With two months to go until Election Day, and early voting kicking off later this month in half a dozen states, Democrats are increasingly optimistic they can recapture congressional majorities.
With the final stretch towards the midterms underway, Democrats see an unexpectedly favorable political environment despite their own weak national brand, while Republicans insist structural advantages and the Democrats’ shift to the left will allow them to defy midterm history.
Senate Republicans control their chamber by a 53-47 margin, and the majority is even more fragile in the House. And the latest forecasts from the leading nonpartisan political handicappers keep leaning towards the Democrats.
But a defiant House Speaker Mike Johnson not only predicts the GOP will hold control of the chamber, but he tells Fox News Digital, “We’re going to grow the majority.”
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Republicans — as the party currently in power — were already up against traditional political headwinds that have historically led to a loss of congressional seats during midterm election years. Add to that the challenging climate fueled by persistent inflation Americans see daily at the grocery store, high gas prices tied to what polls show is an unpopular war with Iran and President Donald Trump‘s well underwater approval ratings.
“We are going to take back the Senate. Republicans thought they had the Senate locked down, but now Democrats, we are on the path to victory. We’ve blown the map wide open,” longtime Senate Democratic Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York told reporters two weeks ago.
But Democrats have problems of their own as they try to win back control of congressional majorities in the midterms, including a party brand that public opinion polling indicates is extremely unpopular. And high-profile victories this spring and summer by left-wing and socialist candidates over establishment rivals in Democratic primaries are giving Republicans extra ammunition to portray all Democrats as extremists.
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“It’s a contrast election, and people are making a contrast between common-sense solutions and candidates, and really crazy, which is represented by the other side,” Johnson claimed, during a Fox News Digital interview on the campaign trail in Maine. “I am very bullish about the outcome on election night.”
In the battle for the House, the mid-decade redistricting push by Trump and GOP leaders is giving Republicans a boost, with a potential net gain of up to a dozen newly drawn right-tilting districts across the country.
But in a sign of the rough landscape facing the GOP, House Democrats last month expanded their midterm target list to 58 Republican-held districts, including 12 seats in territory Trump carried in 2024.
The victories by Trump and Republicans two years ago were fueled by Americans fed up with the high cost of living. Two years later, inflation is the Republicans’ biggest liability.
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Three out of four voters questioned in the most recent Fox News national poll said inflation had caused financial hardship, while 54% expected the economy to worsen.
The Fox News poll and other recent surveys also indicate Democrats holding an enthusiasm advantage over Republicans, and continuing to lead on the generic ballot question, which asks if a respondent would vote for the Democrat or Republican in their congressional district without offering specific names.
“Donald Trump started a war that no one wanted, and now Americans are paying the price. Gas prices are soaring and families who were already struggling in Trump’s economy are forced to stretch their budgets even further while footing the bill for this war,” Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin said in a statement.
Republicans hold a campaign cash edge over Democrats, and remain optimistic about the midterms.
“We have a chance to defy history and win the midterms,” Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Joe Gruters told Fox News Digital this summer.
Gruters and other GOP leaders are spotlighting the major tax cuts on tips, overtime and Social Security that congressional Republicans passed and Trump signed into law last year.
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But Republicans are facing a low-propensity problem: MAGA voters who don’t always go to the polls when Trump’s name isn’t on the ballot.
Gruters called Trump the “best showman that’s ever existed in politics, bar none… He knows how to deliver these low-propensity voters. He knows how to get people up, motivated, excited about the midterms, and that’s what we’re going to need.”
And he pointed to next week’s first ever GOP midterm convention and said, “It gives us a chance to highlight all the wonderful things this president has done in our effort on this great American comeback.”
Trump, at a White House dinner with Republican leaders on Wednesday evening, pledged that he’ll be on the midterm campaign trail: “I’m going to take the final 30 days, maybe a little bit more than that, because it’s all about 35 races.”
Democrats are touting their own get-out-the-vote efforts.
“This year, the DNC organizing team launched Local Listeners, a first-of-its-kind program that talked to nearly 10,000 people who voted in 2020, but not 2024,” the DNC’s Martin said. “What we found could change the game for the midterms this year.”
