The midterm elections will be held this coming November, and they are crucial for Donald Trump. All 435 House seats will be up for election, as well as one-third of the Senate. Historically, these elections serve as a referendum on White House policy, especially given that voices within his own camp have spoken out against the war. And ahead of the United States’ 250th anniversary on July 4: Donald Trump wants to be able to claim credit for this occasion. In the absence of a triumphant victory over Iran, he needs a compromise that preserves the essentials and reassures his voters. Moreover, the island of Cuba, so close to U.S. territory, is an easier target to bring down than Iran.

On paper, the redistricting battle that reshaped the electoral maps for the 2026 midterms created 10 additional red-leaning seats in the House of Representatives, according to an internal House Republican assessment. With the new maps set ahead of November, Democrats must now defend 23 House seats that President Donald Trump won in 2024. That is up from 13 at the beginning of the midterm election cycle. Republicans hold eight seats that the Democratic nominee Kamala Harris won, up from three at the start of the 2026 cycle. The internal Republican assessment, which has not been previously reported, came after the last states involved in redistricting finished redrawing their maps last month.

The new electoral landscape could offer some encouragement to House Republicans, who are seeking to maintain their slim majority in the chamber as polls suggest significant voter anxiety over the economy, the high cost of living, and the war in Iran. House Republicans hold a 217-212 majority, with five vacancies. US midterm elections historically favor the party not in power, and this year Republicans are running as Trump’s approval rating sits near a record low for his presidency. These are conditions that would typically point to a favorable outcome for Democrats. Furthermore, the financial markets are maintaining intense pressure on the White House to find a solution for fear of plunging into a major economic crisis, and with strong opposition emerging even within Donald Trump’s own camp, the midterm elections this coming November represent a critical political challenge. The November 3, 2026 midterms are shaping up badly for President Trump. His approval sits around 39-42%, the generic ballot favors Democrats by 4-8 points, and the enthusiasm gap runs in their favor. Historical models (Abramowitz, Jacobson) project Republican losses of 20-35 House seats — enough to flip the chamber. The Senate, by contrast, remains structurally more favorable to Republicans this cycle, regardless of the national mood. Based on current data, the most likely scenario is a Democratic House facing a Senate that stays Republican or close to it — rather than a full wave in either direction. This is a probabilistic read, not a certainty: political scientists note presidential approval tends to move little in the final four months before a midterm, which cuts against a late Trump recovery without guaranteeing the current trend holds.

The geopolitical correlation. Two opposing dynamics are at play:

– What’s hurting him: tariffs are weighing on consumer confidence (a drop from 102 to 57, comparable to 2010 levels); the stalled Ukraine war triggered a rebellion by a dozen House Republicans, who voted for sanctions and Ukraine aid against Trump’s wishes.

– What was supposed to work in his favor is no longer really doing so since the conflict resumed and the peace agreement with Iran ended. What was undoubtedly supposed to be his greatest diplomatic achievement risks ending in a fiasco. And it is not translating into a positive political dividend in the polls. This is a politically sensitive situation for Trump, who will likely have to explain to the American public why weeks of bombing have resulted in the recognition of some form of Iranian control over a maritime route—in this case, the Strait of Hormuz—that the United States claimed it wanted to “liberate.”

The tariff regime built since Trump’s return to office — a global baseline under Section 122, sector-specific Section 232 duties on steel, aluminium, autos and semiconductors, and negotiated ceilings with partners such as the European Union — has been a persistent source of economic friction, and the clearest link between foreign economic policy and domestic political damage. More telling than Democratic opposition is Republican defection: more than a dozen House Republicans broke with their own leadership in June 2026 to pass a package of Russia sanctions and Ukraine aid, defying Speaker Johnson’s request that they give

Trump space to negotiate — a rebellion that reflects the war’s persistence well beyond Trump’s initial promise to end it quickly.[1] What a Democratic House would change. President Trump would keep the core of his constitutional foreign-policy authority (negotiation, de facto military deployment, nominations and treaties which run through the Senate). But three levers would change hands:

1. Subpoena power — committee chairs (Oversight, Foreign Affairs) could compel testimony and documents, not just request them.
2. Statutory sanctions — Congress can lock sanctions into law, limiting Trump’s ability to lift them unilaterally as part of a negotiation with Moscow.
3. Power of the purse — conditioning Ukraine aid or Pentagon funding through riders attached to appropriations bills.

The net effect would be less an outright block than a slowdown: more friction, more media and legal exposure for the officials executing policy, more time lost to institutional confrontations. For any first-term president these elections are a structural headwind; for Donald Trump, entering his second non-consecutive term, they carry a more specific weight — they will determine whether he governs with a compliant Congress for his final two years or spends them fighting subpoenas, impeachment threats, and a legislative brake on his agenda.

