We have updated our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for Eurasia Group and its affiliates, including GZERO Media, to clarify the types of data we collect, how we collect it, how we use data and with whom we share data. By using our website you consent to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, including the transfer of your personal data to the United States from your country of residence, and our use of cookies described in our Cookie Policy.
{{ subpage.title }}
Was CNN's Town Hall with Trump a mistake?
"The media is not the enemy. The media is the people. And yet that messaging's gone so awry." Media journalist and former CNN host Brian Stelter expresses such a basic thought in the latest episode of GZERO World, and yet it's one about which so many Americans disagree. Stelter joined media historian Nicole Hemmer for a special panel interview on the current state of our hyper-fragmented media landscape and to look ahead at how news outlets can recapture voters' trust ahead of the 2023 election.
A big part of that mission, says Stelter, is to do more listening. "We need to hear so much more from voters and, frankly, so much less from these politicians that are pandering to them."
Watch this episode of GZERO World with Ian Bremmer: "Politics, trust & the media in the age of misinformation"
Watch GZERO World with Ian Bremmer at gzeromedia.com/gzeroworld or on US public television. Check local listings.
How Democrats used GOP wins against them
It's going to be a red wave! No, a tsunami!
Nope. In the end, Republicans hoping for a wipeout in the US midterms barely won the House and Democrats kept the Senate.
Why? Turns out voters cared a lot about protecting two things: democracy and abortion, Ian Bremmer explains on GZERO World.
One big exception to the GOP's bad night: Gov. Ron DeSantis’ trouncing victory in Florida.
Watch the GZERO World episode: US democracy after US midterms: polarized voters & Trump's GOP
Reading the US midterm election tea leaves
Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, DC shares his perspective on US politics.
What is polling telling us three weeks before the midterm elections?
Public opinion polling is taking election watchers on quite an exciting ride this year, from showing Republicans with a massive advantage early in the year, to demonstrating a surge and support for Democrats over the summer. Most election watchers think that surge is fading now in the final weeks before the election. But today, we wanted to focus on a few numbers that matter for forecasting the election results.
But first is the generic congressional ballot, which asks voters which party they would prefer to vote for in an upcoming election. If you have to look at one indicator to make a forecast about congressional elections in the US, this is it. Particularly in the House of Representatives. This indicator has shown Republicans with an unusual advantage for most of this year, which they lost over the summer as abortion climbed in importance for voters. While Democrats lead in this indicator right now by about half a percentage point, because of the way districts are drawn, they would need to have a several-point lead in order to be thought of as favorites in taking the House. So this is telling us that the general environment is good for Republicans at the moment.
The second data point to watch is presidential approval. This is far more important in presidential elections than midterm elections, but it does give an indicator of how voters feel about the party in power. In this case, the Democrats. Biden's approval has trended steadily downwards since his inauguration, going from a high of 54% in January of last year, to a low of 37% in July of this year. But he's staged a bit of a comeback as energy price increases reversed over the summer. Biden currently sits at about 43% if you average together different polls, which is almost exactly where President Trump was before he faced a major setback in his first midterm election, and about four points behind where President Obama was just before the Tea Party wave that cost Democrats control of the House in 2010. So this suggests an advantage for Republicans, to the extent this election is a referendum on Biden.
Then the final thing you want to look at is issue polling. And what's interesting about this election cycle is that Republicans and Democrats are saying they prioritize very different things. Republicans are saying that inflation, crime, and immigration, are their top concerns. And coincidentally, those are all areas where polls indicate that voters trust Republicans more than Democrats to handle these issues. And at the same time, Democrats are telling pollsters that healthcare, abortion, and gun policy, are top issues in this election, and Democrats tend to have a lead in who would handle those issues better. So this is really a mixed picture of who has the advantage in the national environment.
