Bulwark Takes - Ron Brownstein: It's MUCH Worse for Trump Than 2018 | Bulwark on Sunday

Episode Date: October 11, 2026

Trump’s midterm problem may be far worse than it was in 2018, and the warning signs are showing up in places Republicans never expected. Bill Kristol and veteran political analyst Ron Brownstein examine Trump’s collapsing support among core MAGA voters, the surprising Senate races emerging in deep-red states, and how a Democratic wave could reshape the Supreme Court for decades.

Hi, Bill Crystal here. Welcome to Bullwork on Sunday. Before I begin discussing what's going to happen in just over three weeks with Ron Brownstein. I just want to remind people, we have a little southern tour coming up. Charlotte and Columbia are sold out. A couple of few tickets left for Atlanta. So if you'd like to come see us in Atlanta, I'll be there actually on Tuesday night, I believe it is, October 20th. Go to the Bullwork.com slash events and we'd love to see you there. Okay, enough about that. And I'm joined by Ron Brownstein, old friend and, excellent commentator on American politics, broadly on American politics, American music too, for that matter, which we were just chatting about before we went on camera. And especially elections, I think it's fair to say. When did you become, I became an election junkie when I was pretty young. How about you? Not really, you know, I was a baseball junk. I was at National Journal in 1983, I guess early 1984, and Mike Wines, the great Mike Wines,

left National Journal to go to the New York Times. And the late great Dick Frank plugged me in to help cover the 1984 presidential campaign. And I never looked back. I did take it. It's funny. I became an election jacket because I was a baseball track. So I had the baseball media. Well, Michael Barone. And I studied all, I studied all the, you know, the back of the baseball card.

And the numbers and the back of the baseball cards. And I thought, well, elections is basically similar. You know what I mean? So I still have that. Well, you know, Michael Barone, before he kind of became more ideological when he was just kind of a numbers guy, really, the first of the great. congressional him and Kevin Phillips really kind of the first of the great number cruncher uh he was a baseball guy and and and and then found that it applied to politics and i think peter hart as well i think no i think it's a high correlation generally between sports of politics and

right but especially on the election stuff has maybe baseball statistics which for things of our generation were kind of unique right you didn't have those kinds of statistics and football or basketball and of course baseball has that individualization anyway enough about all that. Let's talk about 2026. You and I discussed it before. Let's take a few minutes just on the general lay of the land. I spoke, I was on a panel Friday speaking to a whole bunch of German students, actually, actually, in Brazil, though, at Harvard. Very nice group. And the final thing, okay, two minutes. Give the, what's going to happen in 2026? What's the big thing to watch? Give me your two or three or four minute, top line on 2026, and then I'll go through some of the aspects of it.

I think the big story is it's the wave versus the wall and both are bigger than in 2018. By any measure, the wave of public discontent with Trump and the economy is bigger than it was in 2018. His approval rating now is as much as 10 points lower than it was in 2018. It's lower, in fact, than Biden in 22, Obama in 10, Clinton in 94, even Bush in 06, which was the weakest of any modern president. And I think a big part of the story this year, Bill, is not only the depth, as I've just has been describing of Trump's decline, but the breadth of it. And in a way that was not the case in 2018, we are seeing cracks in his support, even among core groups in the Republican coalition, particularly whites without a four-year college degree,

rural voters. Pew had him at 54 percent among white evangelicals in their poll last week. That's probably not that bad. But, and the breadth of the decline is the key to what is widening the map for Democrats. Democrats, without a doubt. I mean, you know, you could not realistically be talking about a state like Ohio, Iowa, if Trump was still in the 60s among non-college whites because, you know, there are a majority of the voters in places like that. So I think the wave is bigger than in 2018. It's also, I guess, broader. I mean, like, it has a potential. But the wall, the wall is substantial, too. And by the wall, I mean, the Republican money advantage. is much bigger than it was in 2018 when Democrats actually, I think, had the, had the, netted out everything, Democrats had the advantage. The money doesn't seem to be mattering as much as Republicans had hoped.

But I'm not sure we can say it won't matter at all. But the bigger change is that the map, you know, the wall, the essence of the wall is the map. You know, this election is being fought overwhelmingly in places that voted for Trump and that have a lot of residual Republicans. leaning in their DNA. I mean, there are only eight House Republicans in districts that voted for Harris even after a districting.

And there were triple three times as many in districts that voted for Clinton in 2018. And in the Senate, Susan Collins is the only Republican, of course, in a state. She's the only Republican left in a state that voted for Kamala Harris. 19 states have voted three times against Trump. Susan Collins is the last Republican left in those states.

