Off-Year Election Results Should Be a Wake-Up Call for White House - Horowitz

Off-Year Election Results Should Be a Wake-Up Call for White House - Horowitz

Voters in high-profile governors’ races in New Jersey and Virginia, as well as in lower-profile contests throughout the nation, expressed their strong disapproval of President Trump’s job performance, enabling Democratic candidates to rack up victories pretty much across the board this past Tuesday.  While the White House and Speaker Johnson attempted to spin this strong rebuke of the first 10 months or so of Republican rule as much ado about nothing since New Jersey and Virginia are blue states, the double digit victory margins for Sherrill and Spanberger, along with Democrats defeating two Republican incumbents in Georgia to win seats on the Public Service Commission for the first time in nearly twenty years and easily retaining Democratic Supreme Court Justices in Pennsylvania, among other down ballots wins, give that spin a particularly hollow quality.

 

The exit poll results are instructive.  In New Jersey, 41% of voters said that opposing Trump was one of the reasons for their choice of candidate, while only 13% said supporting Trump was one of the reasons.  It was the same story in Virginia: 38% indicated that one of the reasons for their vote was opposing Trump as compared to only 16% who said one of the reasons was supporting Trump.  

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Not surprisingly, New Jersey and Virginia voters gave the president low marks for his job performance, numbers roughly in the same range as recent national polls.  In New Jersey, only 42% of voters approved of Mr. Trump’s performance, while 56% disapproved. Similarly, only 39% of Virginia voters approved, as compared to 59% registering disapproval.

 

Across these races, two segments of the electorate where Mr. Trump gained ground in 2024, Latinos and young men, abandoned Republican candidates in droves.  In New Jersey, for instance, more than 2-in-3 (68%) Latinos voted for Mikie Sherrill, including about 6-in-10 (61%) Latino men.   About 1-in-5 (18%) of Latinos who supported Trump in 2024, switched to Sherrill, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate.   Both Sherrill and Abigail Spanberger garnered nearly 6-in -10, 57% and 58%, respectively, of the votes of young men between the ages of 18 and 29, significantly improving on Kamala Harris’ 2024 performance.  The voting decisions of Latinos and young men on Tuesday track the president’s marked nationwide decline in job approval and favorability with these two key sub-groups as measured in a series of national polls.

 

With the mid-term elections less than a year away, Tuesday’s election results should serve as a wake-up call for Mr. Trump and congressional Republicans. The strong and intense dissatisfaction with the president comes on top of the fact that the midterms usually favor the party out of power.  Even with the several-seat advantage the Republicans will likely gain out of the continuing redistricting wars, the Democrats are poised to regain the House. While retaking the Senate remains an uphill fight, it looks increasingly possible.

 

Mr. Trump is not exactly known for course corrections, even when the circumstances scream out for one.   But if he can be persuaded to make some major adjustments, there is still plenty of time to minimize Republican mid-term losses.

 

In a post-election opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, noted Republican strategist, Karl Rove points the way: “To turn this around, the White House will need to focus on the economy and the cost of living, speak candidly about challenges, lower expectations, temper the rhetoric, underpromise, overdeliver and stop going too far, like with Immigration and Customs Enforcement roundups at Home Depot.”

 

For the sake of the nation, I hope President Trump takes Mr. Rove’s sound advice to heart. I, for one, am not holding my breath.