The NPR Politics Podcast - What's the 'biggest' thing on our political radar for next year?

Episode Date: December 7, 2025

This normally would be a bonus episode just for NPR Politics Podcast+ listeners. With this being the season of giving, we're sharing this one with everyone! To hear more bonus content like this, regular episodes sponsor-free, and support the work of NPR, sign up for NPR Politics Podcast+ at plus.npr.org/politics. It's the latest installment of our series, "Political Mosts," where we answer a superlative-type question about covering politics and our careers in journalism. Today, Sarah McCammon (national political correspondent) and Sam Gringlas (Congress reporter) each share the "biggest" issue or issues on their political radar for next year. They also answer this question from a listener: “What person or event was the ‘biggest’ influence on your decision to become a journalist?"    Listen to find out how you can submit a most-type question for us to answer in a future bonus episode! Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

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environmental disaster, the sour stench of chaos in the air. I'm Brooke Gladstone, host of WNYC's On the Media. Want to understand the reasons and the meanings of the narratives that led us here and maybe how to head them off at the pass? That's on the media. specialty. Take a listen wherever you get your podcasts. Hey there, it's Sarah McCammon. I cover politics. And I'm Sam Greenglass. I cover Congress. So Sam, we're here for our turn at what we're calling political most. For those of you unfamiliar, the idea is pretty simple. These are short conversations where we each take a turn answering a most or other superlative type questions about what it's like covering politics or our journalism

careers. And before I reveal today's question, Sam, let me just welcome you to our first bonus episode. Thanks, Sarah. Everybody might not know you officially joined NPR as a Congress reporter just a couple months ago. Although you're not really a newcomer to NPR. You and I worked together in a previous life when you were a producer, right? Yeah, this feels like a little bit of a homecoming. I started my professional journalism career at NPR as in all things considered intern back in the summer of 2016. And then I stayed on as a producer for almost six years after that before I headed to Atlanta to cover Georgia politics at the member station there, W.A.B. And now I'm back in D.C. and slowly getting adjusted to being back in the Capitol. Well, we are glad to have you. So let's go to our first

most question. When it comes to your reporting beat, what is the biggest thing or things on your radar for the next year? Sam, I'll let you go first. Okay. Well, I cover Congress. So obviously, the midterms are going to be a huge part of my 2026. I was a politics reporter in Georgia, as I mentioned, before taking this job, starting with the last midterms in 2022. And there's, you know, a few threads or themes I've been tracking over the last few years and some new ones, but ones that I'll be following headed into the next year. One is the implications of this redistricting arms race that's happening right now, not only for, you know, who controls the house at the end of next year, but implications for how people are represented and their ability to have issues that they care about voiced in the Capitol in Washington. I'll also be looking for any day late between Trump and Republicans who are maybe running in tough races now that he's not running again for re-election. I'm really curious to follow how some of these affordability themes play out in races. Democrats focused on health care in 2018 and 2022.

and that has really become a part of this affordability conversation. And then I'm also really interested in issues around administering elections, you know, how we vote. Will we see efforts again to interfere with election results? Or, you know, heated political rhetoric about stolen elections as we saw in past cycles. This is not a presidential election year, so maybe the atmosphere is less intense, but, you know, already some of these Indiana lawmakers

considering redistricting have faced threats and harassment. and I'll be watching to see if we continue to see that kind of climate headed into next year. Yeah, and what the rhetoric looks like from the top coming out of the election. I mean, I think a perennial question now when it comes to elections is whether or not there are any actual problems or complications, do people trust the results, given some of the rhetoric they've heard from people like President Trump. You know, you mentioned affordability. That was, you know, a huge issue, of course, in the 2025 elections, the off-off. off your elections, which we'll talk about in a little bit. President Trump has called this issue of affordability a con job. I mean, he's kind of been all over the place with his messaging on

affordability, right? At times acknowledging or suggesting that the things are getting better and at times sort of dismissing the concern altogether. Can he neutralize this issue? I mean, do you think this could be a winning issue for Democrats next year? Well, I think Democrats certainly hope it can be a winning issue. In 2024, Democrats were kind of slow to recognize, the importance of cost of living for a lot of voters. Meanwhile, Republicans just hammered them on it again and again. And this has now seemed to flip a little bit. You hear Democrats talking a lot about affordability. Trump kind of underplaying how important it might be for voters. And I think we're going to see Democrats really put this in the context, not just of the cost of housing and

groceries, but also health care, you know, with this subsidies debate that we've been seeing playing out in Congress. If these Affordable Care Act enhanced subsidies, expire at the end of the year, as it's looking like they're likely to do without a deal to extend them. We're going to hear Democrats talking a lot about this issue and hammering Republicans on it. I talked to Senator Alyssa Slotkin, Democrat of Michigan a few weeks ago, and she told me that of all the issues about affordability, health care is the most personal. And, you know, we've even seen some Republicans start to talk about this and, you know, maybe criticizing their party for not following through on some of their more populist messages. This was a key thing Representative Marjorie Taylor

