Only 15% say most members of Congress deserve re-election
Election Day on Tuesday capped a tumultuous midterm season in which anger at the failures of the political system exposed extraordinary divisions within both parties. Republicans, the party in power, were defending a House majority at high risk and a Senate majority that could slip away, while Democrats entered the vote with a primary-season fight between progressives and centrists. The Republican Party’s recent campaign investments showed it racing to preserve the House majority and protect the possibility of retaining the Senate.
The Wall Street Journal said many voters had been re-evaluating their allegiance to either political party, creating a more fluid electorate. The Journal connected Gallup’s record-high finding from last year that 45% of voters identified as independents to deep dissatisfaction with both political parties, and said voters increasingly did not see the parties as representing them. Recent Wall Street Journal polling found a big jump in the share of voters who held unfavorable views of both parties.
Meaningful shares of Latino voters, young voters, rural voters and some in the large bloc of working-class voters told pollsters they might register their dissatisfaction on Tuesday by staying home or switching their support from one party to the other. The Journal said the midterm results would show how elastic Americans were in their political affiliations and what opportunity each party had to broaden its coalition.
Gallup found last month that only 15% of voters believed most members of Congress deserved re-election, a record low in its polling dating to 1994. When Democratic pollster Mark Putnam holds focus groups with voters, the anger reaches “an extremely poisonous level. One minute after they’ve introduced themselves, they start venting.” Putnam added: “I’ve been doing this for 40 years, and I’ve never seen people as cynical and skeptical as they are now.”
Americans have been unhappy with their political leaders for years. In nine of the past 10 elections, voters ejected one party or the other from control of the House, Senate or White House. The Journal said that history alone left Republicans, as the party in power, with the tougher challenge this year.
The Journal identified three possible openings. First, dissatisfaction could grow deep enough to create new possibilities for political change that a swath of voters could find more satisfying. Second, a new generation of leaders could reshape the parties. Third, voter dissatisfaction had produced agreement across party lines on how government can help people handle the cost of living. The Journal said all three could give the parties incentives to find new ways to become more responsive to voters.
Within the Republican Party, Donald Trump remained by far the dominant force, but Journal polling showed fewer Republicans identifying with his MAGA movement. A range of Republican candidates in recent weeks broke with the president by disagreeing with his tariffs and the war with Iran. The Journal said one reason for Republicans’ political vulnerability was that Trump had angered many of his own voters by imposing tariffs and waging war with Iran, leading to higher prices.
The signs of party fracturing came early. The Journal described Graham Platner as “an obscure and unvetted oysterman from Maine” who surged past party leaders’ preferred candidate with “an angry, populist battle cry.” In a video launching his Senate bid, Platner said, “People know that the system is screwing them,” before adding, “They know it in their bones.” Less than a year later, his meteoric campaign had imploded and he was gone.
The Senate seat in Texas and Senate seats in Ohio, Iowa, Alaska and Kansas were in play after Trump won those states by double digits just two years earlier. The Journal reported that Trump had elevated Ken Paxton, described as the indicted and impeached attorney general in Texas, for a Senate seat over a politically safer option and then mocked him continuously on the trail as his campaign struggled. Some Republican leaders told The Journal that Trump’s backing of nominees such as Darline Graham had involved unnecessary risks that year. The Journal described Graham as an inexperienced candidate whose campaign had put South Carolina in jeopardy of electing a Democrat to the Senate for the first time in 28 years.
The Republican Party was also headed for an internal fight over the best way to draw new voters. Republicans such as Vice President JD Vance were carrying the MAGA banner, while the non-MAGA wing had a voice in candidates such as John E. Sununu of New Hampshire, a Republican centrist running for the Senate who says he is looking to shape a post-Trump America. During a debate, Sununu asked, “When Donald Trump leaves office in two years, where does the country go?”
Among Democrats, the roiling fight between progressives and centrists that defined the primary season presented a chance to build a bigger tent by harnessing the popularity of rising stars. In Michigan last weekend, centrist Rep. Haley Stevens, who had narrowly lost the Democratic Senate primary, endorsed the Republican candidate and accused her party’s nominee, Abdul El-Sayed, of infusing his progressive agenda with antisemitism.
A new cohort of young political leaders was introducing itself to the more fluid voter pool. Sen. Jon Ossoff, a 39-year-old Democrat from Georgia, had drawn at least 3 million followers on social media with critiques of the Trump administration. Democrat James Talarico, 37, was in the hunt for the Texas Senate seat due in large part to his oratory skills. Republican Rep. Brandon Gill, the youngest Republican member of the House, at 32, had about 2 million followers on Instagram and X. All three were on the ballot Tuesday.
Rep. Jake Auchincloss, a Massachusetts Democrat, said, “The parties are going to be realigning,” and “And of course, it’s an opportunity for Democrats, but it’s also a massive risk.” He saw the risk in Democrats offering a watered-down version of Trump’s populism.
Auchincloss leads Majority Democrats, a group trying to steer the party into the political space he sees between Trump’s movement and the “activist left,” which he criticizes for holding ideological purity tests. “The only way to build wealth for the middle class is through the market economy,” Auchincloss said, a position that might involve challenging zoning, pharmaceutical or other interests. Talarico was a member, as were other lawmakers. The group’s goal, according to Auchincloss, was to draw in “the exhausted majority of Americans who want a party that is working for the middle class.”
Both parties also risked alienating voters with their campaign tactics. Vivek Ramaswamy, the Republican candidate for governor in Ohio, ran an advertisement last month featuring his opponent’s estranged mother. The state’s governor and other Republican leaders denounced the advertisement as unseemly. In Alaska, the appearance of Dan J. Sullivan Jr. on the Senate ballot raised accusations that Democratic candidate Mary Peltola was trying to siphon votes from her main opponent, incumbent Sen. Dan S. Sullivan. Peltola’s campaign denied the claim.
The central strategic question was whether either party would try to build a durable majority by moving toward the political center. The Journal said the impediments were high, citing Ruy Teixeira, a political demographer at the American Enterprise Institute, which the newspaper described as a right-leaning think tank. The newspaper reported that primary voters, who pick the nominees, tend to be more ideologically driven, not centrist. Teixeira said, “It would take a real political entrepreneur to do it,” and “sell it to voters. But I think the opportunity is real.”
The Journal said Tuesday’s elections would offer clues to how much change could come from a new Congress and what likely would be the most wide-open presidential primary elections in years. Republican former Tennessee governor Bill Haslam said: “It does feel like we’re at an inflection point.” He asked, “The question is, is something now going to come out of it?” Haslam said the optimistic view of public frustration was that “the ‘pox on both your houses,’ might lead to ‘let’s try something new.’”