Donald Trump’s approval rating is currently lower than it was after 1/6. Trump has known for quite some time that his presidency is effectively over if Democrats win back the House in 2026.
If Democrats win a House majority, Trump becomes a lame duck, and by the late summer of 2027, Democrats will start holding their first presidential primary debates, and the nation will turn its attention toward the 2028 election.
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Trump will be an afterthought, and the person who will be keeping the seat warm for the next, and definitely much younger, president.
To counter his looming irrelevance, Trump came up with a plan.
Trump’s plan is to rig the 2026 midterm election by getting red states to gerrymander more Republican leaning seats for his party.
It seemed like a great idea that was going swimmingly as Texas quickly fell into line and redrew its maps to create five new Republican leaning House seats.
What Trump never counted on was Democrats fighting back.
Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) responded to Texas with Prop 50, a ballot measure voters approved that allowed California to redraw its maps to create five new Democratic-leaning seats. Unlike Texas, California strengthened its Democratic-leaning districts to keep several Democratic seats safe.
North Carolina has gerrymandered to add a Republican House seat, as has Missouri. Ohio went for a weaker gerrymander and ended up preserving several Democratic seats. The latest Democratic win came in Utah, where a judge threw out a Republican gerrymander and implemented a map that will net Democrats another House seat.
Read more below to see the surprising result of the Democratic pushback.