JD FOSTER: An Election Unlike Any Other
Republicans were roundly thrashed in the 2025 mid-mid-terms while Democrats found slivers of hope and energy. Attention now turns to 2026. In America, campaigning, like the NBA season, never ends. History says that…
Republicans were roundly thrashed in the 2025 mid-mid-terms while Democrats found slivers of hope and energy. Attention now turns to 2026. In America, campaigning, like the NBA season, never ends.
History says that absent a war, the party out of the White House typically picks up nine seats in the House, barely enough to utter the words Speaker Jeffries, while the Senate is essentially a push. Ergo, with 2025 wind at their backs, Democrats are licking their chops. But this cycle will be subject to exceptional political winds. The outcome is very much up in doubt. Don’t measure the drapes just yet, Hakeem.
This mid-term’s novelties start with President Trump, by far the most dominant political force the country has seen in years. The far-left will stop at nothing to slow Trump, but then, they would do that anyway. The novelty here is Trump’s ability and willingness to engage with voters directly to support Republican candidates. The flip side is how he drives up Democratic turnout, which in 2025 was substantial.
Next, we have the ongoing leftward lurch of the Democratic Party. Moderate Democrats are turning leftist while leftists are becoming socialists. This may work in blue-state Virginia and New Jersey, but it won’t fly in most of the country.
Enter the new face of the Democratic Party, whether they like it or not, the communist New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani. Soon a whisper campaign will develop that Mamdani should run for president in 2028. He won’t deny it credibly. Running for president would help him “get his message out.”
Democrats will now be stuck with a nightmare worse than Trump. Republicans previously had independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Democratic Rep. AOC of New York to use as scarecrows. For pure Exorcist scary, nothing will beat Mayor metro beard with a huge portion of America’s voters.
Republicans are going to hang Mamdani around every Democrat’s neck like a rotting fish – and Democrats can do nothing about it without infuriating their rabid base.
Democrats’ eventual defense against Mamdani will be the awesome damage he wreaks on the Big Apple, but his wreck and ruin won’t manifest for months and years. So, for now, they’re stuck with the rotting fish.