WASHINGTON: As polls opened across the United States on Tuesday, President Donald Trump faced a consequential test of his political standing, with Democrats hoping to turn growing public dissatisfaction with his administration into control of Congress.
All 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 35 of the Senate’s 100 seats are being contested.
Voters in 36 states will also elect governors, making Tuesday’s elections a significant measure of the country’s political mood midway through Trump’s presidency.
Although Trump is not on the ballot, he has made the midterm elections a personal contest, urging voters to ‘pretend that I’m on the ballot’ and claiming that ‘Republicans get 50 per cent more votes’ when he is a candidate.
However, his approval ratings suggest that his presence in the campaign could prove as much a liability as an asset for Republican candidates.
One closely watched contest is in Michigan, where Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed has made the cost of livingand the influence of money in politics central themes of his campaign.
An Arab-American politician, El-Sayed has become a particularly controversial figure after Trump portrayed him as a security threat, called him a ‘jihadist’ and questioned his loyalty to the United States.
El-Sayed rejected the accusations as baseless attempts to distract voters from economic problems, responding that his name and faith were not responsible for rising prices or America’s foreign-policy decisions.
Despite the attacks and a last-minute endorsement of his Republican rival by former Democratic primary opponent Haley Stevens, El-Sayed continues to maintain a slim lead in the closely contested race as campaigning drew to a close.
Foreign policy has also complicated the Republican campaign. Derrick Van Orden, Wisconsin’s Republican Representative, has blamed the US-Israeli war on Iran for dampening enthusiasm among Republican voters.
Good signs for Democrats The political indicators offer Democrats grounds for optimism. Trump’s approyal rating stands at 38 per cent, against 60pc disapproval, according to the NBC News average of presidential approval polls.
These figures suggest that dissatisfaction with the president could weigh heavily on Republican candidates, particularly in competitive districts.
Democrats need a net gain of four seats to take control of the House. Theirchallenge is that many of the districts they must win are in states and constituencies Trump carried in 2024, some by substantial margins.
The House appears to be the Republicans’ more immediate vulnerability.
Democrats have a credible opportunity to capture it, although the outcome will depend heavily on turnout and results in closely contested districts.
The Senate presents a more difficult challenge.
With 35 seats at stake, Democrats must win in several states where Trump’s support remains politically significant. A Democratic takeover of the House therefore appears more plausible than a victory in both chambers.
Nationwide election monitors Meanwhile, the US Justice Department announced the deployment of around 1,000 election monitors and observers across all50 states for the first time in its history.
The department described the initiative as its largest election-monitoring effort amid Trump’s repeated claims of election fraud and concerns about non-citizen voting, although election officials and research indicate that such cases are extremely rare.
Coordinated by the department’s Civil Rights Division, the monitors will oversee compliance with federal voting rights laws, including protections against voter intimidation, racial discrimination and suppression, as well as safeguards for voters with disabilities.