The Democratic Triumph and a New Vision for America

Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico speaking at an election night victory celebration in Austin, Texas. Eric Gay/AP

The stunning wipeout of Donald Trump’s Republican Party in the 2026 election has given us much to ponder. While the White House and Trump loyalists quickly tried to pin the GOP’s disastrous defeat solely on the Iran war and the accompanying spike in gas and diesel prices—even contending it was damn brave of Trump to launch a military action that could be expected to piss off voters—there’s far more than that going on. 

On election night, as almost unbelievable results poured in (Annie Andrews in South Carolina, James Talarico and Gina Hinojosa in Texas, Adam Hamilton in Kansas, Josh Turek in Iowa, Amy Acton in Ohio, a 20-seat Democratic pickup in the House—no, 30 seats, no, 40 seats), it was obvious that higher prices at the pump could not entirely explain this nationwide seismic shift. We were seeing what I called the Trump hangover election. It was as if American voters, after a long night out, woke up feeling awful and regretted the choices they made the previous evening—that is, the last election.

There’s now a clear pattern over the past 10 years. Voters fell for Trump when he was a candidate railing against the ruling class and issuing grand promises (“make America great again,” bring about a “golden age”). But when the time arrived to evaluate his performance as president, voters handed the former reality TV celebrity a failing grade.

In both 2016 and 2024, he did well as a presidential aspirant, playing the role of the outsider big-daddy nationalist hero who could sock it to the system, take on the elites, own the libs, and deliver prosperity. He won those elections. Yet as president, he has never impressed the electorate. In 2018, voters turned on him, and the Democrats won the House. Two years later—as Trump mismanaged the Covid pandemic—voters booted him and passed the reins to Joe Biden.

Now they have once again given Trump a big F. As I put it on election night, “After nearly two years of crisis, autocracy, brutality, grift, plutocratic policies, and assorted bizarreness, voters have for the third time rejected a Trump presidency. That means Trump has never received a positive performance review from the electorate.”

He’s done a piss-poor job in his rerun presidency, with his cruel mass deportation campaign, his absurd trade wars, and his idiotic attack on Iran. The voters couldn’t kick him out, but they did the next best thing and decimated the party that has served as his personality cult.

But this was more than the rejection of Trump and his ineptitude, chaos, vainglory, and corruption; it was a rejection of Trumpism—his ugly politics of lies, deceit, division, bigotry, tribalism, hate, and demagoguery. He, his MAGA minions, and his GOP zombies spent the entire campaign hysterically exclaiming that the Democrats are USA-hating commies who want to force gender-transition surgery on children and annihilate the nation. They claimed Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic senatorial candidate in Michigan, was a jihadist who endangered the nation and hurled Islamophobic assaults against him and his entire party. This did not work. El-Sayed won by 7 points and will become the first Muslim senator.

Such tactics in the past have succeeded for Trump. But this time voters didn’t take the bait—not in the face of high prices, a misconceived and poorly executed war of choice in Iran, the secret-police tactics of ICE, erratic and unproductive economic policy, vast and brazen grifting and grafting, creeping authoritarianism, and loads of Trump’s bizarreness. (“I looked at his ass.”)

This election was a political revolution—an attempt to end, or at least neuter, a corrupt and authoritarian regime. But it was also a sociocultural revolution. Americans reclaimed America from the Trump-MAGA crowd that advances a worldview in which only white Christian conservatives are the true Americans and the folks who ought to be in charge.

There is now a new majority view of the nation expressed in many ways by the election results. Keisha Lance Bottoms was elected governor of Georgia and will be the first Black woman to lead a state. Hinojosa will be Texas’ first Latina governor. New Hampshire’s Chris Pappas is the first openly gay man elected to the Senate. Two devout Christians who each profess a faith-influenced progressivism—Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian, and Hamilton, the pastor of a Methodist megachurch—will be passionate Democratic voices in the Senate.

