up to the midterms, during a period of great anxiety — is casually posting about how he's the greatest president ever. I get that defenders think it's brilliant because it's trolling. That's pathetic in its own right. But a president trolling about how awesome he is when his approval rating is in the low 30s isn't smart, clever, or wise. It's sad and disturbing."