Trump proclaims ‘golden age’ while US midterm polls are flashing historical defeats

As Americans face into an election day vote on what has been termed the most critical US midterm cycle in modern history, US president Donald Trump closed his unprecedented 28-day tour of the republic by standing at symbolic Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to tell the nation: “I’ve kept every single promise I made, except far more.”

The polls are flashing historical Republican Senate defeats in loyalist strongholds such as Kansas and Texas and a return to Democratic control of both chambers of Congress. The president’s midterm approval numbers are the lowest since Harry Truman in 1946. Fuel and living costs, pushed skywards by the tariffs and the Iran imbroglio, are chief points of public unhappiness. There are broader signs that the Maga movement may be in the early stages of disintegration.

But Trump ended a bitter and phenomenally expensive midterm campaign by using the beloved national landmark as proof that nobody does it better.

In the summer the failed refurbishment, algae-ridden and stinking, was held up by critics as an apt metaphor for the administration. Now, it has been restored to what the president described as “a soft, dark reflective blue”.

Trump held up pictures of the old piping “there since 1922″, blasted the costly, failed refurbishment attempts of the Obama and Biden eras and leaned into his campaign message of a strong economy and secure border as he repeated his mantra of the last 10 years.

[ Trump touts reflecting pool as Democrats try to contain Senate riftOpens in new window ]

“This is the golden age of America. We have never done anything like it: when you hear $25 trillion created in two years.”

But behind bulletproof glass, at a closed event, he heard no cheers this time.

Even if the Democratic Party is understandably wary of the polls, it would be impossible for them to suppress their giddiness if they even peeked at Monday’s latest New York Times/Siena College results. They suggest a blue streak spray-painted through the Republican heartland, from Texas in the south through Kansas, Ohio and as far north as Michigan, where Abdul El-Sayed was polling at 11 points ahead of his rival Mike Rogers in the Senate election.

Even South Carolina, which has not elected a Democratic senator since “Fritz” Hollings left office 21 years ago, has become a tug of war between Annie Andrews and Darline Graham, handpicked by Trump to campaign for the seat her brother Lindsey had held from 2003 until his sudden death in July.

[ US midterm election night: When Irish viewers can expect the key callsOpens in new window ]

All of this comes with caginess over the trustworthiness of the polls, and the habit of Trump-era Republicanism outperforming the forecasts.

The obligatory cliche of the October surprise took on a novel twist in that it took place in the first hours of November. Haley Stevens, the Michigan congresswoman who narrowly lost her primary Senate campaign against El-Sayed, stunned both her former staffers and the wider Democratic movement by suddenly endorsing Republican candidate Mike Rogers.

Stevens’s switch was the end result of months of tense exchanges with El-Sayed over his position on Israel and Gaza, but the 11th-hour decision sent shock waves through the surface midterm narrative, with Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer describing it as a “despicable betrayal”.

Speaking on Monday, El-Sayed declined to comment on Stevens’s stance.

“I will say this though,” he said. “We ran on a very different viewpoint on how politics is organised. Too often we think that politics is about left versus right. It is not. It is about the people who are locked out, which is the majority of us, and the people doing the locking out. There is a level of inequality in this country that is denying people basic access to the goods and services they need in their lives that has created an unlivable situation for a lot of folks.”

It offered a tidy summation of the argument Democratic candidates have waged for months in town halls and gymnasiums through the midwest and south.

The shorthand is that Trump reshaped these midterms into a referendum on himself.

“America is ready to go, ready to vote,” Trump said as he stood facing the Lincoln Memorial.

“I hope they’re ready to do the right thing.”

All indicators are that he will see another hue of dark reflective blue late on Tuesday night.

How we’re covering the US midterms

Follow Irish Times Washington Correspondent Keith Duggan and video journalist Chris Maddaloni in the final week of the campaign as they report from key battlegrounds and gauge the mood of voters across the US.

More US midterm election coverage here.