The USA is going to have its mid-term elections where the fate of Joe Biden will be decided. On November 8, the American people will decide whether Democrats or Republicans will control the US Congress, and with it, the future of the Biden presidency.
And as part of his final significant campaign tour before the midterm elections, which the White House hopes to transform into a vote on Republicans and Republicans into a vote on Biden, US President Joe Biden travelled to the western US on Thursday.
What are mid-term elections?
The elections, which take place every two years and coincide with the president’s four-year term, are known as the midterms.
National laws are enacted by Congress. The Senate can confirm presidential appointments, block or approve laws, and, less frequently, open investigations into the president. The House determines which laws are put to a vote.
Two senators from each state serve six-year terms in the Senate. Representatives represent smaller districts and are elected for two years.
All 435 members of the House of Representatives are chosen every two years.
Only 100 people make up the US Senate, and they are all elected to six-year terms. This indicates that while every seat in the US House is up for grabs, just a third of the Senate’s seats are.
Currently, the Democrats have a slim 220 to 209 advantage over the Republicans in the House. With a 50-50 split between the two parties, the Senate is on a knife-edge balance, and Vice President Kamala Harris must break the tie in favour of the Democrats.
Why do the mid-terms matter?
The American people give the president of the United States a reality check halfway through his four-year term, even though he is perhaps the most powerful democratically elected political executive in the whole world.
The political landscape for the 2024 presidential race will also start to take shape after the mid-term elections.Â
In conclusion, the elections are the most significant current indicators of President Joe Biden’s and Vice President Kamala Harris’s political standing. Some political commentators have described the elections, perhaps exaggeratedly, as a referendum on the presidency itself and a clear indication of the future course of American politics.
History of the midterm election
The mid-term elections frequently act as a presidential referendum. The election for president was held in 2020, 2016, 2012, 2008, 2004, 2000, and so on. Mid-term elections for Donald Trump, Barack Obama, and George W. Bush were held in 2018, 2014, 2010, 2006, and 2002, respectively.
Under Donald Trump’s leadership, the Republicans lost 41 seats in 2018, thus rejecting the businessman-turned-politician.
Even that is insignificant compared to the shocking 63 seats the Democrats lost just two years after Obama’s historic victory in 2008.
George W. Bush famously said that his party’s Republicans suffered a “thumping” in the mid-term elections in 2006.
According to a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted from October 31 to November 1, 40% of the nation disapproves of Joe Biden’s job performance. Only 18% of respondents to the same poll said they thought the country was headed in the right direction, while 69% said it was not.
Trump is not on the ballot, like Biden. However, the former president has sponsored a group of candidates who share his views in an effortless position as the de facto leader of his party before a potential 2024 run for the White House.
Democrats have benefited from the consequences of the US Supreme Court’s ruling eliminating Roe v. Wade’s constitutional protections for abortion, which led to a spike in Democratic protest votes in a Kansas referendum and a jump in female voter registration across the country.
However, according to polls, the economy continues to be a much bigger worry for people, which suggests that Democrats’ outrage over the abortion decision won’t be enough to keep them in power.
What’s at stake?
Currently, the only thing which is at a stake is the future presidency of Joe Biden. Most of the legislation that Biden and his fellow Democrats seek to pass would be stopped by Republican control of either chamber. Even worse, it would spark a wave of congressional investigations into his administration, benefiting the Democrats.
Everything from abortion rights to US backing for the war in Ukraine is up for grabs for the rest of the nation.
It was originally thought that the election would be decided on the issue of reproductive rights. Following the US Supreme Court’s decision to abolish federal safeguards for abortion access in June, voter registration increased significantly, especially among women.
However, it is no longer as relevant as a campaign topic, which has Democrats worried that they may have focused too much on it at the expense of “kitchen tables” issues like inflation and crime.
In the last weeks of the campaign, the party tried to change course, but surging consumer prices—up 8.2% in a year—have thwarted Biden’s efforts to position himself as the president for American workers.
Barack Obama, the former president and current leader of the Democratic Party, has been urged by the party to call up the army.
They are expected to appear together on Saturday in a contentious Pennsylvania election.
Joe Biden on mid-term election
After focusing on the American economy and inflation for weeks, Biden saidched to a more urgent, darker message, warning that the country’s political system is in danger due to the lies told by the late President Donald Trump and the violence they allegedly incite.
Biden called on voters to reject candidates who have disputed the results of the vote, which even Trump’s administration declared to be free of any widespread fraud or interference. He emphasised that it is the first federal election since the Capitol riot and Trump’s attempts to rescind the results of the 2020 presidential election.
In his closing remarks, Vice President Biden urged voters to think carefully about whether the candidates they were supporting would respect the will of the people and accept the results of their election. The answer to that question must be decisive, in my opinion, he remarked.
The most likely outcome, if opinion polls are a reliable source of information, is that Republicans take control of the house and Democrats maintain their hold on the Senate. Republicans are somewhat more likely than Democrats to win the House, and vice versa for the Senate, per FiveThirtyEight.
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