But perhaps most importantly, the top issue for independent voters is the economy and inflation, where Republicans have the overall advantage. So if this were a national referendum, the data tells us that you'd have to favor the Republicans, but of course, it isn't. And while control of the House is affected by national trends, the Senate tends to be much more idiosyncratic, and the outcomes will vary on candidate quality. And of course, we have to be cautious when looking at polls given the sizable misses in catching Republican voters in the last several election cycles.
- What We're Watching: Ukraine's gains, Democrats' midterm odds ... ›
- Jon Lieber: What's different about the 2022 midterms is 2024 Trump ... ›
- The Graphic Truth — Biden's first midterms: How does he stack up ... ›
- Inflation is top issue for US voters ahead of midterms - GZERO Media ›
- US voters think GOP can fix the economy, but can they? Not likely - GZERO Media ›
- "Red wave" coming in US midterms ›
- US midterms have major global implications - GZERO Media ›
Have Republicans ruined their chances of taking the Senate?
Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington, DC shares his perspective on US politics.
Have Republicans ruined their chances of taking the Senate?
2022 started off looking like a very strong year for Republicans who are trying to retake the House and Senate. With inflation top of mind for voters and several Republican candidates in 2021 riding the backlash against COVID lockdowns and teachers' unions, Republicans had solid leads in congressional polling and the winds of history at their back. The president's party typically loses about 30 House seats in a normal midterm elections, and Democrats only had five to give away before they lost their majority. And in an evenly divided Senate, Republicans saw at least four easy pickup opportunities in swing states that Democrats barely won in previous cycles.
But the environment has shifted radically in the last several months. Inflation remains a top issue, but has abated slightly in recent months as energy prices have dropped. The Supreme Court's decision, overturning Roe vs. Wade seems to have increased registration and enthusiasm among Democratic voters, particularly women and President Donald Trump is back in the news because of the sensational raid on his Mar-a-Lago compound hurting Republicans.
In addition to these atmospherics, Republican Senate candidates are drastically underperforming in several key races. GOP candidates in Arizona, Georgia, and Nevada are underperforming a generic Republican in those states. And this week, New Hampshire Republicans nominated an extremely controversial former general who polls far behind the Democratic incumbent, despite the favorable national environment. This has led several mainstream election forecasters to believe that Democrats are now favored to hold the Senate or potentially even increase the size of their majority based on competitive candidates for Republican seats running in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and North Carolina. This probably won't happen, but this is not the campaign that Republican leaders thought they would be running in the spring.
What could change the dynamics back in Republicans' favor? Most likely it's the economy. The Federal Reserve is aggressively hiking interest rates to bring down inflation. And while that hasn't slowed down job creation just yet, it could start to have a bite in the real economy in the next several months. And of course, campaigns matter too. The Republican candidate in Pennsylvania has just started to spend money to define his Democratic opponent as too liberal for the state. The race in Georgia remains very close. And in Nevada, Republicans are running a Senator's son who has already won statewide. If you live in one of these states, watch out for a flood of ads in the next six weeks as both parties prepare to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to keep or take control of the policy agenda.
- Jon Lieber: What's different about the 2022 midterms is 2024 Trump ... ›
- Democrats hope to use Jan 6 Trump focus to gain edge in midterms ... ›
- The Graphic Truth — Biden's first midterms: How does he stack up ... ›
- The Graphic Truth: Upcoming 2022 elections - GZERO Media ›
- How Trump dominates the GOP & "impressed" these DC journalists - GZERO Media ›
What you should know about Elise Stefanik’s rise in the GOP
Get insights on the latest news in US politics from Jon Lieber, head of Eurasia Group's coverage of political and policy developments in Washington:
Who is Elise Stefanik and what does she mean for the Republican Party right now?
Elise Stefanik is a young member from Upstate New York. She had originally started her career as a staffer in the George W. Bush administration, but in recent years, has turned into one of the most outspoken defenders of President Donald Trump, particularly during the impeachment trial last year. She's relevant right now because it looks like she'll be replacing Liz Cheney, the Representative from Wyoming and also the daughter of the former Vice President, who has been outspoken in her criticism of President Trump since the January 6th insurrection, and probably more importantly, outspoken in her criticism of the direction of the Republican Party.
