Midterm voters gave President Trump a “shellacking” on Tuesday, akin to that delivered to Democrat Barack Obama in 2010, when Republicans picked up 63 seats in the House and seven seats in the Senate. Though yesterdays numbers were tempered by recent gerrymandering, the election was brutal for the GOP and for President Trump.
Democrats gained control of both the House and the Senate on Tuesday. The numbers are not all in, but Democrats flipped at least seven Senate seats and more than a dozen House seats.
The results in deep red Texas, where James Talarico beat Ken Paxton to become the first Democratic senator from the Lone Star State in 33 years, were shocking but not entirely unexpected. Paxton was an unpopular candidate who carried a lot of baggage. That Democrat Gina Hinojosa defeated incumbent Gov. Greg Abbott, putting a Democrat in the governors mansion for the first time in 32 years, was more stunning.
TRUMP CONGRATULATES DEMOCRATS AFTER DOMINANT MIDTERMS, SAYS HE LOOKS FORWARD TO WORKING WITH THEM
Equally stunning was that Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, the controversial anti-Israel progressive running for an open Senate seat in Michigan, beat former Republican Congressman Mike Rogers.Â
One of the few bright spots for Republicans was Florida, where Republican Ashley Moody held her Senate seat and Rep. Byron Donalds became the first Black governor of the state.
As they did in 2010, Americans across the nation strongly rebuked the sitting president, declaring themselves unhappy with the first two years of his second term. Unfortunately for Republicans, questionable polling from many sources and President Trumps low approval ratings turned out to be reasonably accurate predictors of the midterms.
My view is this: as in 2010, voters in this midterm cycle pummeled the incumbent for overreaching. Trump mistook his landslide 2024 win for a mandate, as did Obama. Both presidents offended voters by going too far â in Obamas case by trying to deliver on his campaign pledge to “change” the country. He forced through an unpopular massive health care program, turned our energy industries upside down by executive order, an effort later rejected by the courts, and ratcheted up government spending, which ushered in the Republican-led Tea Party.
In President Trumps case, he quickly closed the border, which voters demanded after his predecessor Joe Biden recklessly allowed millions of people to enter the country illegally. But he then pursued an aggressive effort to deport all undocumented people, including those who had lived in the U.S. for years and had committed no crime other than their original illegal entry. Voters did not approve of the resulting ICE-led confrontations, which in a couple of cases led to violent outcomes. Americans, who just months earlier had demanded secure borders, soured on the presidents signature immigration policies.
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