And then Roy Cooper is the only Republican, only Democrat running for a Republican seat in a state that voted for Trump by single digits. Every other Senate seat Democrats are contesting is in a state that voted double digits for Trump. And if you go back through history, that's not easy. Even in a big wave year, it's not easy to flip a state that voted double digits only two years before for the other side. So, you know, I would say that the wave is growing faster. Republicans are stacking bricks, but the wave is growing so high that, you know, you cannot fully contain it.

But does it extend into Iowa, you know, Texas? Texas looks actually, yes. Kansas, Nebraska. That's really it. I mean, where does the, where does the wave hit the wall? Like how far above the wall does the wave get? No, that's very well said and very helpful, actually. I think you and I have always been, I will say, to our credit,

a little ahead of the curve and thinking the wave was going to be big and was getting bigger. and I think one of the big tip house of it was in the summer, often we've seen this before, there's a wave, but then it kind of recedes some, picks up a little bit sometimes in the last month to do. There was really never a moment. It has not yet been a moment this year, honestly, when there's been any, let's call it,

reversion to the me or Republican or evidence of Republican voters coming home. Doesn't mean it couldn't happen, right, in the last three weeks, but I feel like that's pretty significant. I mean, you know who talks about that, Bill? John Anzolone, the Democratic pollster, who was Biden's pollster, and really has been his whole career,

polling in red states, you know, red districts, the hard places for Democrats. And he said the other day that, you know, August is always good for Democrats and then September is miserable, you know, like September is when you see that snapback, particularly in the kind of places where he works, which are the kind of places that will decide how big this gets. And he said, just didn't happen this year. Like it just never snap back. You know, I am a structuralist, probably to an excess. Like I, you know, I probably do not put as much weight as I should.

on individual candidates and idiosyncrasies. You know, I just look at the fundamentals. And the fundamentals is that fundamental, the key fundamental is that Donald Trump's approval rating is so low. And, you know, and, and, you know, by the way, the other thing I should have mentioned at the beginning, when you talk about the wave, the other sign of the wave, I mean, it's really Trump and turnout versus money and map.

Because when a president's approval rating is this low, and you have such strong disapproval, right? I mean, that's important. Half of voters say they strong. strongly disapprove of Trump. And that historically has been a real marker of turnout. And in fact, if you look at special elections and if you look at primaries, the Democratic advantage overperformance relative to the previous presidential is higher in special elections in this cycle than it was leading into 2018. And the total share of the primary vote that has been cast by Democrats is higher

than it was in 2018. So like all of those traditional indicators, you know, basically say you have a way building. So Linda Lake said to me in my story today, and she's been doing this as long as we have. I mean, she's been doing this since the 80s, a Democratic poster. She said, in my political career, we've never had as broad a consensus in the society that a president has failed as we have today in Trump's second term. Now, you keep saying 2018, of course, comparing it to that because that was the previous Trump midterm and it makes sense. And the Democrats picked up a lot of house seats didn't gain in the Senate. It just felt a little more to me, though, like 2006 or even like 1994, which I was quite involved in.

And we used to talk a lot those that year. I remember. And I just felt early then, and I've been wrong. Goddust, but other things, it was a rare case where I was right, that it just could be much bigger than people realized. I guess I felt that all along. You and I discussed maybe two, three months ago, the last conversation we had like this. One thing you were interested in it, well, you've been very strong on the president's disapproval of the single most important thing. And then the generic ballot, the congressional generic ballot, was not nearly as dramatic as the disapproval.

And the question, I think the way you put it was, is it going to catch up to gradually catch up? Never going to get all the way there. There'll always be some Republicans who will stick Republican for the Senate while disapproving with Trump. But will it get closer to the disapproval or is that just a different or voters willing to disaggregate them to some degree? So say a word about the generic versus the disapproval. And I think you've stressed so often so interestingly, the important. of how many Trump, what percentage of Trump disenfranchilers the Democrats can get? Right. I think the way I phrased it was that historically, the generic ballot has bent to the

gravity of the presidential disapproval rather than the other way around, and that ultimately Republicans face the risk of, at that point, this summer, a false sense of security because the generic was lagging behind the disapproval. And I said the history is that they tend to converge. You know, the history is that views of the out party do not matter as much as views of the president. I mean, you know, in the 2010 exit poll, the share of voters with a favorable image of the Republican Party was no higher than the share of voters of the favorable image of the Democratic Party and Republicans won 62 or 63 House seats because that's not what they were voting on. Right. Right. So today, as, you know, as I said, it's not only

the depth of Trump's disapproval, it's the breath. It's not only that he's staring at a 60% disapproval, it's that he is underwater in states that he won with 55% or more of the vote. And the New York Times did its polls the other day of what was the last week in the red states. He was on he was at 41% or below in Iowa, Ohio, Texas, Kansas, and Alaska. All of them all states in 41 and 38. Between 41 and 38 in states where he got 55% or more. Right. And that pretty much tells you.

