Midterm Elections Analysis

with the recount. She's live with us here in this late hour. Grace, it's good to see you tonight. Thanks for joining us. Thank you so much for having me. All right. Let's talk about what you've seen tonight so far. I think, you know, history favored the Democrats on a night like this, but I don't think history favored the Democrats to this level. I think it was surpassing what anybody expected. That's for sure. On a candidate level, on a supporter level, constituent level, voters showed out and showed up in the biggest way and responded to these campaigns that the Democrats have laid out painstakingly over the past couple months. I genuinely think the reaction on social media has surpassed anything I've seen in any election I've worked. So, Jen, from your viewpoint, as we headed into the last couple of weeks of this campaign, did the Democrats win this, or did just the Republicans fumble this? It's tough to say. I think there's a balance between the two. You know, it was the Republicans election to lose the way that they had claimed to be setting it up for a slam dunk. Trump, you know, really went out strong and was like, I I've done everything that I've needed to do to let you guys usher the Republicans in to another two years in the House and Senate majority. But Democrats really came out and tried to pose a counter vision for what American looks like. And for right now, it's still framed counter to Trump. He is the main focal point of the Democrats' message, so it will be interesting to see what they do as they move into power in Congress if he becomes, he starts fading into the background and they take up their own agenda. And I guess where I was going with that was that it seems almost at times that A lot of the things that Democrats are saying in this race, especially in the last couple of days, became irrelevant because of. How much anger there was out there in the electorate, you know, every time somebody drove by a gas station, there's a campaign sign for all intents and purposes in front of them. So was it was it that voter anger that caused this tonight or not necessarily some public policy that the Democrats were pushing? That's a great point that I've talked about. I cover political influencers for the recount. And there was an interesting dynamic at play where we've seen these surrogates, especially for the MAGA side, come out in full force ahead of the elections since, you know, really 2016 when they were laying the foundations, but in 2020 and 2024 in a big way. And you almost saw that they weren't showing up in the same way, these influencers, because the message was already Already being proved, like you said, at gas stations. At the grocery store, when you pay a rent or electricity bill. So I almost wonder if it's, and this will become clearer in the next few days, if influencers really took a backseat and campaigns really took their foot off the gas in social media and campaigning in that way, because the message was already out there. And you know what, Grace? Think about the last couple of election cycles. You look two years ago where trans issues were, you know, top of mind. And I, you know, I'm from Pennsylvania and I remember going home and seeing the very effective ad where it was Kamala is for they, them, Trump is for you. And, and they leaned into these culture wars so hard, but when they tried to, when the When the Republicans tried to resurrect some of them, this time around, They didn't hit, they didn't land the way, because in reality, when you talk about trans students, when you talk about trans athletes, that's one thing. You're looking at, you know, a couple of dozen. But these issues, these economic issues, are far more wide-ranging and affect so many more people. And I think you can really see some scrambling going on in the past couple of weeks where you saw a lot of Republican candidates grasping at straws to try to move the conversation away from a lot of these economic issues. And voters over and over again, whether it was in town halls or meet and greet photo lines, were bringing up the pain that they feel in their pockets. I write a lot about what the material effects of Trump's policies or any government's policies are on people and why material effects, how Not just how they feel or this social issue that they're concerned about, but what's weighing down their wallet or burning a hole in their pocket is really going to be the thing that activates them at the polls. So, Grace, from where we move forward here, let's start with the Republicans. What are they now and where do they go from here? I was at a MAGA podcaster event tonight. So I was really in the room with a lot of people as they were grappling with this issue live. And at one point I asked, is tomorrow when 2020 starts and the Republican side starts to figure out what their future looks like past the name Donald Trump? And there was a lot of unease about whether they're ready to make that decision and comfortable finding out who's next. But I think that that conversation really does start tomorrow. The party has to have an identity outside of the president And by the way, in the last couple of weeks, when people have asked President Trump, like, hey, are you going to, is J.D. Vance, is he the successor? Is he the heir to the MAGA movement? And President Trump. He didn't capitulate. He hesitated on that. And so the longer President Trump waits to say, this is the heir to my political empire, the longer there is that power