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After Tuesday night’s “thumping” — the term President George W. Bush used to describe the GOP’s election night after the Republicans got hammered by Democrats in the 2006 elections — President Donald Trump has some big decisions to make.
Does he bring in some reinforcements, like outgoing Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin, whose 2021 win in Virginia looks even more impressive against the deep blue look of Virginia Tuesday night, and focus like a laser on the seven Senate seats and two dozen House seats up for grabs in a year?
Or does he push hard for what the Senate Republican Caucus will most assuredly not give: the end of the filibuster. The successful developer in the president should rise to the top and drop the impossible project and move to the doable ones which have great potential instead.
TRUMP FLOATS HOLDING REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION BEFORE MIDTERM ELECTIONS
No sugar-coating Tuesday: Even the Cleveland Browns and the New York Jets had better weeks than the GOP — the Browns had a bye and the Jets made bold moves to collect draft picks.
Tuesday wasn’t a realignment. The simple reality is 3 blue states got bluer with Trump in the White House, and while there are dashed hopes about Jack Ciattarelli’s race in NJ, and not a little shock over extremist Jay Jones’ win as attorney general in Virginia, the 2026 midterms will be a wholly different question, one which could go either way. The Fed will cut rates a few times, helping the economy and homebuyers, and new and different substantive issues will drive different results. Either party could “win” or “lose” next year, and that result, in turn, won’t predict 2028.
What matters most and immediately right now in politics is the redistricting of Congressional maps in red states that can do it, and the quality of Senate candidates and campaigns. Republicans need to get their sharpest pencils out and consult the best redistricting minds and wholly adopt the Democratic approach in Massachusetts and Illinois. Virginia’s Democrats are going to follow the example of California’s Democrats and attempt to erase all red districts in the Commonwealth. Republicans should not be shy or fear the double standard employed by coastal media elites which blast GOP redistricting while turning blind eyes at Democratic plays for Congressional power.
The second-layer observation noted above that bears repeating: Outgoing Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin was an extraordinary candidate to have fought to a win in a very blue Virginia four years ago. Expect Youngkin to be among the figures most in demand where Senate seats are up for grabs — in Georgia, Maine, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Hampshire (and less so in Iowa and Ohio, but there should be no taking-for-granted any Senate seat.) The soon-to-be former Virginia governor is a big draw and Youngkin needs to be recruited to raise campaign dollars and get Scott Pressler and his voting registration machine to places like Georgia, Michigan and North Carolina especially to get the GOP base bigger and energized.
State legislatures that can redistrict, ought to. Texas and California reflect the blunt realities of the new “red-blue” dynamic in America, and are drawing the maps to benefit their parties and being unapologetically ruthless about it. So too, should every other state recognize that the old rules are gone. Jay Jones winning in Virginia despite his deranged text messages, and Zohran Mamndani’s win in New York City, despite his extremism, underline the two new realities of that all red-blue battles are “national” and that the Democrats have lurched left, again.
The left dominates the Democrats, and their “moderates” are not moderate at all. The willingness to withhold paychecks from workers, hold SNAP benefits hostage and wound the air traffic control system telegraphs the approach of the Democrats.
“If you can win, you should,” is attributed to former President Barack Obama’s prime directive of politics. So it is “Chicago rules” everywhere, GOP. Watch Indiana, Florida and Missouri legislatures and their decisions on redistricting to see if this truth has sunk in.
Trump has the unique ability to pull voters off their couches and to the polls. He’s been on a great winning streak at home and abroad and the GOP should hope he focuses his remarkable reservoir of energy on raising money and spirits for 2026 — and another reconciliation bill in early 2027 that puts a premium on helping voters deal with the permanent impact of Biden inflation.
The “Ruthless” podcast from yesterday and today will be interesting to hear. They are actual political campaign professionals. There should be zero panic among professionals who know that the tide charts of American politics are pretty fixed. But, as the 2022 midterms showed, the “in” party doesn’t have to suffer catastrophic losses in the 2026 midterms, though they can. As the president doesn’t want to go through another ginned-up impeachment, he’s got an enormous incentive to throw everything he’s got at 2026.
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It’s going to be a fun year in politics, and the Democrats’ hangover this week and next and next year is Comrade Mamdani, the new face of their party as he takes the reins in NYC. His nonsense economics don’t work, and have never worked. That reality, plus the prospect of Trump-on-the-trail, should encourage GOP voters this week. Like baseball, the four-year cycle in American politics is a long season. A blow-out on one night says very little about the election nights ahead in 2026 and 2028.
The self-sorting of Americans into red and blue camps continues and indeed is accelerating. That’s the biggest takeaway. Stare that reality straight in its eyes. It’s the fundamental political fact of this era in American politics. Deal with it GOP.
Hugh Hewitt is host of “The Hugh Hewitt Show,” heard weekday mornings 6am to 9am ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh wakes up America on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6pm ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996 where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990. Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcast, and this column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.
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