There was a Sienna poll, right? Again, it's Sienna. And I think people kind of respect the Sienna, New York Times polls more than anybody at this point. In Stephanics district where he was at 60% of the vote and he was under 50. The Washington Post Schar school polls had him in Virginia 1 in 5 that he won comfortably under 50. Right. Consistently in national polling now, he is only at around 50%. 50-50 among non-college whites.

He's won two-thirds of them in all three of his presidential campaigns. In Ohio and Iowa, in those New York Times policies, he's around 50-50 among college whites. Now, you know, many of those voters, there's almost a, there's almost a paradox here. As you move deeper into Republican core Republican constituencies and find that the rot of Trump disapproval is spreading there, you're encompassing more voters who are really reluctant to vote for a Democrat no matter what. So it is unlikely to me that Democrats are going to match their performance among Trump disapprovers that they had in his first term. In his first term, 90% of voters who disapproved to Trump said they voted Democratic for the House in 2018,

and 93% did in 2020. Every Democratic Senate candidate except Sarah Gideon, again, Susan Collins in 2020, every Democratic Senate candidate except Gideon in 18 and 21, at least 89% of voters who disapproved Trump. And as you and I have talked about, that's what we saw in 25. When Jay Jackson won 89% of Trump disapprovers

in the Virginia AG race. Oh, Jones. Jay, Jay Jones, sorry. And Spanberger and Cheryl won over 90% of Trump disapprovers. Okay, Democrats are not there now. I mean, if there is a worrying sign for Democrats, is that they are way underperforming that number generally.

They're generally on a, on a good day, Democrats are like 80 to 85% of Trump disapprovers. And the races that are not where they should be given the approval, they're in the high 70s. And that really is the game. I mean, they don't need, you know, Trump's disapproval is so high. You don't need to win 90% of Trump disapprovers to win in most places anymore. You probably need low to mid-80s, right? And so, you know, is El-Sayed going to get there against Mike Rogers?

is Tala Rico going to get there? Is Troy Jackson going to get there against Collins? By the way, that's the difference in polls in Maine. Like the polls that have him four or five points ahead have him around 83, 80, 45 percent of Trump disapprovers. And the polls that have it tied only have him in the 70s. Susan Collins held Sarah Gideon to 71 percent of voters who disapproved to Trump. That was far better. As I said, no other Republican held the Democrat to less than eight.

89% of Trump disapprovers in any Senate race incumbent or challenger during his first term. So, you know, I, you know, it depends on the state, but like somewhere around 83, 804, 85% is probably the magic number of a Democrat hits that among Trump disapprovers they're going to win in most contested places. And as you said, you said it very quickly. So I mean, there's a reason, of course, you're not going to get to 90% in these places. You're getting so deep into the Republican bucket that you're just going to, they're going to be less able to flip than the soft than the soft Republicans who flipped in 2018. And also, you know,

the final number may go up because there are a fair number of people, and I think you're, I think you have said this as well. You know, if you are a Republican-leaning voter who disapproves of Trump, how many of them are ultimately going to show up? Well, that's the key, right? You know, the differential turnout question. What do you see about that? Do you have any indications on that? I mean, that's been a, Democrats are kind of counting on that to give the final. final cherry on the Sunday in a couple of these, especially in the red states and red districts, obviously. Historically, you'd say a fair number of them don't show up. I mean, like, if you look at 24, and I had Pew run some of these numbers for me with their validated voters that people

love is probably the most respected post-election. Many people say it is the most respected post-election survey. You know, only about seven or eight percent of Hispanics who voted for Biden in 20 switched to vote for Trump in 24, 28% of Hispanics who voted for Biden in 20 didn't vote in 24. That was, that not showing up is now a measure of disapproval. It's like swing voters

are not only people to swing between the parties. People are swing between the couch and actually coming out to vote. And so historically you would say, yeah, I think a fair number of those people are not going to vote. That'll change the math. I'm not thinking here.

It'll change the denominator, I guess. during my and and the number the Democratic share of Trump disapprovers could be higher than it is today. The only caveat is where we started. Like, you know, we're talking about elections in Ohio, Iowa, Texas, Alaska, Kansas, Nebraska, South Carolina. There's a lot of Republican DNA in those states. And can you, you know, I was in Alaska. And I came back thinking there are like 10 different things working for Mary Peltola. He's a great unusual candidate.