vacuum. After tonight, J.D. Vance might be okay with that. Um... Let me spin the question I asked you about the Republicans onto the Democrats, Grace. They're not one big happy family. They've got deep divisions in that party, and they were blessed with an opposing party That, you know, had voter anger, you know, beating down the door. That was a big help to them this year. But those divisions between Democratic socialists and progressives, they're not going away after tonight. And as they now assume power, you can imagine they're even going to get deeper at some point. So how do we see this shaking out as the Democrats now move to, you know, take the steering wheel? Democrats have two problems ahead. They, number one, have to deal with this idea of the fact that they're not on off or they have to go on offense or not on defense anymore. So that's devising an entirely new playbook, an entirely new strategy to be on the attack instead of, you know, playing this where we're only the opposition to Donald Trump. They have to define what their agenda looks like. That raises the second question and second problem for them. They have to repair divides that are very apparent and very visible among their party right now. And I like to joke that, you know, they need to be sent on a retreat for a couple of days, work out their problems over a campfire, have Chuck Schumer hand off the talking stick to AOC or whoever, both houses of Congress together. But they're going to need to find a way to compromise and work together to make this work. And that is going to be. The challenge ahead. I'm not so sure Chuck Schumer is going to do that. I don't like that. So, you know, we mentioned this a little bit earlier, Grace, but I'm curious just for your take, because when you look at where the Democrats go from here in terms of party leadership, for years, they had this reputation of being this coastal party. But suddenly you're winning these elections in Kansas and in Iowa and in Texas. So, you know, does this change? Do they have to figure out how you tap into that and grow beyond the anger to find ways to capitalize on these gains moving ahead? Correct. I think we've just gotten the most intense and visible case study of what it looks like to lose a coalition that put you into power. Donald Trump put together a massive diverse coalition that brought him into the presidency again in 2024. Democrats are going to have to look at the state of things. They're now also diverse coalition and say we are putting together More rural, working class Americans with our pre-existing, you know, coastal elite base that a lot of people would call it and figure out how to maintain that. Because two years is a lot less time than I think politicians think it is. What are your thoughts as far as now as this divided government takes seat? What changes do you think we're going to see, if any, from the administration? Do they hear what happened tonight? Now, the president, according to the Associated Press, is saying that the Democrats did a good job, despite some of the true social posts that we've seen out of the president tonight. But the Associated Press reporting that the president is saying the Democrats did a good job and that GOP candidates were to blame. Um... G.O.P. candidates that he picked many of, that he hand-picked many of. I mean, look at Texas. You know? John Cornyn would have, it may not have been a romp, but John Cornyn would have prevailed on a night like this. A very competitive race, we know that. Yeah, for sure. And this was not in Texas. So, Grace, when you look at the next two years of the Trump presidency, you know, yeah, he's putting out pictures with a red veto hat on. And yes, he's putting on social media, but he's saying that he would have won if he was on the ballot. But that's not how midterms work. You're not on the ballot. The Congress, do you see more division or does Donald Trump do what he was initially famous for, which was make a deal? I think we're going to see something pretty standard when it comes to the relationship between a Democratic controlled Congress and the president. Really look to his first term to see what that relationship is going to look like. I think it's going to be a little bit more dramatic this time because Democrats have a better sense of how to work through these things, or so they say. The more interesting potential rift or divide to me is what happens between Donald Trump and the Republicans in Congress. These are Republicans who, you know, when Donald Trump leaves office in 2028, assuming he will do so, as he likes to joke, he won't, they're going to have to make a decision about what their future looks like in a Donald Trump-less White House. political environment. That's going to mean that there are going to be cases where they're potentially voting against what he wants. And, you know, he has that red veto hat on. Maybe they override that veto. So I'm really looking to see what rift builds between Republicans concerned about their legacy and the president, who is probably going to be focused, let's say, to be generous as much on. Politics as he is on his personal endeavors and his financial exploits. Yeah, you know, it's interesting. We entered tonight saying, well, maybe if. The Democrats get 50 seats and the Republicans get 50 seats. It won't matter then because the Vice President of the United States would have a tiebreaker. We're looking at 52 Democratic seats tonight. They've still got seven to be called. That would put