On the eve of the midterms, the most important number is not a poll lead. It is 38 percent. That is the share of likely voters across seven Senate battleground states who approve of President Donald Trump’s job performance, according to reporting on the final New York Times and Siena surveys. In an election fought over the cost of living, tariffs and the fallout from war, that approval figure helps explain why Democrats lead in five Republican held Senate states, why Iowa is tied, and why states that have not elected a Democrat to the Senate in decades are suddenly competitive.
The battleground findings are specific. In Texas, James Talarico leads Ken Paxton by 50 percent to 43 percent. In Kansas, Adam Hamilton leads Roger Marshall by 49 percent to 44 percent. In Michigan, Abdul El-Sayed leads Mike Rogers by 53 percent to 42 percent. In Ohio, Sherrod Brown leads Jon Husted by 49 percent to 44 percent. Democrats also lead in Maine and Alaska in the surveys, while Iowa remains virtually tied. The surveys covered 5,708 likely voters from October 23 to November 1, with margins of error from about 3.3 points in Texas to 4.8 points in Alaska. Leads smaller than those margins cannot separate candidates, which is why Alaska and Iowa are described as within the margin even though Democrats are nominally ahead.
National polling points the same way. The RealClearPolling average gives Democrats a 51.5 percent to 43.1 percent lead in the generic congressional ballot. A survey from October 28 and 29 put the lead at 54 percent to 41 percent, an Emerson College poll from October 24 to 26 showed a 10 point Democratic advantage, and an NBC News poll found 52 percent of registered voters preferred a Democratic controlled Congress against 45 percent who wanted Republicans to keep control. No single poll decides an election, but the agreement across pollsters, on the direction if not the exact margin, is notable.
What 38 percent does and does not mean
Approval in battleground states is not approval nationally, and it is not a vote. Voters can disapprove of a president and still vote for their party senator, especially where the challenger is unfamiliar or the incumbent is personally popular. That is why forecasters moved Kansas only to toss up, rather than to lean Democratic, and why the polling institute director stressed that a majority for either party remains possible. The 38 percent figure measures mood. Turnout measures power, and turnout on Tuesday will include voters who did not answer any poll.
President Trump’s final weekend campaigning reflected that reality. After initially cancelling events in Iowa and Kansas, he reversed course, headlined a rally in Dubuque, Iowa, and scheduled remote tele rallies for candidates across the country. The midterm campaign final days are therefore not a victory lap for either side. They are a turnout operation, aimed at voters who approve or disapprove in principle but have not yet voted in practice.
Tuesday will test the mood
Democrats need a net gain of four Senate seats for a majority, and three in the House. The final polls give them a path, not a guarantee. If Tuesday follows the polls, the 38 percent approval figure will be remembered as the early warning that the Senate map had changed. If it does not, the polls will be remembered as another case of mood measured imperfectly. Either way, the number that matters on Tuesday night will not be 38 percent. It will be the count, state by state, of ballots cast by voters who decided that mood was enough, or was not.
