House Republicans came into 2026 knowing that they had a small, less than five-seat margin in their majority, which meant that they faced uphill odds to keep power. This realization is why Trump and his party tried to gerrymander as many House seats as they could.
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The gerrymander strategy was dependent on the Republicans not losing voters and the midterm election looking just like the 2024 presidential election.
Both of these assumptions turned out to be false.
Republicans are facing the worst party-in-power voter backlash since 1994, when Democrats lost 54 House seats and 8 Senate seats.
Election direction tends to become clear in the final days and weeks.
Democrats have known that they were likely to take back the House since Trump returned to the White House. Trump is the least popular president in the history of polling, so a wave election in 2026 was always possible, but no one expected what Trump and the Republicans have unleashed on themselves.
The bad news for Republicans is that they aren’t sure where rock bottom is. The GOP can’t plan for the worst-case scenario, but the situation on the ground keeps deteriorating. The party’s cash advantage over Democrats has been useless, and those on the ground fear a catastrophic defeat next month.