the override in really close contention. As far as the Senate goes, without Susan Collins now, the biggest loser who wasn't on the ballot tonight in the U.S. Senate is John Fetterman. Think about it, because John Fetterman is this big question mark. The Pennsylvania? Um, the candidate, he and Dave McCormick, the Republican Senator, they have, they were going to fundraise together. They promised not to campaign against each other. But John Fetterman, uh, is that, that swing vote is not going to matter at this point. You, you can lose, you know, you, you don't need his vote to get legislation across the finish line at this point. And, you know, you look at what the Michigan race over the weekend, you know, all we talked about all weekend was Haley Stevens, you know, that that was going to be some kind of, I don't know that that is proving to be the case in any sense tonight, that Haley Stevens had any big impact on that race. So, Grace, I mean, we're still waiting for the dust to settle on some of these races. Obviously, Michigan, we're hearing we might start getting more vote tallies coming around 3 a.m. Last time around when it was Alyssa Slotkin who defeated Mike Rogers two years ago, that wasn't called until the next day. But as far as what we're seeing, I mean, at this point, Michigan, Alaska, I mean. So that's really what that's the game at this point. We're waiting for those states to come in here. And those could be some question marks, especially with Alaska with ranked choice voting that could take a couple of weeks. Yeah, I think this is a funny thing that I encounter, like talking to young people about these election results. And I get a furious text any election night being like, when are we going to know? Can you can you give me any sense of when I can go to bed? And I'm like, the process that we've established here, breathe for you. Where can we go to bed? Yeah, I'm like, well, you just said 3 a.m. in Michigan, so we got a ways to go. But I always tell them, like, it doesn't breed any confidence in our system that it takes so long for these results. But be patient. We're going to get them. They're going to come even if it's Alaska on November 18th, I think, or 15th. The way they do it is crazy, because I remember when Sarah Palin was running against Mary Peltola for Congress, and it was so, with ranked choice voting, it's so anti-ceremonial, because they basically had a camera on a spreadsheet, and they hit a button, and that was it. So there wasn't any grand reveal or anything along those lines. But as we look, by the way, Alaska, they're likely going to flip the governor's mansion to the Democratic side. And that's a big deal. You know, Alaska. It was a stronghold for Republicans for a long, long time. And I think one of the big takeaways tonight is that I think Democrats need to look at this election. And figure out not only what they did tonight, but how they can replicate it in two years. Because there's already a presidential race getting underway. Here's a question, Grace, because we were talking about what we're seeing here in D.C. tonight, because we had a mayoral race, you had a Democratic-Socialist-aligned candidate winning. Muriel Bowser, the incumbent, is certainly not that. She was very, very mainstream. New York City, you had Zoran Mamdani win. Again, what? It's two years ago, I believe, at this point. In Los Angeles, Los Angeles, I have friends who are watching the stream tonight and they just texted me. They said, every time you look at your iPad, we think you're looking at this chat. But out in Los Angeles right now, you have Karen Bass, who is your standard Democratic candidate running against Nithya Raman, who is more DSA. So you are seeing like there's not a universal shift in the Democratic Party right now. It's going a little more left in some places and a little more moderate in others. I think Democrats are learning that, or hopefully they're learning, that there can be many different types of visions and approaches here that can work together in a lot of different ways. I think coming out of 2020 and the COVID era, you know, the BLM era, it was like you're either one way as a Democrat, you're either a centrist mainline, or you are a far lefty and a hard line on all these social issues, and there's no compatibility between the two. I think if there's any visual... Or map or factual presentation of that not being the case anymore. It has to be this map that we are looking at on election night. It's kind of the opposite of what's been going on in the Republican Party as well, too. Because, you know, if you're not MAGA. If you've not been on the Trump camp, you're out. Even people who previously were very much entwined in that, like Marjorie Taylor Greene. You know... And that limited their pool of reach in a lot of places. Because you look at this race tonight, the race that James Tallarico ran in Texas, Very different than the race that... El-Sayed is running in Michigan. Right. But if they're going to move forward as a party, the Republicans, I think they might need to figure that out, that lesson that the Democrats may have uncorked. We look at national Republicans right now, I guess more so on the state level, because those are the ones where you kind of stray from the party line a little bit. Is there anybody that you see on the Republican front that might emerge as some sort of, I I don't want to say a moderating effect, but that would be the. Anti-MAGA that might win some votes, might win some of those people