2026-10-20T08:00:44.939Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/20/politics/democrats-midterm-blue-wave-expectations
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民主党人迫切希望在11月的选举中掀起蓝色浪潮，近期一系列民调让他们认为，自己有可能在数月前还被认为难以企及的深红选区取得胜利。
党内的期望如此之高，以至于如果民主党未能在选举日全力以赴、拿下国会参众两院的控制权，党内很可能会出现大量失望情绪，而共和党则会欢庆胜利。
“我认为民主党在足够多的州都处于势在必得的位置，有望度过不错的一天，”CNN高级政治评论员大卫·阿克塞尔罗德周一在凯西·亨特主持的《竞技场》节目中表示，“但如果他们未能拿下参议院多数席位，我也不会感到意外。”
另一方面，阿克塞尔罗德表示，他也不会对民主党拿下53个参议院席位感到意外。“这真的取决于这场浪潮的规模有多大，”他说。
不过，人们普遍预期，此次选举将出现一定程度的“浪潮”效应。
2022年，在最高法院推翻罗伊诉韦德案后，民主党人和总统乔·拜登几乎是在庆祝：他们仅输掉了9个众议院席位，未能拿下众议院控制权。
“尽管媒体和专家们都在预测会出现巨大的红色浪潮，但最终并未发生，”拜登在次日表示，他将选举结果描述为“民主的好日子”，尽管共和党控制众议院终结了他的立法议程。
2018年，在共和党输掉41个众议院席位、失去众议院控制权后，特朗普指出共和党保住了参议院多数席位，并吹嘘他们“大幅超出了历史先例”。
无论今年结果如何，特朗普都可能会毫无根据地声称存在选民欺诈行为，并试图宣称自己取得了某种形式的胜利。
民主党人对此次选举充满热情。在最近的ABC新闻/《华盛顿邮报》民调中，当被问及11月将支持哪个政党时，民主党人领先共和党近10个百分点。在参议院选举中，民主党候选人在阿拉斯加、艾奥瓦、堪萨斯和得克萨斯等深红州与共和党人竞争激烈。
在密歇根和佐治亚等摇摆州，选举也势均力敌，民主党人希望凭借选举势头保住目前掌握的席位。选举结束后，民调机构必然会进行复盘，核心将在于今年的民调是否准确捕捉到了民主党人的热情，还是高估了这种热情。
总统所在政党几乎总会失去众议院席位。
在过去100年里，总统所在政党仅两次没有失去至少一些众议院席位——而且往往是大量席位。
这两个例外分别是2002年乔治·W·布什总统任内，当时正值9·11事件后美国入侵伊拉克的筹备阶段；以及1998年，当时互联网经济泡沫提振了经济，公众对比尔·克林顿总统弹劾案的反弹情绪高涨。
选举结果各不相同。
仅仅几个席位的变化都可能意义重大。2022年民主党仅输掉9个席位，仍以微弱差距失去众议院控制权，这显然是一次失败。但这远不及当年许多人预期的压倒性惨败。
更大幅度的席位变动也曾出现。1994年，在克林顿首届任期中期选举中，民主党输掉了54个席位，即所谓的“共和党革命”。2010年，在“茶党革命”期间，民主党输掉了63个席位，时任总统巴拉克·奥巴马将其称为“惨败”。在这两次中期选举中，民主党都失去了众议院控制权。
在特朗普首届任期的2018年中期选举中，共和党输掉41个席位，从而失去了众议院控制权。
2018年仅有35个参议院席位参与竞选——参议员任期为6年，任何一次选举中仅有约三分之一的席位会进行换届。2026年的35个席位中，仅有10个被CNN列为关键竞选席位。民主党需要在这10个席位中赢得8个，才能达到51个席位的多数。
在这些关键席位中，佐治亚、密歇根和新罕布什尔州的3个席位目前由民主党掌控。阿拉斯加、艾奥瓦、堪萨斯、缅因、北卡罗来纳、俄亥俄和得克萨斯州的7个关键竞选席位目前由共和党掌控。
由于多年来许多州都存在选区划分不公的问题，竞争激烈的席位有所减少，因此很难想象今年的选举会出现如此规模的席位变动。无党派的库克政治报告将仅21个席位列为“摇摆不定”。在这些摇摆席位中，15个目前由共和党掌控，仅有6个由民主党掌控。
根据库克政治报告的分类，有10个共和党掌控的席位被明确、大概率或倾向于民主党。另有1个席位由脱离共和党成为独立人士的议员掌控。
有8个民主党掌控的席位被明确、大概率或倾向于共和党。
这意味着民主党可能仅需赢得一个或几个摇摆席位就能拿下众议院多数席位。但如果共和党赢得大部分摇摆席位，他们就可以宣称打破了所谓的“蓝色浪潮”。