Green of Georgia cited when she said that she'll be quitting Congress next year that the White House hasn't done enough to make life better for people. And Sam, when it comes to the midterms, are there particular races, particular states that you are going to be paying especially close attention to? So there are always two states that are really close to my heart, both personally and when it comes to politics. One, you might be able to guess is Georgia, where I spent the last four years. There's a huge Senate race. Senator John Ossoff is the only incumbent Democrat defending a Senate seat in a state that Trump won. And then also be paying really close attention to Michigan, which is my home state. And it's also a really fascinating place for politics

where there is also going to be a heated Senate and governor's race, as well as several competitive House races as well. Okay, Sarah, how about you? What's the biggest topic on your radar when it comes to your beat in 2026? Yeah, you know, it's a little trickier for me to answer because my beat is not as clearly defined as yours. I don't cover the White House or the Capitol Hill. I cover politics and culture. And so sometimes that means reproductive rights and gender. Sometimes it means demographic. Sometimes it means other things. But I think all of us are going to be thinking hard about the midterms. Obviously, that is the big political story of next year, both because it matters for control of Congress and because of what it could signal about what's to come

two years later in the 28 presidential election, which is sure to be contentious. You know, so one of the big things on my radar is what's happening with demographics. I was fascinated looking at the exit polls in 24 and seeing those really surprising demographic shifts almost across the board. Most groups moving to the right, moving toward Trump, including voters of color, especially men of color. We've talked about this a lot this year. But the big question is, does that last? Is that a realignment for the Republican? party or is it a one-off? And what will that look like in 26 and beyond? So to try to answer some of those questions, I went to several different communities over the last year or so that represent

some of those shifts. One of them was the Dearborn area in Michigan, which, as you know, Sam, is a heavily Arab and Muslim community and a place where a lot of voters were conflicted about how to vote, especially given the war in the Middle East at the time. So Sarah, we often hear from Democrats that demographics are destiny, that this increasingly diversifying nation will vote Democratic and that will, you know, guarantee them elections for a long time. 2024 kind of showed that that conventional wisdom is not true. I'm curious, you know, when you're looking at these conversations you had this year, what themes you're looking for with some of these groups headed into the next cycle. Yeah. What was interesting to me, Sam,

is as I talked to different groups, so I talked to Arab and Muslim voters in Michigan. I went and spoke to some Asian American voters in Nevada and right after the election spent some time in Pennsylvania talking to Hispanic voters, most of whom had voted for Trump. So in all these communities, I heard some overlapping issues. I also heard some distinct issues. So, you know, from the Hispanic voters I talked to at a church in Pennsylvania, I heard a lot about cultural issues and a sense that, you know, these were conservative Christian Hispanic voters who felt. that the Republican Party was speaking to their concerns. I heard some similar themes from some of the Arabs and Muslims in the Dearborn area, you know, concerns about LGBTQ rhetoric they were seeing in schools and in their communities and a sense that the Republican Party perhaps spoke to their cultural and religious values more than the Democrats had. But I also heard, you know, from the folks in the Dearborn area, a lot of concern about Middle East policy and a desire for peace and a sense that may be voting for Trump would sort of disrupt the current situation. Of course, now there's a ceasefire in place that appears to be holding.

But all of these groups will be watched really closely heading into the midterms. The question for Republicans is, can they hold on to this support? Will it be lasting? And so far, there are a lot of signs, Sam, that they can't. Yeah, I'm curious when you look at the couple of off-year elections that we've already been through this year, are there any signals about what's to come in 2026, or is it just such a small sample size that there's not a lot of conclusions that we can draw from them? Yeah, it's really important to caveat this because these off-year elections in places like Virginia and New Jersey that just happened last month represent a really different electorate.

