On November 8th, millions of Americans cast their ballots, to vote on issues from local school boards to the governors of their states.
This midterm election was a poor showing for the American Republican party. For a multitude of reasons, typically the party controlling the White House and Congress will face significant losses during the midterms. Frustrated by a lack of change, voters often vote for the opposing party. Studies from the UC Santa Baraba indicate that the “president's party has, on average, lost 28 House seats and four Senate seats in every midterm between 1934 and 2018” (The Economist). Under this logic, Republicans should have coasted atop a red wave to control the Senate and the House equally.
The ‘“red wave” of the 2022 midterms, however, is likely more of a trickle.
Republicans lost a senate seat to the Democrats, giving 50 seats to the Democrats. The one, missing seat is in Georgia, where neither candidate received a majority of the votes will instead head to a highly contested runoff in December (Bradner). The Republicans pulled a small majority in the house, with 219 seats to the Democrats’ 209 (Bradner).
Despite rising inflation and overall dissatisfaction with the economy from a Democrat-dominated leadership, American voters were more concerned with issues like immigration and abortion. The latter was a significant issue, considering, the repealing of Roe v. Wade in June. Pollster Chris Jackson notes that “Republicans essentially gave Democrats something to run on other than the issues they were losing on, which was the economy” (Collinson).
Important elections were won across the country, however. Floridians voted in droves for Ron DeSantis, famous across the country for his Republican policies that prevented the requirement of COVID vaccines in schools, the “Stop WOKE Act” which gave authority to schools to prevent discussions of race, and for fighting back against Disney when the corporation spoke out against the treatment of LGBT students in Florida schools (Sullivan).
With nearly 60% of the vote, DeSantis sailed to the governorship. The question remains, what is next for this up-and-coming Floridian?
DeSantis is only 44, but faces a difficult question in four years when Floridian law prevents him from serving a third consecutive term as governor. Comparable to his situation is Texas’ Greg Abbott, who easily defeated Beto O’Rouke to win his third term as governor. DeSantis, without the option to run again for the governorship, will be out of a job in 2026 and must answer the question of what is his next step.
Already, American voters are conflicted between the two. DeSantis is a Republican icon and has been incredibly successful in his past term, but to take on the cult leadership of Donald Trump is an incredibly large task for anyone to handle.
Potentially sensing challenges to his leadership, former President Donald Trump announced his intention to run for President in 2024 (Orr). Notably, members of his leadership team have stepped away, such as his daughter and son-in-law Ivanka and Jared Kushner who have decided to use this time to focus on their families (Madarang). This announcement followed Trump lashing out on TruthSocial dissing DeSantis, naming him “DeSanctimonius”, likely due to anger about the internal state of the Republican party which are unsure about Trump’s candidacy after his failure in the 2020 elections (Hansen). Even now, his endorsement did not aid many candidates, such as reality TV star Mehmet Oz who lost the Pennsylvania senate seat to Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman (Orr).
2024 is two years away, but campaigning has already begun. The Republican and Democrat parties must make difficult decisions about who truly is the future of their party, and who is the future of American society?
Until then, we can only watch and wonder what is next for the US.
Bibliography
Bradner, E. (2022, November 13). Democrats will keep control of the Senate, CNN projects | CNN politics. CNN. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://edition.cnn.com/2022/11/12/politics/democrats-keep-senate/index.html
Collinson, S. (2022, November 17). Trump sets off GOP identity crisis heading into 2024 | CNN politics. CNN. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://edition.cnn.com/2022/11/17/politics/republican-party-2024-identity-crisis-analysis/index.html
The Economist Newspaper. (2022, November 12). A disappointing showing for the Republicans in the midterms. The Economist. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2022/11/09/a-disappointing-showing-for-the-republicans-in-the-midterms
Hansen, C. (2022, November 11). Trump attacks desantis, GOP in barrage of social media posts. US News. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://www.usnews.com/news/elections/articles/2022-11-11/trump-attacks-desantis-gop-in-barrage-of-social-media-posts
Isenstadt, A. (2022, November 16). DeSantis draws contrast with trump as party hunts for 2024 alternative. POLITICO. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://www.politico.com/news/2022/11/16/desantis-trump-2024-election-00067834
Madarang, C. (2022, November 16). Ivanka Trump steps away from politics, Skips Dad's big announcement. Rolling Stone. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/ivanka-trump-steps-away-politics-skips-trump-announcement-1234631629/
Orr, G., Holmes, K., & Stracqualursi, V. (2022, November 16). Former president Donald Trump announces a White House bid for 2024 | CNN politics. CNN. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://edition.cnn.com/2022/11/15/politics/trump-2024-presidential-bid/index.html
Sullivan, B. (2022, November 18). With a nod to '1984,' a federal judge blocks Florida's anti-'woke' law in colleges. NPR. Retrieved November 19, 2022, from https://www.npr.org/2022/11/18/1137836712/college-university-florida-woke-desantis-1984
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