The insider DC sheets this morning all have news of a coming deal to reopen the government. The outline of that deal is an agreement to hold a future vote on Obamacare subsidies (a name we should really drop), which there’s no certainty Democrats would win, in exchange for another short or medium term continuing resolution. The catch to these reports is that, if you look closely, they seem to be overwhelmingly sourced to Republicans. That, however, doesn’t mean they’re not accurate — though you wouldn’t go too wrong being suspicious. Another dimension of this story is that the Democrats doing informal negotiations — and the potential crossover votes — are heavily stacked with soon-to-be retirees, Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) and Gary Peters (D-MI) among others.

Tomorrow we’re going to get our first widespread read on what actual voters think of the Trump presidency. Of course, Trump isn’t on the ballot. Nor is it a federal election. But, more than at any other time in our lifetimes, all political questions revolve around Trump and whether you’re for or against him. We’ll get indirect reads on how perceptions of Trump are affecting voting behavior. We’ve also just gotten a series of new national polls, timed for release just before Tuesday. They show Trump almost as unpopular as he has ever been, not only during his second presidency but at the most feral and unhinged moments of his first. FiftyPlusOne shows his average approval numbers underwater by 15 points, with approval at 40.9%. If there’s anything “new” here, it’s that his high disapprovals are breaking more ground than his low approvals. He’s wringing the final undecideds or not-paying-attentions out of the electorate.

But the picture is different on the generic ballot — the standard measure of a congressional election. There, it is a kind of choose-your-own-adventure. The FiftyPlusOne average here have Democrats up by 3.5 percentage points — 45.6 to 42.1. That’s okay for the Democrats but it’s far closer than you’d expect with a president this unpopular. The most recent numbers are fairly scattered. NBC and Verasight have the Democrats with an eight point advantage. CNN gives them a five point advantage. But Washington Post/ABC have it at two points. NewsNation (whose pollster I can’t identify) says it’s essentially even.

As you’ve probably already heard, Donald Trump went on Truth Social late last night and announced that the time had come for his senators to pass a clean “continuing resolution” to reopen the government with a simply majority vote by abolishing the filibuster. The only proper response to this is “bring it on.” It’s never good to cower, of course. “Give it your best shot” is always the proper posture. But if Trump is able to accomplish this (I’m skeptical — more on that in a moment), that’s great news.