Trump's really unpopular. Gas prices, grocery prices, corruption in Washington, frustration with the political status quo. There's one thing working for Sullivan. There's one thing working for John Euston. One thing working for Ken Baxter. One thing working in all these races, which is that there is probably still a majority of voters in those states who are reluctant to let Democrats set the national direction, like are at least uneasy about a Democratic campaign.

majority Senate. And so can you weaponize that enough to overcome everything else they're unhappy about? You know, I would say no in most cases, but like deep down, would any of us be shocked if a Republican wins by a point in the end in Kansas or Iowa or maybe even Texas? I think Texas would be more surprising at this point because the candidate is so weak. But that really is it, you know? I mean, you're kind of, you're kind of running, and this might be, I mean, you're kind of running against the out of limits of places and states that Democrats can win because Trump is weaker than any other president has been in the midterm. I don't even think Carter was not this low in 78. Certainly Reagan was not in 82. And, you know, Ford pardon Nixon. So maybe, it may be this is the

lowest since Truman in 50. Yeah. I've been, so I've always been bullish for Democrats. I think I was early on Kansas. I will say to my credit. which is now treated as a correctly, I think, as a up in the air stage, just like Iowa. But I've always thought that even the Great Plains states were more getable. And one reason was there's some just individual reasons in some of these states,

the independent candidate, where the Democrats is withdrawn and so forth, a little more acceptable to Republicans, a little less motivating for them to say Republicans, but also because I've instructed your researchers and the numbers have shown this, I think, very much, right? People talk about the white working class, but the non-evangelical white working class

is quite different from the evangelical webbed. I've always thought, well, okay, those great plains-type states are less evangelical. The South is more so. Right. I've always thought, I've always thought the South wouldn't come through. I've got to say now looking at, and I'd like you to go through these numbers, I now look at South Carolina, even Florida in Florida,

and think, I don't know, the cracks in the evangelical support are there too, though. And, you know, and just final point, you can react to all of them. I mean, people are a little overdoing it, don't you think, on how Republican some of these states are? It's not like none of them has ever elected a Democrat in modern times. I mean, you know, it's not like Sherrybrandt was actually center for Ohio. And Kansas has a Democratic governor and, you know, and et cetera. Some of them happens.

I mean, elected like South Carolina. That's pushing it a little. Florida was a one-and-one or two-point race in 2018. Texas, where everyone's so surprised by a final point I make by Tala Rico. In a certain way, though, if you came to us from, you know, we were some guy from Mars came down and said, okay, Beto lost a cruise by what, what, two points in 2018 in Texas, two and a half. Trump is 10 points. 10 points weaker in Texas today than he was then.

Trump is much weaker. Right. His approval is five lower, five or six points lower. Democrats have probably a maybe more acceptable candidate to a little more, a few more independents than Beto was. And Republicans have a lot weaker candidate, Paxton, then Cruz. Why shouldn't tell him we go be on five points? I mean, why shouldn't there be a seven points in Texas, you know?

So, yeah. But the evangelical, not evangelical is not addressed enough by people, you know. I've written several stories over the year about what Mike Podhorser, somewhat tongue-in-cheek calls any NCWs, right, non-evangelical, non-college whites. as a former political director of the AFL-CIO, he always resents the idea that the white working class is the bulwark of the Trump, as it were, coalition, and points out that, you know, yes, if you look at the non-college,

at the non-college whites who are not evangelicals, Democrats perform much better and sometimes win them. They don't always win them. I mean, they still lose them in, I think, the non-evangelical non-college whites in the Rust Belt states, but they're certainly more competitive there. And, you know, Iowa does have a lot of evangelical, and so does Ohio, I think, less so. Kansas may as well, actually.

I mean, Kansas may be another state where that's, where that's an issue. We could, one of us could, you know, if you had, if you had graphics, we could, we could, Google on the Public Religion Research Institute has a very nice map of American religion, and we could tell you what share of Kansas voters or what evangelicals. But yeah, look, I mean, you're right. I mean, you know, these are states that have, where Democrats were certainly more competitive in the Obama era. I mean, one of Trump's greatest strength is that he has taken red-leaning states and made them really red. I mean, that he has done.

He has taken Florida, Ohio, and Iowa really off the board. And, you know, Democrats have a chance to put them back on the board. I mean, you have to say they're favored in the governor races in Ohio and Iowa, probably favored in the Senate race at this point in Ohio. and, you know, a coin flip in Iowa. I don't know what to make of Florida. I mean, you know, we have divergent polling. I guess I'm kind of skeptical until proven otherwise. I could imagine again, you know, it is easier to kind of get voters to look past their ideological priors in a governor than in a Senate race.

Right. Right. You know, so like I'm not vastly easier. You know, you and I have talked about, I focus a lot on the Trump 25, the 25 states that have voted all three times for Trump. Democrats right now have zero of their 50 Senate seats, but they do have three of the governorships, right, Kansas, Kentucky, and North Carolina. Not vastly more, but, you know, at least a little bit of an inroad. So, yeah, I mean, you know, again, but, you know, the wave is really high.