If you watched the acceptance speeches of the Democratic victors, you witnessed diverse crowds of supporters—what America truly looks like. In the Trump era, he and his MAGA movement have tried to define the United States in narrow and racist terms. They have waged war on so-called wokeness. Republicans ran more than 200,000 anti-trans ads during this campaign. As with the commie-baiting, none of this helped them. Most voters were unswayed by the now all-too-familiar culture warfare the Republicans have long waged to distract from their efforts to serve the American oligarchy and corporate interests. What Republicans have often considered their best ammunition was a big dud. That’s historic.

At victory celebrations across the country, Democratic candidates shared a vision of an inclusive America and evoked an expansive sense of community as they vowed to lead the nation forward. In his election night speech, Talarico earnestly noted there could be no love of God without love of neighbor. This was a full counter to Trump’s never-ending attempt to exploit and exacerbate divisions, resentments, and prejudices. It often seems that Trump lives to vilify. But that act is getting old. Millions of Americans voted for the Democratic dream.

And not all who did were libs. After the tsunami struck—it was more like a supernova—Republican political professionals pointed out that the Trump-Vance voters of 2024 did show up at the polls. They did not sit it out because they were disenchanted or disappointed by the Trump-Vance administration. They voted, and many voted for Democrats.

So much for the strategic realignment of 2024.

Political parties are always quick to declare they’ve accomplished a permanent restructuring of American politics. After George W. Bush won reelection in 2004, Karl Rove, his top strategist, and others maintained the GOP had achieved a long-lasting realignment of the electorate. Four years later, Barack Obama won the presidency. After Trump defeated Kamala Harris, with a coalition that included significant swaths of young white men, Black men, and Latino men, Republicans crowed they had forged a new GOP majority that would reign for years. Oops.

This election has revealed much about the state of American politics. Big-money donors have far too much influence, and the amounts spent by billionaires and super-PACs (especially those financed by the Big Tech lords of AI and crypto) were obscene. Elon Musk deployed about half a billion dollars against Talarico and other Democrats. Yet it was money wasted. Talarico deftly jiu-jitsued Musk’s attempt to buy a US Senate seat by running against Musk and declaring, “Texas is not for sale.” Musk failed big time—but he and other oligarchs remain a threat to American democracy.

There will be much jawboning among pundits over whether the victories of progressive Democrats, such as El-Sayed, provide a roadmap for the party, as the usual intraparty debate between moderate Ds and lefty Dems proceeds. But it was clear that both centrist and progressive Democrats fared well in this anti-Trump atmosphere. No side comes out with a clear advantage, and the party, as it tries to govern and meet the expectations of an electorate that’s looking for action on prices, the affordability crisis, and the costs of health care and education, will have to work hard to bring its factions together to advance legislation and policies that clearly address what the people are demanding. Governing together is always more challenging than campaigning separately.

This election was a glorious course correction for the nation. Is it the end of the Trump era? Perhaps. But the forces that animate Trumpism—racial hatred, religious bigotry, corporate and plutocratic greed, economic unease, far-right extremism—have not been vanquished. The Democrats—with their own brand battered—provided Americans an alternative, and the electorate went for it. They persuaded millions to dump Trump. Now they must prove they can make their vision of America succeed.

Got anything to say about this item—or anything else? Email me at ourland.corn@gmail.com.

We’ve been through a lot together these past two years, and I’m happy this election demonstrated what I’ve been saying for years: We are the majority. The MAGA world of hatred, bigotry, tribalism, and cult worship is but a slice of America, and thanks to tens of millions of our neighbors and fellow citizens, it has been relegated to minority status. This is a major accomplishment that many of you helped to bring about.

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On the new episode of the Stress Test podcast that I cohost with Garrison Hayes, we look at the many investigations that Democrats are considering firing up when they take charge of various congressional committees in January. We also examine the possibility that this week’s election results could lead to the end of the Electoral College. Yes, really. And you can check out our previous post-election analysis episode here.

On the day before Election Day, Trump, naturally, gave a speech at the Reflecting Pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial hailing his glorious victory in the war on algae. As if voters needed any further indication that POTUS is a doofus. During that address, Trump proudly declared, “I've kept every single promise I made, except far more. I've actually kept far more promises than I made."

