With just over a week to go before the 3 November US midterm elections, polls point to a difficult night for Republicans. A Reuters/Ipsos poll of 1,679 adults found 47% would vote Democratic and 35% Republican, a 12-point lead, up from seven points two weeks earlier, while President Donald Trump’s approval fell to 31%, the lowest across both his terms. Republicans currently hold the House 218-214 and the Senate 53-47, and all 435 House seats and 33 of 100 Senate seats are on the ballot. The question is how much the polls can be trusted.
The case that Democrats are heading for gains starts with consistency across pollsters. A Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll of 2,028 adults, taken 13 to 19 October with a 2.2-point margin of error, found Democrats ahead 52% to 41% among registered voters and 54% to 42% among likely voters. NBC found 71% say the country is on the wrong track and 55% would vote Democratic, and a Washington Post/ABC/Ipsos poll put Trump’s approval at 33%. In Reuters/Ipsos, 40% said Democrats were better at managing the economy against 33% for Republicans, and the Center for Politics notes that supporters of the party not holding the White House are often more motivated to vote in midterms. In the Verasight poll, 58% want Congress to act as a check on Trump, against 25% who want it to help him pass his agenda. History points the same way: the governing party lost House seats in 18 of the 20 midterms since 1946, according to University of California, Santa Barbara data.
The case for caution is in the limits of the polls themselves. NPR’s Domenico Montanaro writes that polls “are not meant to be predictive,” that a two-point lead “is not a lead at all,” and that declining local journalism has reduced reliable state-level polling. The Reuters/Ipsos poll is a generic ballot that does not provide a state-by-state breakdown. The Senate is closer: NBC sees North Carolina and Maine as likely Democratic gains but Alaska, Iowa and Texas as toss-ups, and four Republican-held and three Democratic-held House districts are rated toss-ups. The Center for Politics at the University of Virginia notes that in the past five midterms presidential approval was slightly higher in exit polls than in pre-election polling, which could help Republicans, and the Verasight poll found only two in five voters see their vote as mostly a statement against Trump, while 20% say it depends on local issues and candidates.
The result shapes more than the next Congress. Cost of living is the voters’ top concern, with 63% naming prices and inflation among their top three problems, and the war on Iran has pushed up fuel prices, with seven in 10 telling the Washington Post/ABC/Ipsos poll that gasoline is becoming unaffordable. A Democratic House would be able to investigate and block Trump’s agenda, and the outcome will also be read abroad as a verdict on his foreign policy, from Iran to Ukraine.
The polls favour Democrats, and history does too, but the margin and the Senate are not settled. The 12-point Reuters/Ipsos lead, the 11-point registered-voter lead and 12-point likely-voter lead in the Verasight poll sit in a consistent range, yet each carries its own margin of error. Turnout on 3 November will decide.