And it can wash over into these places, but I don't think, I said, I'm not going to be surprised if Republicans hold on narrowly in Kansas and Nebraska. I won't be surprised if they, you know, at the trajectory we're going, you know, it often gets worse at the end, not better. And given everything that's happening in the Mideast or diesel prices, you know, the attacks on Saudi Arabia, I mean, are diesel prices going to spike again before the end? And that's critical in these farm belt states, obviously. You know, by the way, by the way, the, you know, you can make a case that once you start getting

passed, I don't know, 2.30, 232 in the House. You're renting seats for two years that you're going to get back. And like, so what? You know, I mean, like, really, the Senate is six years, okay? How old are Alito and Thomas? Like, every, every additional Senate seat reduces the odds of Republicans regaining the Senate before 2030 and maybe 2032, given how little playing field there normally is, right? So, you know, if people have been listening carefully, I said that, you know, Democrats have zero Senate seats in the 25 states that voted three times of Trump. Republicans have only one Senate seat in the 19 states that voted three times against Trump. There's very little movement. There's very little give in the Senate. So if Democrats can swipe in an historically

bad year, seats in Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, much less South Carolina and Florida, you could build a cushion that will make it very hard for there to be a Republican Senate, I think, before 2030 and probably 2032, which would require Alito and Thomas to stay on six more years. No, it's so interesting. I mean, important. I think Tim Miller and I haven't pulling her hair out about this and I think you've commented on it unless pulling your hair out of way. I mean, the Democrats still, everyone's always lags. I mean, I don't blame them because I probably am the opposite. You're a structuralist. I'm a way, I'm a momentum guy kind of, so I always overdo it a little probably. But the idea that people, you go to these, I was in a meeting just

two, four days ago, the house is the key. We need to focus on the house. There's democratic operative types. I think, are you kidding me? The house is done, I think. I mean, what's the difference? And what's the difference between having 225, 230 or 235, honestly, in the real world? They're not going to govern for the next two years. They'll pass most of what they want to pass. Trump will sign any of it. The Senate does, the Senate matters so much more. One Senate seat is worth so much.

I feel like it's this, do you ever play jazz? I mean, the bishops versus knights kind of debate, which is really worth more. The Senate seat is worth so much more than on the margin. And as you say, it's six years. The Senate's will tip one way or the other. It confirms just, not just Supreme Court justices, but all federal judges. It confirms cabinet officers having both houses. even with narrow margins,

it's worth so much more than having one house, even with a second-uponage. Yeah. You think the Democratic operatives and donors are finally realizing that, and these are cheap states, the Senate's. Who knows whether you can pick up Nebraska. I think Kansas, you might well be able to do,

but who knows you, or even if you go up to South Dakota with the Independent, if you go down to South Carolina. But picking up one of those, just for, is worth so much more than the extra four house seats on the margin. Well, there's no question. And do you think Democratic operative and donor world is adjusted to this? I don't talk to don't know enough anymore to really know what donor world

is thinking. I think the, but objectively, first of all, Democrats probably may need to get to 52 Senate seats to Chris Dave, because with 51, the drama, the drama alone may appeal to the betterment to be the center of the universe and shift it back to a 50-50 Senate, in which case, Alito and Thomas would certainly retire in 27 and 28. Democratic Senate, I do not believe, I do not believe after McConnell Garland, a Senate of the opposite party will, again, in my lifetime, at least, confirm a president, you know, a president of one party could not get a Supreme Court justice or a Senate of the other party. I don't think if it's on day one of the presidency anymore.

I really think that's over. Like, I just don't see it. Now, you know, especially in kind of the Democrats have confirmed, obviously a lot of Reagan, the Democratic Senate confirmed Reagan. What was it? They confirmed Kennedy and, right? Well, after defeating Bork, though. After defeating Bork, but they did confirm Kennedy.

Sure. And they did confirm Kennedy. And I just don't see that happening again after Garland. So, yeah, I mean, and, and, you know, you look forward to 28. Obviously, that's the class of 22. There are seats Democrats would have to worry about. But I think they, you know, you start getting up to 53 or 54 Senate seats. Yeah.

You know, you're building a little bit. of a cushion. You know, here's, here's an interesting, okay, I'll see if I can find the number. You know, you and I have talked about, I, one of my other obsessions besides presidential disapproval and the vote, and maybe it's related to that, is how difficult it's become to maintain unified control of government, right? The last five times a president went into the midterm, important phrasing, last five times the president went into the midterm with unified control of government, voters have revoked it. So that is, Biden in 22, Trump in 18, Obama in 10, Bush in 06, Clinton in 94.