that maybe voted for Donald Trump in 2024 but decided to vote for a Tallarico or a Turek or an Adam Hamilton in 2026. I'm like, does anybody have a pulse check on Mitt Romney? Maybe he's out there somewhere. He can come back, make a comeback. I'm back. You know, I don't really know. When I look at the map and I look at the Republican success stories of the night, they are tried and true MAGA candidates who have stood by as Donald Trump loyalists. But what throws everything into a bit of a, you know, dizzying spell is. You also see candidates like Max Miller, who is MAGA through and through, and who Trump even defended after these horrible allegations of domestic violence. You saw him lost. You see him lose in what was believed to be a safe Ohio district. So I do think the theme of the night for Republicans and Democrats is what works in one place. Can't necessarily be replicated in another and in some way that, you know, breeds a sense of anxiety among candidates. But I think that anxiety maybe prompts them to work a little bit harder when it comes to serving their constituents and delivering for their communities. And I don't want to, you know, bury the Republican Party permanently tonight because I'm kind of old enough to remember in 1976 when Jimmy Carter won. God, you're old. I am old. I just turned 60. You know, when Jimmy Carter won in 1976, I can remember clearly we're coming after Watergate. Gerald Ford had just pardoned Richard Nixon. And there were people at the time saying the Republican Party is gone generationally. That will never recover for years and years and years after. Four years later, Ronald Reagan ushered in. You know, two terms of his own presidency and went a long way to ushering in his vice president as a successor as well, too. So, you know, it is kind of, I think, sometimes easy in the moment to say, you know, they're gone for good. Yeah. But, you know, history and politics is a way of kind of turning that around. Somebody could emerge. And listen, back in 2015, let's be honest, people giggled. When reality show TV star Donald Trump said he was going to run for president. Came down the escalator. Came down the escalator. And ten years later, he's still affecting politics. Okay, so, Grace, we were dreading asking this question earlier on air, but I'll send this to you now. Because, obviously, everybody talks about the 2028 campaign starting tomorrow. And when you look at the victories tonight, John Ossoff... Winning in Georgia early on, Keisha Lance Bottoms, I think that was a pretty good indication how well she did, she was going to do based on the margin of victory for Ossoff. But you had Ossoff in Georgia, you had Westmore here in Maryland, who was only, I think, two points off his win from last time around. And then in Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, who, by the way, didn't just win re-election, for the first time, Democrats flipped the state Senate. I mean, there are some storylines coming out of tonight. How long before we start seeing these candidates make moves on exploratory committees or making moves on 2028? Considering it's already Wednesday, November 4th at almost 1 a.m., I think we have about 12 hours until you start to see the first movements. This is going to happen fast. People want to plant their flags as, you know, the first one who jumped in. They want to be that brave soldier who, you know, trekked out into the unknown before the rest of the camp. And I know John Ossoff said I'm not running. I am very pleased with my, you know, position in the Senate for six more years. I do not believe that for one second. So I wouldn't be surprised. He's on the later end, but I think that campaign starts today. It's always a trap question, though, you know, to ask somebody if they're going to run for office and they'll say, well, no, I'm running for governor. I'm running for senator. Technically, that's correct. But, you know, we've seen that I've seen that change before, you know. Do you want somebody who isn't qualified to run for a higher office? Right. Hey, out of New York, I got another question just based on New York politics, because every every I think this is the second cycle where everybody thought Kathy Hochul was was up against the up against the rails. And again, very early on, she she was projected the winner. Not somebody who I think has a national profile, but. It just shows that she has defied the odds once again in a race where you had a lot of national MAGA influencers, national MAGA figures trying to prop up the Republican Bruce Blakeman in that race. And she won. She walked away. She won. She's going to be governor for now at least eight years when all is said and done. Yeah, she had to walk a very fine line between embracing the politics and sort of piggybacking off of the success of Zoran Mamdani, which would obviously be, he's hugely popular in New York, especially among young people. So she had to make sure that she was addressing and paying attention to that crowd enough that they came out and voted for her. But not so much that she had that she ended up alienating the rest of New York State, which is very diverse ideologically compared to New York City. So she had to walk that fine line. And clearly she did so effectively enough to win the second term. Grace, we really appreciate it. Thank you for indulging us on this late hour. But it was a great conversation with you. Grace Weinstein from the from the recount. It's good to see you tonight. This morning. Thank you so much.