But as Americans woke up Wednesday morning, it appeared that the long-awaited “red tide” had changed course and never made landfall. Democrats’ push to protect abortion rights and Republicans’ move to the far right with the nomination of several Donald Trump-backed conspiracy theorists and election deniers have helped turn the tide for Democrats, analysts say. David Cohen, a political science professor at the University of Akron in Ohio, said the Supreme Court decision in June that ended the constitutional right to abortion in the US was an “energetic moment” for Democrats. “It was one of the most important incentives to get Democrats to the polls,” Cohen told Al Jazeera. “I think also the concern of many Americans about threats to democracy — that issue has not been considered enough by the prognosticators.” President Joe Biden had stressed that “democracy is literally on the ballot” as he warned ahead of Election Day on Tuesday that candidates challenging the integrity of the election were a danger to the US system. While the results are still coming in and the GOP may gain control of the House, the Senate or both, it became clear in the early hours of Wednesday that Democrats had exceeded expectations. “Certainly historically, this is really an incredible night for Democrats. There hasn’t been a majority party in the White House and in Congress that has done this well in the midterms,” Lara Brown, a political science professor at George Washington University, told Al Jazeera in a television interview. “Even if the Democrats lose the House, and they seem on track to do so, [Republican] Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s majority would be very narrow – and that would be a victory for Democrats.”
Defying historical trends
In US midterms, the party in control of the White House usually suffers heavy losses in Congress. Former President Trump lost dozens of House seats in 2018. Barack Obama lost large majorities in both houses of Congress in 2010, prompting him to describe the vote as a “mistreatment.” George W. Bush and Bill Clinton also lost control of the House and Senate in the midterms. “In a normal midterm election, you see a 31-seat swing — and that was more pronounced in the first presidential midterms, when voters who had turned out for the president in previous general elections tend to sit out the midterms.” said Robinson Woodward-Burns, assistant professor of political science at Howard University. But this year, losses for Biden’s GOP will be modest at best — and Democrats could end up with gains when all the votes are counted. The party won a Senate seat in Pennsylvania in one of the most closely contested races in the nation, and Democratic Governors Gretchen Whitmer and Tony Evers won re-election in the states of Michigan and Wisconsin, respectively. Democrats also avoided major upsets in their coastal strongholds. Senate races in Colorado and New Hampshire that were expected to be competitive ended up being easy wins for Democratic incumbents. And in the House, many Democratic candidates in swing districts survived, and the party was actually able to flip some Republican-held districts. Democrat John Fetterman beat Republican Mehmet Oz in a Pennsylvania Senate race considered one of the most important contests of the midterms [Gene J Puskar/AP Photo] Abortion has been a focus of many Democratic campaigns, with liberal candidates promising to protect the right to the procedure and painting their Republican opponents as “extremists” who want the government to dictate to women what to do with their bodies. A conservative majority on the US Supreme Court – including three Trump appointees – had revoked the constitutional right to the process in June, sparking outrage from women’s rights groups. Biden has promised to pass a federal law codifying abortion rights as part of his pitch to voters. On Tuesday, the states of California, Michigan and Vermont passed ballot measures to enshrine abortion protections in their laws. And voters in deeply conservative Kentucky rejected a measure that would have amended the state constitution saying there was no due process. While the defeat of the referendum would not have an immediate effect on the law in Kentucky, which has banned abortions, it showed that even some conservatives who vote Republican do not support government restrictions on reproductive rights.
Election deniers
Republicans also did themselves no favors by fielding far-right candidates in key races, including swing states, analysts said. Trump-backed candidates challenging the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election are floundering on the map. In Pennsylvania, a state Biden won by just over 1 percent two years ago, far-right Republican gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano lost by more than 13 percentage points to Democrat Josh Shapiro. In Michigan, election denialist Christina Karamo trailed Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson by a similar margin, with 87 percent of the vote counted by Wednesday afternoon. Voters sent a message Tuesday that “Americans are not really excited about extremists in either party,” Brown said. For his part, Cohen said the “quality of the candidates” undermined Republicans’ chances of winning across the map, citing several races where GOP candidates didn’t do as well as expected. “Some of the troubling rhetoric that we heard from the Republican side, I think really drove home the message that American democracy is not secure and that there were many candidates on the ballot who would actively undermine the American political system,” Cohen said. . In addition to warning against what they call Republican extremism, Democrats also sought to tout their own record. Despite his perceived unpopularity, Biden has been vocal about his economic policies, including a bipartisan infrastructure bill he signed last year and the most recent deflationary law that freed up billions in funding to fight climate change. In addition, the president’s decision to forgive up to $20,000 in student debt may have helped mobilize young voters who appear to have played a role in the Democrats’ better-than-expected performance. “The youth vote is overwhelmingly Democratic,” Cohen told Al Jazeera. “And I think they’ve helped put Democrats over the top in a lot of races.”