The asterisk is that Bush lost unified control in 2001 when Jefford switched and got it back in 02. But basically, if you go into the midterm with unified control of government and voters see that you, clearly you are the party in charge, no president has defended that since Jimmy Carter in 78, and that was an antediluvian times when Democrats could not lose the South. That was the only reason he defended unified control. However, however, the flip side is also true is that every president since Clinton, every newly elected president has arrived with unified control. So Biden had unified control when he got in for the first time. Trump got had unified control when he got in for the first time, when he got in the second time.

Bush got in with unified control. Clinton, I went back this weekend only six times in, since, the formation of the modern party system in 1828. Only six times has a president come in without unified control. You happen to serve in a couple of them, the Reagan and the Bush administrations. But it is common for voters. Now it has become common to revoke unified control quickly, but they also tend to grant it to a new president. So that is just something to keep in mind that if Democrats win the,

Senate and the House this year. And they win the White House in 28. The odds of them losing either chamber while winning the presidency are very small. Right. And again, like whatever you think a Democratic president may or may not accomplish in their first two years, tearing down the east wing, you know, et cetera, tearing down the arch, I'm sorry, tearing down the ballroom that tore down the east ring, tearing down the arch, passing a public option in health care,

there's nothing more important than outweighing the clock. on Thomas and Alito. Nothing. Like, there's nothing that can happen, I think, in domestic legislation that will change America more than whether Democrats can hold the Senate long enough to get a legitimate shot at five Supreme Court seats. No, that's so, yeah, that's so interesting. And it is, I got right. I got right. You should read that. And I think, I mean, it's gets to the, Democrats want to talk about their agenda a little bit all the time. And I, they don't like it when I say, you know what, you should just talk about it. You need to check Trump for the next year. That's what the voters are voting.

I mean, people sometimes make it seem like voters are kind of silly to be focused on presidential approval. But the fundamental choice voters have is do you want to check Trump or do you want to give Trump further support? And that's why these different terms come out the way they have, right? Yeah, I mean, it's not foolish of the voters. They know the Democrats aren't running the country for the next two years. So the House literally, I mean, now, Senate, they are making a slightly longer investment, which is why maybe there'll be a little more resistance in a couple of these cases. But I do think that the Supreme Court thing would be interesting.

It's helped the Republicans somewhat over the last 20 years, basically that issue. Well, you could not run on that in the states that you have to win. No, but that's right. I'm not sure voters would agree with it. Well, that's a good point. They do need, don't you think Democrats, I still feel like their message just needs to be, ultimately, do you want more of the same the last few years or not? And they need to sort of forget about all their nice ideas about the public option and, you know.

They really have suppressed that this year. Yeah, they've done pretty good job. I agree with that. There's not. They got out of their own way, right? Yeah, I mean, there's, you know, a lot of it is just undoing what Trump did. I'm going to put pressure on him to end the war. I'm going to reverse the tariffs.

I am going to let Medicare negotiate for more prescription drugs. Many of them have the public option. I think the Medicare for all thing is more of a problem that, that, you know, may or may not bite Troy Jackson and El Coyed, Peggy Flanagan. and their important signal. By the way, those three, you know, the kind of the three leftist, most left candidates they've got, Minnesota, Michigan, and Maine are all running in states

where they're electing governors. And the Democrats have nominated a more centrist, gubernatorial nominees. And I think it'll be interesting to compare how they perform versus how they go. Understanding you great on a curve because it's easier to, as I said, put aside partisanship in governorship. But yeah, I mean, you know, you could literally,

Do you have your memos from 1994? What was it called the project for the Free Republic? For the Republican future. Yeah, no, I don't know if I have them. They're probably available somewhere. But, but like, you could send that to Adam Hamilton, you know? I mean, you know, you know, because it really isn't that complicated in the midterm. I mean, the single most important factor in how midterms turn out in modern American politics

is views of the incumbent president. You know, the correlation between approval and disapproval of the president and how you vote for House or Senate in the midterm is much higher than it was in the 70s and higher even than it was. Reagan's approval was 50% in 1982 and they lost 26 seats. You know, and again, go back, like Reagan, Reagan and Bush won 38 states, all three elections of the 1980s. And in January, 1989, at the end of that, Democrats still had a majority of the House seats and a majority of the Senate seats from those 38 states. Right. So right now, as I said, Democrats have zero Senate seats in the 25 states. I voted for Trump three times. And they have about a quarter of the House seats. And that's going down because of redistricting. But this is, I mean, I feel like, I don't know, I feel like this is the once in a century flood. That will tell you how far over the levy the water can get because it's never going to be better for Democrats. Like you will not have a president this unpopular absent. What? I mean, Trump's in the mid-30s. I mean, Pew had him in 30, which is probably, you know, excessive. And again, since many Trump disapprovers, like, if you had to predict today, the exopoles will look a little different than the polling going in, because Trump disapproving Republicans may not show up, in which case, his approval rating will be a little higher in the ex-poles than it is today. And the share of Trump disapprovers voting Democrat will also be a little higher than it is today. That's probably what's

going to happen. That's what I bet on happening. And, you know, is that enough to get Turek and Hamilton over the line? It's going to be close. I mean, it is. And of course, probably we continue to have the same general patterns and rules that we've had even after a big democratic wave. But it could also be a moment that does change. It's kind of an inflection point as well, because then a lot depends on what happens in the actual country, in the actual governance of the country and the world, you know, over the next two, four, six years, obviously. But, but, then a lot depends on the two, four, six years, obviously, but the degree to which it is a kind of historic opportunity, at least for six years, right?

