Republicans saw their nightmare of a Trumpless future in 2025 election blowout: analyst
In their nationwide election drubbing this week, Republicans got a glimpse of the future that scares them most: a future in which the coalition President Donald Trump built for them falls apart when he is no longer there.
Eric Levitz wrote for Vox on Wednesday that Democrats clinched practically every major election they were shooting for on Tuesday evening. They won the governorships of Virginia and New Jersey, elected Zohran Mamdani Mayor of New York City, flipped non-federal state-level offices in Georgia for the first time in decades, broke up the GOP legislative supermajority in Mississippi, and passed California's proposition to redraw congressional districts in retaliation for Trump's gerrymandering project, among many other things.
"Polls had anticipated Democratic victories in Tuesday’s major gubernatorial races," wrote Levitz. "But they drastically underestimated the scale of the Democrats’ success. The party appears to have both engineered exceptionally high turnout among its base for off-year elections — and won a significant number of swing voters. Indeed, Tuesday’s blue tide rose high enough to lift even the Democrats’ leakiest boats: In Virginia, Democratic attorney general candidate Jay Jones managed to secure a comfortable victory, despite having wished for the death of Republican children in leaked text messages."
Republicans have a reason to fear these results for a key reason, he continued: "Put simply, the results suggest that the GOP has become perilously reliant on voters who will only turn out for President Donald Trump — a man who will (almost certainly) never be on the ballot again."
The problem for Republicans, he wrote, is that "Trump did not merely build a less educated Republican coalition — he also crafted a less politically engaged one. During his time at the helm of the GOP, Americans began polarizing on the basis of their political engagement — by how often they tended to vote and how important politics is to their identity. Highly politically engaged Americans moved left, while the disengaged moved right."
This has given Republicans a boost in presidential contests, he wrote, even as it has been disastrous in off-year and midterm elections. But things could get even worse for them: "The nightmare scenario for the GOP is that college-educated Never Trumpers will remain solid Democrats — while less engaged, working-class Trump voters will slink back into political apathy. Tuesday’s results make that future look a bit more plausible."
Things aren't exactly perfect for Democrats either, Levitz cautioned, given that Trump's coalition is spread much more efficiently to give the GOP a geographic advantage in things like Senate contests. However, he concluded, "the Trump GOP’s reliance on low-propensity voters is a clear vulnerability. And the 2025 elections showed us why: If you want a picture of a Democratic future, imagine hyper-engaged, suburban wine-moms stomping on Vance’s face — forever (or, you know, in the 2028 election)."