President Donald J. Trump walks across the South Lawn of the White House Thursday, Nov. 1, 2018, to board Marine One for his flight to Joint Base Andrews, Md. to begin his trip to Columbia, Mo. (Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian)
With an expanded slate of senators, and an easily surmountable Democrat majority in the House, Trump is ready for 2020. Until then, he can focus on stacking the courts with originalist, constitutionalist judges vetted by The Federalist Society, and on renegotiating the terrible trade deals, alliances, and treaties in which two decades of unabated globalism have embroiled America. At The National Interest, Christian Whiton compares the performance of Trump to previous presidential first term midterm elections. He writes:
Blue wave, schmoo wave. By any historical measure, Democrats stumbled in midterm elections, ceding several Senate seats and gaining only a precarious hold of the House of Representatives. The outcome positions President Trump to win reelection in 2020 while carrying both houses of Congress into a second term.
It looks like Republicans will end up with 54-55 Senate seats, up from 51 in the outgoing Congress, and Democrats will have a thin majority in the House.
In 1994, Bill Clinton’s party lost fifty-four House seats and eight Senate seats. In 2010, Barack Obama’s party lost sixty-three House seats and six Senate seats. The ballyhooed “resistance” to Trump didn’t even come close to these standards.
More stunningly, Trump’s party gained Senate seats—lots of them. That seldom happens. There is, however, one recent exception. In George W. Bush’s first midterm, which took place a year after 9/11, the Republicans gained two Senate seats.
Read more here.
