Democrats favoured for US House as midterm voting takes place Tuesday

Final push before the vote

Donald Trump made his last campaign speech on Monday, 2 November, at a lake in Washington, after 25 rallies across several states. Most of those stops were in Republican strongholds such as Texas, Iowa and Kansas, where polls now show the race leaning toward the Democrats. In his closing remarks he described the midterms as the most important elections of Americans' lives and said the Democratic Party had nominated the most radical and dangerous candidates in US history. He also said some Democratic candidates were jihadists and members of the Muslim Brotherhood, an accusation without evidence behind it that he repeated against Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic Senate candidate in Michigan. If elected, El-Sayed would become the first Muslim senator in US history.

Forecasts and the stakes

The Decision Desk HQ model gives Democrats an 84% chance of winning the House, five points more than on 26 October. A poll aggregator gives them a 65% chance of recovering the Senate majority, eight percentage points above the figure seven days earlier. Republicans currently hold 53 Senate seats against 47 held by Democrats and independents who vote with them. On Tuesday, 3 November, voters will choose 35 Senate seats, all 435 House seats, more than 30 state governments and other local posts.

House (Decision Desk HQ model)84%

Senate (poll aggregator)65%

House (Decision Desk HQ model)

84 %

Senate (poll aggregator)

65 %

Data from the article text

House5

Senate8

House

5 percentage points

Senate

8 percentage points

Data from the article text

Trump is not on the ballot, yet he has campaigned as though he were. A Democratic House majority would let the opposition block or slow parts of his agenda and open parliamentary inquiries into the administration. Approval for the president sits near the lowest level of his second term, and rising living costs and fuel prices have fuelled discontent. Speaking to Miranda Devine, host of the Pod Force One podcast, Trump said the country would be finished if Republicans lost the House, the Senate and the presidency. He also said he would use his veto to block Democratic bills, and when asked whether he expected honest elections he answered no. On Monday he promised $5,000 to every adult US citizen if Republicans keep control of both chambers.

Observers and election integrity

The Justice Department has deployed more than 1,000 observers across all 50 states, an operation it described as the largest election monitoring effort in its history. For the first time since 2002, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) will not take part in monitoring. The department said FBI agents and immigration officers, including ICE, will not be used in the operation, and that observers will be unarmed and limited to documenting possible violations. Democratic officials in Maine, Illinois and Minnesota have announced their own measures against voter intimidation, while Common Cause and the American Civil Liberties Union will also watch the process. Senate Democrats have recruited more than a hundred staff members to observe the vote. In Alaska, Republican Dan Sullivan faces independent Daniel J. Sullivan, whose similar name could confuse voters. Trump accused Democrats of backing the independent without offering evidence, and the Alaska Supreme Court allowed that candidacy to proceed.

Musk and possible investigations

Trump said he could grant preventive pardons to Elon Musk and some members of his team if Democrats win Congress and launch investigations, which he called empty talk. He pointed to the pardons Joe Biden granted to members of the House committee that investigated the attack on the Capitol on 6 January. Musk has said he will fight any Democrats who investigate him. Democrats have proposed inquiries into possible conflicts of interest involving SpaceX and Tesla and Musk's ties to the Trump administration, and would pursue inquiries into Trump's family and allies over suspected corruption rather than impeachment. The administration has awarded Musk's companies several further contracts, including $5.9 billion to SpaceX with the US Space Force for a space launch architecture, $2.29 billion for a spatial data network, and $200 million between the Pentagon and Musk's xAI to help integrate artificial intelligence into military operations.