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We’re officially inside 40 days until the 2026 midterms — and Republicans are feeling the pressure.
Nearly every poll seems to bring more bad news for GOP candidates, even in what would normally be comfortably red seats. And one of the clearest signs of how the party is feeling is how they’re talking — or not talking — about President Donald Trump and his record.
As my colleague Andrew Prokop reported, some Republicans are slowly, tentatively starting to edge away from Trump and his least popular policies, including the Iran war and mass deportations.
In Florida, Rep. María Elvira Salazar — who won with more than 60 percent of the vote in 2024 — released an ad addressing Trump directly and criticizing his immigration enforcement efforts for having “gone too far.” Two Republican incumbents in Iowa, which has been hard-hit by soaring diesel prices, voted in favor of a resolution to end the Iran war.
Whether any of those gestures toward moderation will matter is another question, especially after almost a decade of unquestioning Republican fealty toward Trump. But they’re reflective of an environment that, even by usual midterm standards (when the president’s party almost always loses ground), is looking increasingly dire for the GOP.
The battle for the Senate
As things look worse for the GOP, Democrats are starting to eye an expanded Senate map and a very real chance of reclaiming the upper chamber, which once looked like an uphill battle.
Over the last two months, according to election forecasters like the Cook Political Report, more Senate races have slid into the tossup column or otherwise moved left.
Among them are the open Senate seats in Iowa and Texas — currently Republican-held — which Cook now considers tossups. Kansas, where incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall is on the ballot, has shifted from likely to lean Republican. And even South Carolina has drifted out of the solid Republican column, though it’s still an extremely long shot for Democrats. (The New Hampshire Senate race, where Democrats are defending an open seat currently held by retiring Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, has also shifted into the tossup column, from leaning Democratic.)
Texas, in particular, would be a prize for Democrats; polls have consistently shown Democratic state Rep. James Talarico leading against Republican Ken Paxton, Texas’s scandal-plagued attorney general who defeated incumbent Republican Sen. John Cornyn in a primary.
And Kansas has emerged as a surprise pickup possibility, with Democratic candidate Adam Hamilton, a megachurch pastor, giving Marshall a tough race. Earlier this month, the New York Times reported that Marshall, a doctor, sued hundreds of patients for medical debts, sometimes resulting in their arrest; one of those patients has since appeared in a Hamilton campaign ad.
One link for later
➨ We should be partying more. Vox’s Explain It to Me podcast talks with a party historian about our long — think medieval — history of having fun together, how it’s manifested over time, and why it’s so important societally and culturally, above and beyond purely being a good time.
Before you go…
- Did you know…that a sinkhole recently swallowed actor Nicolas Cage’s driveway in Malibu, California — and they’re growing more common around the world, thanks to aging infrastructure and extreme weather?
- Today’s trivia: Which film won the Oscar for Best Picture at the 85th Academy Awards, after The Artist and before 12 Years a Slave? (You can find this and other brain puzzles in Vox’s daily crossword. Look for the answer in Monday’s edition.)
- Yesterday’s trivia: Yesterday, we asked you for an adjective that can be used to describe both a low female singing voice and an instrument. That would be alto, as in alto saxophone or alto clarinet.
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