众议院和参议院的选举结果可能背道而驰。在最近两次中期选举——特朗普首届任期的2018年和拜登任内的2022年——中，总统所在政党都因失去足够多的众议院席位而丧失了众议院控制权，但实际上在参议院获得了席位。
2018年，共和党拿下4个参议院席位，民主党拿下2个，尽管特朗普当时的支持率相当低，但特朗普所在政党仍净增2个席位。2022年，尽管全国民意对拜登不利，民主党仍拿下1个参议院席位。
参众两院 rarely 同时易手
近年来，参众两院的控制权更迭相当频繁，以至于每次选举都在某种程度上属于“变革选举”。但在过去100年里，仅有两次参众两院同时在同一选举周期内易手：1994年的共和党革命，以及2006年反对伊拉克战争的民主党浪潮。
唐纳德·特朗普总统的低支持率拖累了共和党候选人，近期的一些民调让民主党人对在意外选区获胜充满期待。
但每一场选举都有其独特性。北卡罗来纳州的参议院民主党候选人是受欢迎的前州长罗伊·库珀。佐治亚州的民主党候选人是现任议员乔恩·奥索夫。得克萨斯州的共和党候选人是该州口碑不佳且丑闻缠身的总检察长肯·帕克斯顿。在近100年都没有民主党参议员的堪萨斯州，一位以温和派身份参选的民主党牧师让民主党人看到了希望。
堪萨斯和得克萨斯？真的吗？
这两个州的民调显示，参议院和州长选举都势均力敌。长期以来，民主党人一直试图证明得克萨斯州的参议院席位有可能被拿下，但自1988年以来从未实现——那一年塔拉里科出生的前一年。2014年，堪萨斯州一名独立候选人在选举前民调中领先不受欢迎的共和党候选人，但最终在选举日落败。因此，共和党在这些州重新崛起并非没有先例。
如果真的出现大规模蓝色浪潮，不妨将目光投向更靠深红的州，比如南卡罗来纳州。民主党医生安妮·安德鲁斯此前曾遭到特朗普的辱骂，她希望击败达琳·格雷厄姆参议员——后者于今年年初在其兄长林赛·格雷厄姆去世后被任命填补该席位空缺。
民主党今年需要拿下多少席位才能掌控参众两院？
两院目前都处于微弱分裂状态。民主党需要在参众两院各净增4个席位，才能获得多数控制权。
事实上，共和党在众议院的多数席位是历史上最微弱的。选举日前，众议院共有218名共和党议员——在435个席位的众议院中仅占微弱多数，尽管独立议员、来自加利福尼亚州的众议员凯文·基利在行政程序上会投票支持共和党。众议院目前有214名民主党议员和两个空缺席位，两党各占一个。如果民主党未能拿下几个席位，那将是他们的重大失利。
在参议院，目前有53名共和党议员、45名民主党议员和2名立场与民主党一致的独立议员。
民主党需要达到51个席位才能掌控100个席位的参议院，因为副总统JD·万斯作为参议院议长拥有决定性投票权。
失去参众两院控制权对特朗普和共和党意味着什么？
特朗普一直在为自己的第二任期设定预期，他承认总统所在政党通常会在中期选举中失去一些席位。他也一直在以近乎放纵的方式施政，尽可能多地推进政策，仿佛已经预见到第二任期内国会将更加敌对。
如果民主党掌控众议院或参议院，就会以调查和听证会的形式加强对特朗普政府的监督——这是将政府运作暴露在公众视野下、并试图塑造公众舆论的有力工具。
他们还将对美国预算拥有更多控制权。特朗普一直刻意不动用国会拨款，但如果参众两院都由民主党掌控，就可以在拨款法案中对特朗普施加新的限制。如果民主党仅掌控其中一院，这种影响力将会减弱。
如果民主党真的拿下参议院控制权，他们的行动也将受到严格限制。在任何合理情况下，两党都不可能获得推翻阻挠议事所需的超级多数席位。这意味着拨款法案最终仍需要两党支持——以及白宫的认可——才能通过。
特朗普曾在共和党掌控参众两院的情况下，任由政府拨款到期失效。
共和党曾试图在拨款斗争中为特朗普的优先事项争取缓冲；例如，今年早些时候，他们绕过阻挠议事规则，使用预算协调程序为移民海关执法局拨款多年，直至特朗普任期结束。他们当时就知道，历史显示选举浪潮可能即将到来。
Do Democrats have inflated expectations for the midterms? Examining the case
2026-10-20T08:00:44.939Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/20/politics/democrats-midterm-blue-wave-expectations
_A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.