At least for four years. And certainly for 28. Certainly for 28. I mean, again, if you go through American history, long before polling, find the examples of a party that held onto the White House in an election to succeed in unpopular president. It does not happen very often. Woodrow Wilson in 1920, he left office, it flipped. him in in 52. He left office. It flipped. Johnson and 68. Bush, Biden. The only example,

the only example, I think, of the outgoing president being unpopular and his party winning the election to succeed him was the stolen election of 1876 when Grant left amid scandal and Rutherberg-B-Hays had to steal the election by promising to end reconstruction. But if Trump stays where he is, I mean, you know, past performance, no guarantee of future results and all that, but if Trump stays where he is, I would say the possession arrow points toward Democrats in 28. I mean, if 60% of the country said he has mismanaged, if 60% of the voters say he's mismanaged the country, it's a lot to ask them to say, let's continue in this direction.

Can you make the other side scary enough? Maybe, depending on who you nominate, but maybe not. And it doesn't help that much, as she would suggest, to have a candidate from the same party, even if he's not that closely associated with the president. McCain, I was a big McCain guy. McCain's not like Bush. It's not going to pay a huge price for Bush.

Yeah. Yeah, I think, I think 65, you know, McCain did better among Bush disapprovers than Gore did among Clinton disapprovers or Bush did among Reagan disapprovers, but he didn't do well enough. There were just too many of them, right? The truth is Democrats weren't like to hear this was they're all going to be into, we're going to pass this legislation and we're going to put Trump on the spot, which is all fine with me and investigations and all. The single best thing Democrats could then do for the next two years is just keep Trump's numbers

down and even going low. right? I mean, they won't want to hear this because it is a single, probably best predictor, though, of what's going to happen? As Mitch McConnell said to Major Garrett, when Major was working with me at National Journal in 2010, what is our number one goal? It is to make Obama a one-term president. So they failed that, though. So that's, but that was the first, but that was his first. But it's the same idea. I mean, it's totally the same idea. And look, you, you were in the way. I mean, you saw this from the other side. I mean, actually, George Mitchell did do a good job in 91-92 of forcing Bush to do uncomfortable things. Yeah. weakening Bush. Let's setting it up for Clinton. Final thing I should let you go and let people go. Governors, I mean, it would make a big difference in American politics if the Democrats, I feel like, actually had the governorship in some of these reddish states where they're now competitive. What or two, they might even even if they don't, even if they don't win the other constitutional offices.

I mean, the governors have really can make a difference in a lot of practical ways. Yeah. So go ahead. Talk about the governors briefly. It's key for Democrats to. have the governorship in the few swing states where, you know, control of the election machinery and the ability to validly certify an election is important. And they and they are favored, certainly in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin and Arizona.

They already have North Carolina. Nevada is kind of the other real, you know, swing state. And that's a toss up, I think maybe slightly Republican, but I think even more important. Georgia and Georgia. Georgia, excuse me, yes. Georgia is the other one. And that, I would say, lean slightly toward the Republican. But again, that's the kind of thing where as the final weeks go on, you could see the undertow pulling down Jackson.

The other thing, though, I think Ohio and Iowa, the likelihood of electing a Democratic governor is really important. I mean, you know, when you have no Democratic officials, it's really hard to start from zero. You know, the party has no rallying point. There's no positive imagery of the party. And this could be, I'm not saying that, you know, in a presidential year when there are more non-college whites voting, the Democrats are right away going to win Iowa and Ohio. But winning a governorship is a step toward doing that. And obviously, Texas would be even bigger in that regard. I'll believe that when I see it.

Texas and Florida, that would be. Florida, I think. If we wake up on Wednesday morning and Democrats have won the governships of Texas and Florida, that will be a truly historic. It will mean they've won a ton of other stuff. I would suspect. And that would be a sort of real possible, I would say, you know, inflection point. Yes. Post-Trump America.

