Trump faces day of reckoning as voters head to the polls for midterm elections

Donald Trump is bracing for a day of reckoning as Americans head to the polls for the midterm elections. These races will determine whether his Republican Party retains its majorities in Congress or loses them to the Democrats, which would be a blow to him and his allies. Midterm elections have often been used by voters to vent their frustration against the president, and Trump is no exception. He lost his Republican House majority after the 2018 midterms but kept control of the Senate. Now he is at risk of losing majorities in both chambers of Congress after voters soured on his handling of the economy, his war against Iran, and his governing style.

Most polls suggest Democrats will win the House comfortably. The Senate race is expected to be closer, with Democrats needing a net gain of four seats to take control. According to the latest New York Times/Siena poll, the party is leading in nearly all seven battleground Senate races. Trump’s approval rating on the eve of the midterms stood at 39 per cent, down from 50 per cent when he took office in January 2025. Trump said on Fox News that he believed the Republicans would win in a landslide if their people voted.

Democrats have pummelled Republican rivals for links to Trump and policies that failed to address concerns about the high cost of living. Lexi Ries, a 33-year-old Democrat in Iowa, said she was “cautiously optimistic” that backlash against Trump could help the party reclaim power in the state, which backed him in the last three presidential elections. She added that many Republican voters, including her husband, were “struggling” to decide whether to support the party because its politicians had become so beholden to Trump at the expense of local priorities.

Some Republican candidates have sought to distance themselves from Trump, saying they disagreed with his tariffs and the war with Iran that has sharply driven up energy prices. In last month’s debate, Maine’s Republican Susan Collins, who is battling against Democrat Troy Jackson, highlighted instances in which she had split with the president. She said she had voted against him 137 times in this Congress alone.

Jim, 64, an independent in Portland, Maine, said he normally supported Collins but would cast his ballot for Jackson as “a vote against president Trump”. He said he was voting for change in Washington. Yet Trump still thrust himself into the centre of the campaign in an attempt to energise conservative voters.

If Republicans perform better than expected in the midterm elections, it will probably be because they managed to parry attacks on Trump’s record and voters believed Democrats were an unreliable alternative that had veered too far to the left. The Senate race in Michigan is a key test of the electability of left-wing Democrats in swing states. Gregory Russette, a trucker, said he normally voted for Republicans but had been disturbed by how “nasty” the Senate race had become, and he could not bring himself to vote for Rogers or El-Sayed. He said he was “truly that bad.”