One day, America will have a president who understands basic math.

Joel Webbon is a far-right, antisemitic, Christian nationalist extremist who has called for executing women who make false charges of sexual assault. This week he turned his scolding gaze upon one of the most popular movies of all time:

In terms of the message of Star Wars, it is absolutely liberal slop…If you like the message of Star Wars, then you need to sit down and tell your dad you’re gay. It is one of the gayest franchises, the gayest stories…It is so effeminate. It is so feminized. It is so homosexual…You see young, straight, Christian men—they go to Star Wars and they’re like, “Um, the message—the cinematography is pretty cool—but the message is entirely wrong. The bad guy is actually the good guy.”

Is Webbon suggesting that Darth Vader, the chief enforcer of the fascistic, planet-destroying empire, is the good guy in this story? His rant is in sync with what’s known as “Anakin posting”—an internet meme that laments lost cultural or traditional ideals and that casts Vader, who was once known as Anakin Skywalker, as a sympathetic character. (Elon Musk recently joined in with a social media post that hailed Anakin and bemoaned, “This is what they stole from us.”)

Webbon has called for the public execution of Mike Huckabee, the GOP politician now serving as Trump’s ambassador to Israel. But his Star Wars comments really go too far.

The 2026 midterms, no surprise, yielded a flood of BS from Trumpers and MAGA-heads. No one should forget this idiotic rant from Fox News’ Jesse Watters from two weeks ago:

The day prior to the election, MAGA influencer Benny Johnson hosted GOP pollster John McLaughlin on his show, praising him as the “Most Accurate Pollster in America.” McLaughlin predicted the Rs would hold the Senate with 53 votes, noting, “There are more Trump voters than Democrats. If Republicans show up, we will WIN."

Nope. Republicans, as noted above, did show up. Many voted Democratic. The “most accurate pollster in America” could not conceive of this.

On Fox News, former GOP congressman Jason Chaffetz dissed Democratic voters as bad citizens and predicted their lack of civic virtue would prevent a Democratic victory:

The MAGA Republicans, they’re going to vote because they’re patriotic. They think it's a duty. On the Democratic side, they’ve got to try to convince them to come out.

He got that wrong.

Until the last moment, MAGA land leaned heavily into demagogic demonization of the other side. Right-wing bellower Matt Walsh proclaimed:

I am not here to tell you that Republicans have done a wonderful job. I am here to tell you that the Democrat Party has been fully captured by communists who want you dead and seek to destroy western civilization itself. Go vote against them. It’s the only choice. 

Does he believe that James Talarico, Annie Andrews, Troy Jackson, Sherrod Brown, Jon Ossoff, and Amy Acton are part of a nefarious band of commies seeking to kill Americans and blow up Western civilization? Actually, Walsh might believe that of Abdul El-Sayed, and we don’t have to wonder why.

Speaking of El-Sayed, on Fox Business, host Stu Varney and Fox News host Jimmy Failla had conniptions when Bruce Springsteen endorsed the Michigan Democrat running for US Senate. Varney exclaimed, “I will never play that man’s music on this program again!” And Failla groused, “The idea that Bruce Springsteen is now sticking up for people who weren’t born in the USA, Stu, is why, like you, I'm never buying a ticket to watch him sing ‘Born to Walk’ ever again! I can’t.”

El-Sayed was born in Rochester Hills, Michigan.

Vice President JD Vance made sure to get in his racist whacks right before Election Day. Campaigning in Ohio for GOP gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, he said,

I saw a story…that there are illegal communities of illegal immigrant Somalis who are coordinating to flood the polls and drown out your vote…We want American elections to belong to American citizens. Send a message by voting for Vivek for governor.

There was no such story. Vance was vilifying a community of Black people to…well, you know. In that same speech, Vance said, “I'm sick of politicians dividing us against each other.” No self-awareness, bro.

Back to Watters. After the election, this is how he explained the walloping Trump’s GOP received:

The base was a little depressed. The Epstein file release was kind of bungled, and [Charlie] Kirk’s death kind of turned people against each other. And there were a lot of people [in 2024] who voted for a dictator. [Trump said] he wanted to be a dictator on Day One, and a lot of people said, “Good. You know, lock up the crooked, deport the whole country.” But that didn’t happen. That’s why the base didn’t show up.