The irony here though, is that while Cheney is going down, she's being replaced by somebody who, when she came into office, was expected to be a pretty standard-bearing Bush Republican. And so this is just really indicative of where the Party is, very hard to stay on in Republican leadership if you aren't going to be a supporter of President Trump. Too many of Cheney's colleagues thought she had become a distraction and wanted her gone. Stefanik is probably a placeholder. She says she doesn't want to serve in the position long-term. She eventually wants to take over the chairmanship of a committee, and she has many years ahead of her in Congress. She is very young.
What's the outlook for the Democrats' election bill?
Well, the Democrats in the House and Senate have introduced a bill to rewrite federal election law. Traditionally, election laws have been set by the state. States are allowed to choose how to do their redistricting. They're allowed to choose how people vote. Do they do mail-in votes? Do they have no-excuse mail-in votes? How many days of early voting are they going to allow? And, the Democrats bill would append that entire regime, and create a federal standard that every state would have to meet for number of days of pre-election day, in-person voting, standards around absentee voting, how to draw districts, taking it away from partisan gerrymandering and moving it towards a commission, in most states. And, there's been a lot of opposition to it. So the Democrats argue that this bill is necessary because Republicans are passing what they think are restrictive voting laws across the country. And Republicans are saying the Democrats are trying to take over and federalize elections to increase the chances that they win future elections and hold onto their current majorities in the House and Senate. And there's truth to both claims. The bill is very unlikely to move anywhere. It has 49 Democratic Senators who support it, who are co-sponsors, and one Democratic holdout, Joe Manchin. But even if Manchin never came around and said he supported the bill, it would require 60 votes to overcome a filibuster in the Senate, or the elimination of the legislative filibuster, so it's very unlikely to pass into law. You know this is a really big deal for the Democrats. They've given it the special designation S.1 in the Senate, H.R.1 in the House, which is a symbolic act suggesting this is their highest priority. But also, in a Rules Committee hearing earlier this week, both Majority Leader, Schumer, and Republican Minority Leader, McConnell, showed up to debate the bill in-person, debate amendments, and there've been multiple showdowns on the Floor. This is a really high-stakes piece of legislation. It would fundamentally tip the balance of power in favor of the Democrats were it to pass, which is, among other reasons, why Republicans are so opposed to seeing it get into law.
- Should Democrats abolish the filibuster? - GZERO Media ›
- Congress after the attempt to overthrow democracy: Democratic ... ›
- The Democrats run Washington – so what are they scared of ... ›
- Marjorie Taylor Greene support in House shows Republican Party ... ›
- Affordable Care Act upheld by Supreme Court, and Republicans move on - GZERO Media ›
- Why election reform laws are deadlocked on Capitol Hill - GZERO Media ›
- Why election reform laws are deadlocked on Capitol Hill - GZERO Media ›
Why ‘America first’ means “America involved”
What's the biggest foreign policy misconception that Americans have about the US's role in the world? According to international relations expert Tom Nichols, too few Americans believe that the US, in fact, has a critical role in the world, and that the things Americans enjoy, from cheap goods to safe streets, are made possible because of American global leadership. "Americans have become so spoiled and inured to the idea that the world is a dangerous place that they don't understand that the seas are navigable because someone makes them that way. They don't understand that peace between the great powers is not simply like the weather, that just happens," Nichols tells Ian Bremmer. Their conversation is featured on an episode of GZERO World, airing on US public television – check local listings.
Watch the episode: Make politics "boring" again: Joe Biden's first 100 Days
- Trump didn't invent Americans' rejection of US post-war leadership ... ›
- Who is Tony Blinken, Biden's pick for Secretary of State? - GZERO ... ›
- “A referendum for the whole world”: Global voices on the US election ... ›
- Anne-Marie Slaughter on a Biden administration's top foreign policy ... ›
- Quick Take: "America Is Back": Biden on Munich's virtual tour ... ›