I’m sure this has occurred to you, but in case it hasn’t, the 2018 midterm elections look like they’re going to be a real bitch for Republicans.
Part of the problem is legislative ineptitude and to be sure, that’s a bipartisan issue.
That is, the blame for gridlock inside the Beltway does not fall solely on the shoulders of the GOP. That said, when you control the government and cannot get anything done, your party will invariably lose public support.
When you exacerbate the situation by allowing the party to morph into a personality cult (which is what’s happened to the GOP under Trump), the backlash from the electorate is likely to be all the more acute, especially when the personality in question is as controversial as Trump is.
Mitch McConnell and other mainstream Republicans have recently moved to counter the influence of the Steve Bannon drift ahead of 2018 when the Breitbart boss has promised to challenge incumbents by fielding populist/nationalist candidates like Roy Moore. Of course Bannon’s “war” against the establishment risks further alienating voters as those candidates are inherently volatile. The risk for the party is that the electorate comes to identify the GOP as the party of firebrand bigots like Bannon, Trump, and Moore leading directly to devastating losses like those which played out in Virginia and Alabama.
That risk may have been mitigated last week by Bannon’s stunning fall from grace. Roy Moore’s defeat in Alabama had already derailed Steve’s “war” but the break with Trump was the real kick in the balls. Now, Republicans can plausibly claim that Bannon has no connection with the President. That’s handy, because it alleviates the some of the psychological pressure GOP voters might have felt in terms of worrying about whether they are implicitly supporting a party whose values aren’t exactly aligned with what it means to be an American.
On the other hand, one might argue that if Trump doesn’t accept Steve’s apology, Bannon loyalists will support outsiders, thus splitting the GOP vote and giving Democrats the upper hand in the process.
Last month, in the latest evidence to suggest the public is turning against the GOP, an NBC/WSJ poll showed that “Democrats now enjoy their largest advantage in congressional preference in nine years.”
Specifically, 50% of registered voters polled said they would prefer a Democratic-controlled Congress vs 39% who want Republicans in charge. As NBC noted, “the last time Democrats held both a double-digit lead in the polling series and hit 50% on the congressional preference question was in September 2008, right before the party won the White House and picked up a substantial number of House and Senate seats.”
The breakdown is a disaster for Republicans. Have a look at this:
The bottom line, as spelled out buy pollster Fred Yang of Hart Research Associates, is this:
All in all, I think a 41 percent Trump approval and an +11D lead in the control of Congress definitely puts control of the Senate and the House as more doable for Democrats in 2018.
If Steve Bannon persists in trying to undermine the mainstream candidates, you can bet Democrats’ prospects will only brighten in the weeks and months ahead.
Against that backdrop, Goldman is out with a preview of the November midterms that underscores a lot of the points made above. “The November 2018 midterm election looks very competitive [and] Democrats look at least as likely as Republicans to win the majority in the House of Representatives,” the bank writes in a note dated Monday.
When you dig into the details, it’s pretty disconcerting for the GOP. To wit:
Generic congressional ballot polling, which asks voters nationally whether they will vote for a Republican or Democrat for Congress, shows an 11pp Democratic advantage, which would suggest a loss of at least 30 seats in November. Similarly, an average presidential approval rating of around 40% suggests a Republican loss of more than 40 seats. We also note that the number of retiring or retired Republican House members–34 at last count–has already reached a record level for House members of the President’s party ahead of midterm elections, going back to the 1930s. Widespread retirement announcements by the party in power have been seen in the past ahead of substantial midterm losses or a change in control.
The Senate is, if not equally uncertain, almost so. But Goldman is a little more upbeat on the GOP’s chances there. “Republicans, who currently hold 51 seats, are defending only 8 seats, six of which are in states President Trump won by large margins,” the bank goes on to say, adding that “by contrast, Democrats are defending 24 seats, including 10 seats in states that President Trump won in 2016.”
The bottom line is illustrated in one final chart which speaks for itself:
But look, it should be fine. Because there’s no way that Democrats will try to keep Republicans for scoring any further legislative victories that might shore up their reputation and there’s also no way Donald Trump will do anything between now and November that turns the electorate against his (adopted) party, right?
Right.
