A lack of WOW
The pundits predicted these results
THE three-plus years since Donald Trump came down that escalator and changed American politics forever have been so melodramatic that everybody expected the first midterm election of the Trump presidency would be equally so.
Turns out the melodrama on election night was basically that there was no melodrama.
What we could have predicted the night after the 2016 election appears to be the story of 2018.
Republicans knew on Nov. 9, 2016, that they were going to have a good national map when it came to the Senate two years later — and indeed they improved on their position in the upper chamber.
Similarly, Democrats had every reason to believe on that bitter morning that the common rules governing midterms would secure them the 23 seats necessary to take control of the House of Representatives in 2018 — and it appears they have done so.
What didn’t happen in this election was something that would make everybody go WOW.
Democrats won a lot of seats, but couldn’t stage a colossal blowout the way Republicans did in 2010 when they took 63 seats away from Barack Obama’s party and brought Obama’s presidency to a screeching halt.
Their victory more closely resembles the one Democrats won in 2006 when they took 30 seats and took the House — but that year has to be judged a bigger and better one for Dems because they also won the Senate.
Here’s what else didn’t happen. Democrats did not win surprise governorships in Florida and Georgia, nor did a telegenic middle-aged skateboarder dethrone Sen. Ted Cruz in Texas. The places Democrats took seats away from Republicans were exactly the ones we thought they might take given the district-by-district results in 2016.
No, all the melodrama came in the run-up. Trump’s controversies stimulated record Democratic participation and fundraising. But Democratic rage against Trump and conservatives more generally may have stimulated record Republican participation in response.
For example, there is now no question that the late hit on Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh — who was targeted for his conservatism and then had his character assassinated when that targeting didn’t succeed — played a role in helping Republicans increase their majority in the Senate.
The Democrat running for reelection in a pro-Trump state who voted for Kavanaugh (Joe Manchin of West Virginia) won. The Democrats who voted against (Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Joe Donnelly of Indiana) lost. Republicans said they saw a surge of interest and enthusiasm in these states after the attempt to bring Kavanaugh down.
Over the past week, the question was whether the president’s aggressive doubling down on the dangers of immigration would hurt or help. Chances are, though, that it was a wash; it probably stimulated the Republican base and made sure those voters turned out but also irritated and thereby motivated suburban voters the Democrats needed to win the House.
Surprises or no, this is a very consequential election. The Senate results mean Trump will be able to nominate anyone he wants to the judiciary and the Cabinet and get those people through the process comfortably.
More important, Democrats will control House committees and dig deep into the Trump Cabinet departments and everything they do. Forget Robert Mueller — this is where all the action (and the press leaking) will be. They will subpoena documents. They will call people to testify. They will hound. They will torment. And they will find dirt. Lots of dirt.
It’s a new moment in American politics, starting now. And we have no idea how any of this will play in the next big election — which will be one really, really big election.