You know, the kind of people who come out to vote in a year like 2025 are much more politically engaged than certainly a presidential election year or even a midterm year. That said, these races were closely watched for signs of how voters were feeling and what kind of direction the parties were going. And, you know, we saw Democrats really overperform in, for example, the Virginia governor's race and the New Jersey governor's race with a focus on those issues of affordability. Last month, I met a woman named LaShawn Jordan at a rally in Norfolk, Virginia. This was a rally for Abigail Spanberger, who was just elected governor. She's a Democrat. And President Obama was there campaigning with her. Jordan told me that she had voted for Trump last year for the first time.

in 55 years she'd ever voted for a Republican because she hoped that Trump would bring about change. She felt concerned about the direction of the country. And she said, you know, at the point I talked to her, this was still during the government shutdown, she was feeling differently about Trump. He talked things that he thought we wanted to hear. You know, we needed to hear those things, but we needed to hear them from a Democratic candidate. And a lot of us were bamboozled? Yeah, it was a good word. So that's just one voter.

She's an African-American woman who went for Trump last year and now says she felt, you know, you heard it bamboozled. So, Sarah, I know you have a lot of experience covering politics in Virginia. Is there another place or group of voters that you're excited to talk to in 2026 that you think will help answer some of these key questions about where the country is headed next year? I am really curious about the future of the Latino vote. you know, this is an interesting group. Of course, within, it's a growing demographic. Within the Latino vote, there are many different people from different backgrounds and religion comes into

play. Like I said, Latinos tend to be heavily Catholic or evangelical. And so sometimes there's overlap with religious conservative concerns that you might see among white conservatives. And, of course, the big issue this year that I think complicates this whole question is Trump's immigration policy. Now, the folks I talked to at the church I visited in Pennsylvania said at that time that they felt like Trump was going to target, you know, only people who were here illegally and had committed crimes, which was one of his messages during the campaign. But given the way this policy has played out, there's a lot of polling that suggests that Latino voters are starting to move away from Trump. So that's one of the groups I'm most interested in. Sarah, you're getting me excited to get back out on the trail next year. I'm glad to hear it.

We're going to be busy. Yes. We're going to wrap up quickly by answering a most-ish question, which came from one of our listeners named Arlo. Arlo asks, what person or event was the biggest influence on your decision to become a journalist? Sam, do you want to go first? I think this is a pretty easy question for me because I'm going to say my high school journalism teacher, Nikki Schuller at North Farmington High School in Michigan. She was kind of one of the first people who showed me the power. of journalism and storytelling, even in small issues like, you know, too many kids packed on a

school bus. And she also reminded me the importance of being a good person and a human every time that you're interacting with someone even if they're a source. Sarah, how about you? I love that, by the way, that focus on just connecting with people as humans. It's such an important part, I think, of individual conversations and of political dialogue, and we should think about it more. For sure. One of the most influential people for me was the editor of the Kansas City Star's teen page called Teen Star.

When I was a teenager in the 90s, 100 million years ago, I was really fortunate that my hometown newspaper, the Kansas City Star, had a teen section, specifically devoted to issues facing teenagers in Kansas City, and it was written by and for high school students primarily from all across the metro area. We came in like once a month and had a big meeting and sort of planned out the next few issues. And it was really rigorous. I remember getting articles back with lots of red marks and like crying in my parents' basement as I rewrote because I, you know, I hadn't seen those kinds of red marks before on most of my papers at school. And so it was humbling and really, really instructive. And Bill Norton, the editor there, mentored a lot of people.

people, including Juana Summers. Our colleague was part of that project as well. Unfortunately, Bill passed away last year, but he is somebody that I definitely owe my career to lots of lessons about how to do journalism, lots of lessons about how to develop a thicker skin, and just some basic insights into how the process works. So I'm grateful for him. Cheers to good journalism, teachers and mentors. For sure. Okay, thanks Arlo for submitting your question. If you have a most-ish or other superlative type of question you'd like us to answer, email us. The address is NPRPolitics at NPR.org. We'll be back with another bonus episode for you in a couple of weeks.

I'm Sarah McCammon. I cover politics. I'm Sam Greenglass. I cover Congress. And this is NPR. You come to the New Yorker Radio Hour for conversations that go deeper with people you really want to hear from, whether it's Bruce Springsteen or Questlove or Olivia Rodriguez, Liz Cheney, or the godfather of artificial intelligence, Jeffrey Hinton, or some of my extraordinarily well-informed colleagues at The New Yorker. So join us every week on the New Yorker Radio Hour wherever you listen to podcasts. Thank you.