The corporate media invested heavily in getting Donald Trump elected in 2024, and they have done everything in their power to ignore the fact that the candidate is backed in cognitive and physical decline while also being historically unpopular with voters.
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Trump’s attempt to rig the midterm election through mid-decade gerrymandering was always based on the assumption that the 2026 election would be close, but the Democratic overperformance in special elections indicates that voters are angry and want change.
This dynamic is no different from 2024 when voters were angry about the economy, costs, and inflation, and demanded change. The difference is that Democrats are the party of change in 2026.
The political shoe has changed feet, and it is now the Republican Party that is trying to figure out how to survive with an unpopular president and a brutal economy. The difference is that Trump is actively taking steps to make the economy worse and is trapped in a war in the Middle East.
Even with the conservative Supreme Court ruling on the Voting Rights Act, and the new Virginia map being thrown out by the state Supreme Court, not much has changed.
Kyle Kondik is an American elections analyst and the Managing Editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia, and he broke down the numbers.
Kondik posted on X:
Following VA and new TN/FL maps, 211 at least Leans R, 208 at least Leans D, 16 Toss-ups. I do think it’s reasonable to think Ds will win the bulk of the Toss-ups, though, and quite possibly more beyond that.
Kondik’s analysis doesn’t include three more majority minority districts that might be eliminated in the South, but that still isn’t enough to save the Republican majority, and we’ll examine below.