Democrats are hungry for a blue wave in the November election, and a series of recent polls has them thinking they could pull off victories in some deeply red territory that would have seemed unthinkable a few months ago.
Expectations for the party are so high that one could envision a fair amount of disappointment in the party — and celebration among Republicans — if Democrats don’t shoot the moon on Election Day and take control of both chambers of Congress.
“I think Democrats are in striking distance in enough states to have a really good day,” CNN senior political commentator David Axelrod said Monday on “The Arena” with Kasie Hunt. “But it wouldn’t surprise me if they fell short of taking over the Senate.”
On the other hand, Axelrod wouldn’t be surprised if Democrats got 53 seats, he said. “It really depends on how high this wave is,” he said.
The expectation, though, is that there will be some degree of wave.
In 2022, after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Democrats and President Joe Biden all but celebrated that they lost only nine House seats and control of the House of Representatives.
“While the press and the pundits are predicting a giant red wave, it didn’t happen,” Biden said a day later, describing the results as “a good day for democracy” even though Republican control of the House put a stop to his legislative agenda.
In 2018, after the GOP lost 41 House seats and control of the chamber, Trump pointed to Republicans maintaining their Senate majority and bragged that they “dramatically outperformed historical precedents.”
No matter what happens this year, Trump is likely to allege there is voter fraud — regardless of whether there is any evidence — and to try to claim some form of victory.
Democrats are excited about this election. They held a nearly 10-point advantage over Republicans in a recent ABC News / Washington Post poll when voters were asked which party they will support in November. In Senate races, Democratic candidates are competitive against Republicans in red states including Alaska, Iowa, Kansas and Texas.
There are also tight races in purple states like Michigan and Georgia, where Democrats are hoping momentum can save seats they currently hold. The inevitable post-election review of polling will hinge on whether pollsters this year captured or over-indexed Democrats’ enthusiasm.
The president’s party almost always loses House seats.
Only twice in the past 100 years has the president’s party not lost at least some – and frequently a lot of — House seats.
The two exceptions were in 2002 under President George W. Bush, in the run-up to the US invasion of Iraq after 9/11; and in 1998, when the dot-com boom buoyed the economy and there was a public backlash to the impeachment of President Bill Clinton.
It varies.
A change of a few seats can be a very big deal. When Democrats lost nine seats in 2022, they narrowly lost control of the House, a clear defeat. But it was far from the landslide many expected that year.
Much bigger swings can happen. In 1994, Democrats lost 54 seats in the so-called Republican revolution of Clinton’s first midterm. In 2010, the so-called tea party revolution, Democrats lost 63 seats, something then-President Barack Obama called a “shellacking.” In both midterms, Democrats lost control of the House.
During Trump’s first midterm, in 2018, Republicans lost control of the House when they lost 41 seats.
Only 35 Senate seats were up for grabs in 2018; senators serve six-year terms, and only a third or so are on the ballot in any given election. Of the 35 seats up in 2026, only 10 are on CNN’s list of key races. Democrats need to win eight of those 10 to reach 51.
Of those key races, three — Georgia, Michigan and New Hampshire — are seats currently held by Democrats. Seven of the key race states — Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, North Carolina, Ohio and Texas — are currently held by Republicans.
It’s hard to imagine a swing on that level in this election because there are fewer hotly contested seats after years of gerrymandering in many states. Only 21 seats are labeled as “tossup” by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. Of those tossup seats, 15 are held by Republicans and only six are held by Democrats.