Watters was saying that Republicans were disappointed that Trump had not acted more authoritarian in the past 22 months and that was why the GOP lost. That’s quite the spin.

As expected, it was a week of heavy competition, but, unlike with the election, Trump prevailed. After the party over which he has exerted total control was crushed, he said, “I don't like to consider it a defeat for me. I wasn't on the ballot."

In the final weeks of the campaign, Trump repeatedly urged crowds at rallies he headlined to  “pretend I’m on the ballot.” He said it at least 47 times. Poor guy—he seems to be slipping.

On Election Day, voters in Minneapolis placed their “I Voted” stickers at the memorials for Alex Pretti and Renée Good—a poignant reminder of the ICE resistance movement in Minnesota that helped fuel the national repudiation of Trump and the Republicans.

Most of the mail this week came in before the election results were known. No shock, some of the missives were imbued with anxiety. Harry Freiberg picked up on a line I wrote in a pre-election issue: “Yet this election, like the last one, remains a test for the American political system. Can it beat back a political movement predicated on prevarication?” And he emailed:

As has been noted:

“No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.” H.L. Mencken, 1926

Today, Mencken could add meanness to intelligence.

Maybe this week showed that Mencken's axiom doesn’t always apply. It seems a great mass of Americans did figure out Trump’s con.

Charlotte Dunham sent in this dispatch from Texas in response to another pre-election issue:

Thanks for reiterating the importance of the stories we tell. I have seen a change in the stories Texas Democrats are telling, and I think it is paying off. They campaigned on what is hurting people, affordability. But they are telling a story to place it in context, which is one of class and wealth distribution. In a normal climate, that message would be drowned out as socialist or communist. But this time people are really hurting. That message won't work like it did before. James Talarico's closing speech in Lubbock was absolutely brilliant. He framed it as the people's voice against big money. Talarico drew almost as big a crowd as Trump.  I will go out on a limb and say something is happening here.

Republicans are flooding the air with ads. They have a lot of money and they are using it. But there is such a thing as overkill. The vast majority of the ads are crude, overblown, and negative. People get tired of the ads about Democrats turning Texas kids from boys to girls. Republicans have nothing else. What Texas desperately needs, even more than Talarico, is a sweep down ballot. We need a housecleaning of the Christian nationalism that has infected our state and our schools that has been created by Abbott and Paxton using oil billionaire money.   

You will probably read this after the election. I sure hope I am right. 

Charlotte absolutely nailed it.

Margo Landrum replied to how I framed the midterm contest when I wrote, “This election will tell us whether democratic backsliding will be reversed, whether voters will punish corrupt grifters, practitioners of plutocratic policies, and proponents of brutality, and whether such political chicanery as racist gerrymandering and big-money politics (see Musk and his hundreds of millions of dollars) can triumph. It will also show whether Trump’s disinformation crusade has stalled and his art of the lie has lost its shine.” She emailed:

Your last paragraph gave me chills. If we can’t get money out of politics, we’ve lost control of our democracy.

Thanks for the note, Margo. I agree, but this election showed that big money can be fought and doesn't always win. Poor Elon.

Sue from Florida wrote:

I live in a small town in Central Florida, not anywhere near the ocean. I use my local Nextdoor app. Last week, I skimmed it and found dozens of my neighbors worried about Sharia law taking over the US by Dems. It's amazing how gullible and ignorant people in Florida can be. Reminded me of the first Trump administration, when I spoke to an older woman in the supermarket. She warned me to take caution and prepare for ISIS invading Florida shores.

No doubt, much of that MAGA- and Trump-fueled paranoia exists throughout the country. But Tuesday showed it is not a majority position.

“Moxie, look at that gorgeous yellow, orange, and red.”
“You know that’s not fair.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot. Look at that bright yellow. And the deep blue sky.”
“Now that I can see! It’s beautiful.”