President Donald Trump closed his 2026 midterm campaign on Sunday night in Salina, Kansas, his 30th and final rally of the election season, urging voters to turn out for Republicans before Tuesday's vote. Americans head to the polls on November 3 with control of Congress — all 435 House seats and 35 Senate seats — at stake for the final two years of Trump's presidency. Final polls published over the weekend point toward Democratic gains, with the party leading in all seven of the most competitive Senate races surveyed, though several of those leads sit inside the margin of error.
 |
| File photo: Supporters at a Donald Trump campaign rally. Trump closed his 2026 midterm campaign with his 30th rally, in Salina, Kansas, on Sunday night. |
Trump spent the final weekend before the election on a whirlwind tour of states he once won comfortably, holding rallies in Florida, Iowa and Kansas and joining telephone rallies for candidates in Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, according to BBC News reporting. That the president felt compelled to campaign in Florida, Iowa and Kansas in the closing days underscored how competitive those states have become, and how much ground Republicans fear losing.
In Salina, Trump told the crowd he had briefly considered cancelling the event in favour of a tele-rally but came in person to boost incumbent Republican Senator Roger Marshall. "This is my 30th rally, and I'm closing it down tonight, this is it," Trump said, according to USA Today. "I had to come here to make sure that Roger got elected." Marshall faces a competitive challenge from Democratic challenger Adam Hamilton.
A Closing Message Built on the Cost of Living
The dominant issue hanging over the final weekend was the cost of living. Voters have grown frustrated with rising prices, particularly for fuel, groceries and health care, which have climbed since the war in Iran began more than eight months ago, the BBC reported.
At the rallies, Trump sought to shift attention to trade and immigration, and to warn supporters about what a Democratic victory would mean. He told crowds that Democrats would bankrupt families if elected, and argued that giving them power would open the border and take away guns.
Trump also presented his own record in sweeping terms, telling supporters that Democrats had left the country in a dark age but that under his leadership it had quickly been turned into a golden age. In Kansas, he promoted what he called the most secure border in American history and his push for tariffs — though whether the tariffs have succeeded remains a crucial disagreement between Trump and his critics, and Kansas ranchers have recently pushed back against his beef import plan.
One of the weekend's most eye-catching pledges came in Kansas, where Trump repeated a campaign promise tied directly to the election result. "If Republicans win the House of Representatives and the Senate, I am going to give all adult citizens in the United States of America $5,000," he said, according to USA Today. The president said the distributions would cost about $1 trillion, adding that the only caveat is that the money must be spent in the United States.
There were lighter moments too. Trump invited Secretary of State Marco Rubio to say a few words during the Kansas rally, joking that Rubio was "getting a little bit too popular." Rubio, who ran against Trump for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016 and has been mentioned as a potential 2028 candidate, praised the president in brief remarks.
Final Polls Point to Democratic Gains
Democrats used the weekend to press their own closing argument. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries said he was very confident his party was on course to win control of the House, while former President Barack Obama made final appeals to voters.
The polling picture gives Democrats reason for optimism, though party strategists remain wary after past disappointments. A forecasting tool from Harvard University that combines multiple polls with historical data puts the Democrats' chances of taking the House at 96 percent and of taking the Senate at 76 percent, the BBC reported. A national NBC News poll published over the weekend found registered voters preferring a Democrat-controlled Congress by a seven-point margin, leading Republicans by 52 percent to 45 percent.
The most detailed battleground picture came from the final New York Times/Siena polls, conducted October 23 to November 1 among likely voters in seven competitive Senate states: Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Michigan, Ohio and Texas. Democrats led in all seven, according to reports of the surveys, with five of the leads inside the margin of error. Democrats need a net gain of four seats to win a Senate majority.
In Texas, Democratic State Representative James Talarico led Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton by 50 percent to 43 percent. In Michigan, Democrat Abdul El-Sayed led Republican Mike Rogers by 53 percent to 42 percent — the largest gap in the battleground set. In Kansas, Adam Hamilton edged Senator Roger Marshall by 49 percent to 44 percent, while in Ohio, Democrat Sherrod Brown led Republican Jon Husted by 49 percent to 44 percent. Democrats also led in Maine, Alaska and Iowa, with the Iowa contest virtually tied.
Just 38 percent of likely voters across the seven states approved of Trump's job performance, according to the Times/Siena findings — a weak figure given that he won five of those states by double-digit margins in 2024. On the cost of living, Democrats held a nine-point advantage over Republicans across the battleground states, leading on that issue in all seven surveyed.
A Record Early Vote and a Transformed Senate
A record 54 million Americans had already cast ballots before Election Day, according to the University of Florida's Election Lab — a measure of the campaign's intensity.
The Senate will also look different regardless of which party wins. At least 16 senators will have won their first elections, USA Today reported — more than the average dozen seats that changed hands each Congress since 1990. Eight senators retired, including Republican Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the longest-serving party leader in Senate history, and Democrat Dick Durbin of Illinois. Three others lost Republican primaries in which Trump endorsed their rivals: Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina.
The run-up to the vote has also been marked by legal fights over the election itself. In Alaska, a judge on Sunday dismissed an attempt by the Trump administration to delay certifying election results if the Republican incumbent loses, after a lawsuit centred on two candidates named Dan Sullivan appearing on the ballot. More broadly, the Justice Department has sued states and threatened election officials — moves that USA Today noted come during a period when the department has historically refrained from politically sensitive actions in the weeks before an election.
 |
| File photo: The U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. Control of both chambers of Congress is at stake in Tuesday's midterm elections. |
What This Means
The stakes on Tuesday could hardly be higher for the White House. Republicans currently hold slim majorities in both chambers, and history suggests the party holding the White House usually loses seats in midterm elections. Losing either chamber would hinder the administration's ability to pass laws, while a Democratic majority would give the opposition investigative powers over the administration for the final two years of Trump's term.
The weekend's polling suggests that verdict may break against the president, but the polls also carry a warning for Democrats: five of the seven battleground Senate leads are within the margin of error, and a section of voters remains undecided. Those who made their voting decisions within the last month favoured Republicans by nine percentage points, according to the Times/Siena findings — a reminder that late movement can still reshape tight races.
 |
| File photo: Voters cast ballots at a U.S. polling place. A record 54 million early ballots had already been cast before Election Day, according to the University of Florida's Election Lab. |
What Happens Next
Polls close across the country on Tuesday evening, and the first results will begin to show whether the final polls were right about a Democratic wave — or whether the Republican base Trump spent the weekend rallying in Florida, Iowa and Kansas turns out in numbers the surveys missed. Control of the House is expected to come into focus first, while the Senate battle, with its cluster of close races, could take longer to resolve.
Both parties have staged their final get-out-the-vote rallies on the eve of the vote, and with 54 million ballots already cast, the outcome now rests with the millions of Americans who will vote in person on Tuesday. By Tuesday night, voters will have delivered their verdict on a presidency that has dominated the campaign from start to finish.
Post a Comment