I remember writing a column years ago that MAGO will dominate the Republican Party for as long as it can hold Texas. And after it can't hold, if it can't hold Texas, you have to reconsider it as an electoral strategy. I think I would put Florida slightly ahead of Texas in terms of the Democrats or anything. But like, you know, let's not just glide past the enormity of. Democrats possibly winning the governorship in Ohio and Iowa, given the partisan trends in that part of the world in recent years. I think that could be very significant. And again, would not be possible without not only the depth, but the breadth of Trump's decline. I mean, that's just so important that, you know, in 2018, in the exit poll still,

his approval among whites without a four-year college degree was still 61% national. Right? Now it's usually slightly below 50-50. And again, like when we get to the exit poll, it'll probably be a little better, but Democrats will win more of the disapprovers because some of those Trump disapproving Republican-leaning voters who now say they're not going to vote Democratic,

probably won't vote at all. Final question. Things to watch for in the next three weeks, final three weeks? I think gas prices, right? I mean, diesel prices, maybe above all. You know, and then I'd say the places where Republicans have not spent a lot, and are now spending. Like I it's hard for me to imagine the second hundred million in Texas

is going to have a lot more effect than the first hundred million, but that's not really the story in Kansas right where they're where they're just starting or South Carolina. You can try to really crush a Democratic candidate who's not that well known. It just paid the picture of you know her. Yeah. So I mean somewhere this is the hundred year flood somewhere the firewall will stop it or the levy will stop it how deep into Republican territory does that go. I do not understand. anticipate Trump's approval getting materially better. I do not anticipate Republican enthusiasm getting vastly better on a national basis. I think if I was going to watch anything, it would be whether you know, diesel prices and gas prices make all of this look a little worse and the money can

matter in places where the two sides have not been spending. And that's true in the House, too. Although, like I said, whether Democrats get to 235 or 242, 232 or 242 in the House probably isn't that big deal because unlike the Senate, you really are renting those seats. I mean, Democrats won seats in Charleston and Oklahoma City in 2018 and gave them back two years later. And you'd suspect a lot of that would happen. And then the other thing to watch is in a very bulwarky in way. At what point do Republicans say this isn't working? Are they willing ever to say that? If, in fact, some of the things you're describing happen, do any of them have, the emperor has no clothes? Like, you know, you can't run the, you can't run the country this way and expect to maintain support of a majority of the American people.

That's a very good question to close on, actually, which we can discuss after the election. But, Rob, this has been terrific, really an absolutely terrific primer, more than a primer or two, a sophisticated primer of what to look for in the next three weeks and how to think about these elections and what to think about when you see some of these poll numbers. So thank you for joining me. We'll get together after the election. and have a good to have safe travels. Are you going anywhere exciting in the next? Well, I'm actually, I think the next race I'm going to is Lala Conley in, because, which is the flips.

I've been talking to so much about the non-college whites. It's one of the last well-educated white, you know, suburban districts that Republicans hold, the vacancy, Tom Cain, Fitzpatrick, Lala. I mean, they could, they could be, you know, the same thing that happened to the Blue Dogs in 2010, and the Democratic glugugs, you know, hunted to virtual extinction. And they have good opponents. I mean, this is where candidates, and this kind of about a house seat like this,

where this is a lot of money being spent, having a Kate, my mind's calling out, Connolly and, I know, in New York and Rebecca Bennett, I think, in New Jersey, veterans, you know, moderate Democrats. That's probably helpful. Hey, what are you going to be watching most before the end, before I go, between now and the finish line? I think just the obvious. I kind of keep waiting in 94. There was a bit of a reversion back to the Democrats, actually. People forget this.

And the people got very nervous, un understandably. I mean, they hadn't won the House of 40 years, it was right to be nervous that it wasn't going to happen. And then the last two weeks, the way I think of it as like stock market terms, like the primary trend reasserted itself. You know, it was like there was a correction, the dip, and then the trend kind of kicked in at the end. And I kind of think that's happened in most of the wave years.

And so I keep waiting for the dip. There hasn't been much of one. But does it stall out? Is there a little coming back home for the Republicans? or do we, I'd be very curious to see state level, even district level polls, whether you have a little bit of a continued uptick in the Democratic number and especially on the enthusiasm to the degree that can be measured or not. So I think, I think probably what we're seeing now is a reasonably good predictor of where the final vote is. It's not going to be off by huge numbers. Right.

I wouldn't think. But boy, those last two or three points plus or minus can make a huge difference in these states. Again, especially because almost every race is being fought out in a place. the voter for Donald Trump in 2024. So the reversion of the mean thing is a risk for Democrats. And as you say, it's not going to be big, but it doesn't have to be that big. And they will probably have some heartbreak, some places where they fall just short. But if that's at the 54th and 55th Senate seat, I think they'll look with it.

Yeah, they sure will. Right. Ron, thanks so much for joining me today. Safe travels, and we'll talk again soon. Thank you. Thank you all for guarding us on the Bulbar-Kis Sunday.