Ten Republican-held seats are either solidly, likely or leaning toward Democrats, according to Cook. One more is held by a lawmaker who left the GOP to become an independent.
Eight Democratic seats are either solidly, likely or leaning toward Republicans.
It means Democrats may only need to win one or a few tossup seats to take the House majority. But if Republicans win a large portion of those tossup seats, they will be able to claim they breached the wave.
The House and the Senate can go in opposite directions. In the two most recent midterms — Trump’s first-term midterm in 2018 and Biden’s midterm in 2022 — the president’s party lost enough House seats to lose control of House of Representatives, but actually gained seats in the Senate.
In 2018, Republicans flipped four Senate seats and Democrats flipped two, gaining two seats for Trump’s party even though Trump’s approval rating was quite low at the time. In 2022, Democrats flipped one seat when the national mood was against Biden.
The House and Senate rarely change hands in the same year
Control of either the House or Senate has changed with regularity in recent years, to the extent that every election is a change election of some kind. But only twice in the past 100 years — in the 1994 Republican Revolution and the 2006 Democratic wave against the war in Iraq — did both the House and Senate change hands in the same cycle.
President Donald Trump’s low approval rating is dragging down Republican candidates, and some recent polling has Democrats dreaming about wins in unexpected places.
Each of these races is also unique. The Democrat running for Senate in North Carolina is a popular former governor, Roy Cooper. The Democrat running in Georgia is an incumbent, Jon Ossoff. The Republican running in Texas is the state’s relatively unpopular and scandal-plagued attorney general, Ken Paxton. In Kansas — where there hasn’t been a Democratic senator in nearly 100 years — the moderate pastor running as a Democrat has the party hoping.
Kansas and Texas? Really?
Polling in both states suggests tight statewide races for Senate and governor. Democrats have long tried to manifest the idea that a Senate seat in Texas could be up for grabs. It hasn’t happened since 1988, the year before Talarico was born. In Kansas, an independent candidate led an unpopular Republican in pre-election polling back in 2014, only to lose on Election Day. So it would not be unprecedented for Republicans to re-surge in these states.
If there’s a true blue wave, start looking even further into red states, like in South Carolina, where Annie Andrews, the Democratic doctor who has been the subject of insults by Trump, wants to unseat Sen. Darline Graham, who was appointed to fill the seat left by her brother, Lindsey Graham, after his death this year.
How many seats do Democrats need to take the House and Senate this year?
Both chambers are narrowly divided. Democrats would need to net four seats in each chamber to gain a majority.
In fact, Republicans’ House majority is the narrowest in history. Headed into Election Day, there are 218 Republicans — a bare majority in the 435-member chamber, although the one independent member, Rep. Kevin Kiley of California, votes with Republicans for administrative purposes. There are 214 Democrats and two vacancies, one left by each party. It would be a major disappointment for Democrats if they don’t pick up a few seats.
In the Senate, there are currently 53 Republicans, 45 Democrats and two independents who function like Democrats.
Democrats would need to reach 51 in order to control the 100-member chamber, since Vice President JD Vance, in his role as president of the Senate, casts tie-breaking votes.
What would losing control mean for Trump and Republicans?
Trump has been setting expectations for his entire second term, acknowledging the history that the president’s party usually loses some midterm seats. He has also been governing with a kind of wild abandon, getting as much done as possible as if in anticipation of a more hostile Congress in the second half of his term.
Democrats in charge of either the House or Senate would mean much more oversight of Trump’s administration in the form of investigations and hearings — powerful tools in exposing an administration to sunlight and trying to shape public opinion.
They would also have more control over the US budget. Trump has made a point of not spending money appropriated by Congress, but a Democratic majority in the House and Senate could put new restrictions on Trump in spending bills. That power would be less if Democrats took control of only one chamber.
There will be harsh limits on Democrats if they do take control of the Senate. In no plausible scenario will either party have the kind of supermajority needed to overcome a filibuster. That means spending bills would ultimately need bipartisan support — and buy-in from the White House — to pass.
Trump has shown a willingness to allow government funding to lapse even when Republicans control the House and Senate.
Republicans tried to inoculate some of Trump’s priorities from spending fights; they bypassed the filibuster and used budget reconciliation earlier this year to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement for multiple years, for instance, for the rest of Trump’s term. They knew history suggested a wave might be coming.