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Historically, first midterms are cold showers for presidents Historically, first
midterms are cold showers for the occupant of the White House.
   
   
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POLITICS


THE MIDTERMS DIDN'T PRODUCE A WAVE. HERE'S WHAT THAT'S MEANT HISTORICALLY

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November 13, 20225:00 AM ET

Ron Elving

THE MIDTERMS DIDN'T PRODUCE A WAVE. HERE'S WHAT THAT'S MEANT HISTORICALLY

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Presidents Trump, Nixon, Ford and Kennedy all felt the impact of midterm
elections in different ways. Drew Angerer/Getty Images; Keystone/Getty Images;
AFP/Getty Images; National Archive/Newsmakers/Getty Images hide caption

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Drew Angerer/Getty Images; Keystone/Getty Images; AFP/Getty Images; National
Archive/Newsmakers/Getty Images


Presidents Trump, Nixon, Ford and Kennedy all felt the impact of midterm
elections in different ways.

Drew Angerer/Getty Images; Keystone/Getty Images; AFP/Getty Images; National
Archive/Newsmakers/Getty Images

Midterm elections are expected to push back against the party of the president
who won two years earlier. This past week's vote was surely a pushback on
President Biden, but a far weaker one than had been widely foretold.

Moreover, the results could also be read as a partial rebuke of the previous
president, Donald Trump. While not on the ballot, Trump had promoted surrogates
in the primaries who embraced his claims about the 2020 election. Trump was able
to secure GOP nominations for many of his handpicks and some won this week. But
in marquee races for senator and governor and secretary of state, his stand-ins
did not fare well.

More than a few Republicans felt Trump's long shadow cost the party its big wave
this weekend.


OBAMA'S FIRST MIDTERM TEST A "SHELLACKING," GEORGE W. BUSH'S A "THUMPIN' "

Republicans had expected to be partying like it was 1994, the year they captured
the majority in the U.S. House for the first time in four decades and in the
Senate for the first time in eight years.



That was also the year they ended Democratic dominance in the South for the
first time in well over a century, winning most of the region's governorships as
well as of its seats in both chambers of Congress.

Republicans this fall had at least expected to have another "Tea Party"
celebration like the one when they gained 63 seats in the House in the first
term of President Barack Obama a dozen years ago. He called it a "shellacking."

Democrats have had their "big wave" years, too, such as in 2006 when they seized
the House and surprised many by also squeaking out a bare majority in the
Senate. It was a setback for the Republican president at the time, George W.
Bush, who called it a "thumpin'."


ELECTIONS


DEMOCRATS RETAIN CONTROL OF THE SENATE AFTER HOLDING NEVADA SEAT

Democrats also had a granddaddy of waves in 1974, electing 76 of their nominees
to be House freshmen in one day. They were called the "Watergate babies" after
the scandal that had spawned them: Earlier that year, evidence of criminal
involvement had forced the resignation of Republican President Richard Nixon.
While the offending incumbent was gone, his Republican successor, Gerald R.
Ford, had pardoned him in September and the cloud over the GOP had yet to lift.


HISTORICALLY, FIRST MIDTERMS DON'T BODE WELL FOR PRESIDENTS

First midterms are usually cold showers for the occupant of the White House.



The average seat loss in the House has been 28 since World War II. It has been
43 seats when the president's Gallup Poll approval rating was below 50%. And as
for Democrats, in particular, the last four lost an average of 45 House seats in
the first midterm after they were elected.

You have to dig deep to find exceptions to this historic rule. Franklin Delano
Roosevelt gained seats in both chambers of Congress in his first midterm (1934)
as his New Deal found wide acceptance in the depths of the Great Depression.
George W. Bush also added a few seats in both the House and Senate in his first
midterm (2002) during the national trauma that followed the terror attacks of
Sept. 11, 2001.


ELECTIONS


HERE'S WHERE THE RESULTS FOR CONTROL OF THE HOUSE STAND

In both cases, the midterm boost and the extra seats on the Hill encouraged
those presidents to press forward with their programs and projects. That led to
a great deal of controversy, of course, and produced mixed results – such as
Bush's invasion of Iraq — that remain debatable (and topics for separate
discussion at another time).

But what about the weird midterm elections that did not result in a clear sign
from the heavens? What about those that did not point in one direction but in
several directions at once?

In 1962, an embattled first-term President John F. Kennedy lost just four seats
in the House (scarcely a dent in the Democrats' huge bulge there) and actually
gained three Senate seats. There were two reasons he escaped his first midterm
unscathed. One was a spike in his popularity following his steady performance in
what came to be called the Cuban missile crisis that fall. (Kennedy sent the
Navy to block Soviet ships bringing missiles to bases in Cuba for potential use
against the U.S.)

The other was the lack of "coattails" attached to Kennedy's narrow win in the
Electoral College in 1960. Kennedy's edge in the popular vote nationwide was
barely six-figures that year, and Democrats added only a modest 10 seats
nationally that year.


ELECTIONS


WHY ELECTIONS ARE NOT OVER UNTIL THE VOTES ARE CERTIFIED

Biden's coattails were non-existent, as his Democrats actually lost seats in the
House in 2020. George W. Bush had also won his election in 2000 without adding
much to his party's ranks in the House.

All three presidents would surely have liked to have more votes in Congress in
their first two years in office. But lacking same meant also that they had fewer
first-term incumbents to protect, which spared them bigger losses in their first
midterms.


NOT MUCH DRAMA IN 1970

Another lukewarm electorate gave few signals to Nixon in his first midterm as
president in 1970. The opposition Democrats added a dozen seats to their
existing majority in the House while actually losing a couple of seats in the
Senate. Majority control was not affected in either chamber. Nixon never looked
back, roaring into his reelection campaign the next year and sweeping to a
49-state landslide.


POLITICS


CONTROL OF CONGRESS MATTERS. BUT WHICH PARTY NOW RUNS YOUR STATE MIGHT MATTER
MORE

Two decades later, President George H.W. Bush had his only midterm election in
1990 and was hoping to build on gains the GOP had made recently in the South.
His party did pick up a few seats here and there but lost a net of seven in the
House overall, a distinct disappointment. Bush was at least able to limit the
Democrats' gains in the Senate to just one added seat. But there was no sign in
that year that the first President Bush would struggle in the primaries in 1992
and then lose his bid for reelection to Bill Clinton.

Each of these instances of divided government has forced presidents and both
parties in Congress to confront each other. The divided government eras have
also forced officeholders to govern in crosswinds and crosscurrents. Both
executive and legislative branches have been compelled to seek the counsel of
the electorate itself, to discern the mood of the voters and get something done.

When leaders from both parties have been willing, compromises have been reached
at times to move legislation — even in a closely divided Congress where neither
side was able to dominate.

The challenge for the days and months ahead will be to find once again that
formula for at least limited bipartisan cooperation, and to do so even with the
next set of elections looming in 2024.

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