Midterms have punished the president’s party in nearly every cycle since the Second World War, with rare exceptions (2002, after 9/11, and 1998, during Clinton’s impeachment saga). The mechanism is well understood: the president’s coalition, mobilized to elect him, tends to demobilize once he is in office, while the opposition’s coalition, energized by grievance, turns out disproportionately. Historical models built on this pattern — the Abramowitz and Jacobson « referendum » models, which weight presidential approval and the generic congressional ballot — are the standard tools political scientists use to forecast seat swings a year out. Trump’s approval rating has been on a downward trajectory through spring and summer 2026, clustering in the 39–42% range, with disapproval in the mid-to-high fifties. An Emerson College poll found a four-point approval drop tied to a prolonged government shutdown, placing approval at 41% and disapproval at 49%.[2]

The generic congressional ballot has consistently shown Democrats ahead by four to eight points in spring 2026 polling, with the average near six points — a level that, historically, has translated into swings of roughly twenty-five or more House seats, based on the relationships observed in 2018 and 2006.[3] Consumer confidence has fallen sharply, from roughly 102 to 57 — a drop that rivals the 2010 environment, itself a wave-election year, and one directly tied to the tariff regime’s inflationary effects on households. Trump himself has publicly predicted a «red wave,» pointing to a substantial early fundraising advantage. Republican strategists counter that the Senate map is structurally favourable to the GOP this cycle regardless of national mood, making a divided outcome — a Democratic House alongside a Republican or narrowly-held Senate — the more plausible middle scenario, rather than a clean sweep in either direction.

Given the data available in July 2026—an approval rating of around 40%, a deficit of a few points in generic polls, a marked lack of enthusiasm, and open rebellion within Trump’s own House caucus on the issue of Ukraine— the overall picture points to a Democratic-majority House, while the Senate—where the outcome will be closer and depend on the electoral distribution—is expected to remain Republican. There are four months left before the election, and analysts most familiar with the data point out that, historically, approval ratings tend to remain stable in the final stretch rather than experiencing sharp fluctuations—a trend that runs counter to a late surge by Trump, though it does not rule it out entirely. The most profound and enduring point for strategic analysis is structural rather than electoral: tariffs and the stalemates in Ukraine and Iran are currently exacerbating Trump’s popularity problem. The war against Iran has even deepened his disavowal among his MAGA base. This situation harms President Trump and constitutes the most revealing geopolitical signal emerging from the midterm election data, and it is likely to persist regardless of which chamber the Democrats ultimately manage to win in November.

The next major event after these midterm elections will be the 2028 presidential election. Who will succeed Donald Trump? The 2028 U.S. presidential election is scheduled for November 7, 2028. It will determine the 48th President of the United States, elected by 538 electors through an indirect popular vote. The 22nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution stipulates that no one may be elected president more than twice, so Donald Trump will not be able to run for another term. Even though the Republican Party will face a test during the midterm elections on November 3, 2026, some possible scenarios for the 2028 presidential election are already beginning to take shape. Having returned to power in January 2025 with a “trifecta”—the presidency and control of both houses of Congress— the Republican camp is riding a wave of momentum fueled by the upheavals following the pandemic, Trump’s deliberate claims of irregularities in the last presidential election, tensions at the Mexican border, and a sense of rejection and a desire for isolationism among the vast majority of Republican voters.

In this context, will the 2028 midterm and presidential elections mark the continuation of a polarized nation or the beginning of a political realignment, and what signs, starting in 2026, will help determine the outcome? Looking ahead to 2028, if discontent persists, the campaign will hinge less on enthusiasm than on rejection, and each candidate will have to prove that they can speak to a weary nation—not just to their own base. On the left side of the political spectrum, Kamala Harris is polling the highest. Having already run against Donald Trump in the last election, the former U.S. vice president is named by 41% of those surveyed. Gavin Newsom, governor of California and a staunch opponent of Donald Trump, comes in second with 26%. He is far ahead of Josh Shapiro, governor of Pennsylvania, who has 10% of the vote. New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, meanwhile, stands at 8%.

Among Republicans, current Vice President JD Vance leads by a wide margin with 42%. Senator Marco Rubio, meanwhile, had announced that he would not run against the former Ohio senator, but still garners 17% of the vote. However, this result places him only third among right-wing voters. In fact, another conservative is ahead of him by one point in the polls: Donald Trump Jr., the current president’s eldest son. Ultimately, these midterm elections will serve as a preview of the 2028 election, which will hinge on a simple mechanism and deep divisions: 538 electors, a majority of 270, and a few swing states where the bulk of the battle will be fought. Nevertheless, securing this majority depends on deeper factors such as the choice of candidates and their ability to rally support beyond their base, Donald Trump’s popularity and the effect it will have on voter turnout in each camp, as well as voters’ priorities—which are dominated by the economy and a sense of “poor leadership.”

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[1] CNN Politics, « House approves Ukraine aid and Russian sanctions, defying Trump and GOP leaders », 4 juin 2026. https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/04/politics/house-vote-ukraine-russia-bill

[2] Emerson College Polling, cité par The AOL, « Donald Trump’s Popularity Falls As Shutdown Drags On », 2026. https://emersoncollegepolling.com/june-2026/

[3] USPollingData.com, indice de confiance des consommateurs, comparaison 2026 / 2010.