The conventional wisdom from Tuesday’s election results suggests that Republicans had better buckle up for a 2026 midterm beatdown.
I’m not so sure. Not at all sure, actually.
Yes, the Democrats notched some wins in predictable places, like New York City and New Jersey and Virginia. But what does it mean for next year’s midterms and for the 2028 presidential election? Not much at all, I think.
First off, the Senate will stay put. Not even the fever-dreamiest Democrats think they can overcome a three-seat Republican majority, even if next year’s races set up favorably for the Democrats. Which they don’t. So judicial nominations and perhaps even a SCOTUS pick or two are looking good between now and January 20, 2029.
Republicans, of course, are inclined to put on a brave face even after a bad night, but an internal memo from the National Republican Congressional Committee says that despite the “historical headwinds” that midterm elections present for the party in power, it’s the profound weaknesses of the Democrats that will wreck their chances of regaining the House and thereby scuttling Donald Trump’s second term.
“Democrats have their weakest brand in decades, with 67% of Democrats saying they’re frustrated with their party, up from about half in Pew polls from 2021 and 2019,” the memo puts it. “Voters define [Democrats] as higher taxes, weak leadership, a soft-on-crime stance, open borders, and wokeness. They are the party of the elite interests, out of touch with the working class.”
Or, as House Speaker Mike Johnson argued:
What happened [Tuesday] night was blue states and blue cities voted blue. We all saw that coming, and no one should read too much into [Tuesday] night’s election results. Off-year elections are not indicative of what’s to come. That’s what history teaches us. …
I think people are frustrated and angry as we are. I am. The president is, and we express that in different ways. But we’re looking forward to a great election running on our record, and we’re going to get all of our incumbents reelected, and we’re going to add to the number here.
Then, of course, there is Zohran Mamdani, the communist mayor-elect of the world’s most consequential city — the gift I believe will keep on giving to the Republican Party. As I noted a couple of weeks ago, I believe Commie Mamdani’s tenure in Gracie Mansion will be a four-year-long “I told ya so!” and a master class in unbridled leftism for the entire nation to see. If New York City’s dalliance with a naked commie turns out like we think it’s going to turn out — like these things always turn out — his manifold failures will further marginalize the Democrats and their policies while boosting the GOP’s image as the sober-minded adults in the room.
And it’s here that we can focus on what unites our left-leaning friends with We the Thinking — namely, the election of Zohran Mamdani. They’re thrilled by it, and so are we.
Political parties tend to misread favorable election results and apply the wrong lessons. If Democrats were wise, they’d realize that the takeaway wasn’t Commie Mamdani’s win in New York City, where Democrats outnumber Republicans by 7-to-1 or so. No, the takeaway is that come election time, Democrats who present themselves as moderates — even disingenuously so, as Abigail Spanberger did in the Virginia governor’s race — invariably do better in competitive congressional districts. Instead, though, the energetic part of the Democrat Party — which is the communist-socialist-anarchist part of it — will be the loudest and angriest voice between now and next November. They’ll push not only for more radical candidates in their primaries but also for more radical policy positions among their ultimate congressional candidates — positions that are softer on crime, softer on the mass deportation of criminal illegals, softer on the cult of transgenderism, and self-destructively out of control in their opposition to Donald Trump.
Finally, even in victory, it’s easy to see the fractures in the Democrat Party. There’s a moderate faction, a hard-left faction, and an insane-left faction. On the Republican side, there is a danger of internecine warfare taking the place of honest and thoughtful debate, but if the Right can remember where the greater threat to Liberty lies and row in the same direction, there’s hope.
The mischief-makers on the Trump-Deranged Right know who they are, and they know precisely what they’re doing. And we need to tune them out and focus on the bigger picture — which is putting America First, defending the Constitution, retaining the House in next year’s midterms, and charting a winning course for Donald Trump’s successor in 2028.
Set against those four overriding goals, nothing else matters.
