The
tumultuous 2018 midterm campaign, shaped by conflicts over race and
identity and punctuated by tragedy, barreled through its final weekend
as voters prepared to deliver a verdict on the first half of President
Trump’s term, with Republicans bracing for losses in the House and state
capitals but hopeful they would prevail in Senate races in areas where
Mr. Trump is popular.
The president
was set to storm across two states Saturday, two Sunday and three Monday
in an effort to pick off Senate seats in Indiana, Florida and a handful
of other battlegrounds where Republicans hope to add to their one-seat
majority in the chamber. Democrats and liberal activists, galvanized by
opposition to Mr. Trump, gathered Saturday to knock on doors and make
turnout calls from Pennsylvania to Illinois to Washington to try to
erase the G.O.P.’s 23-seat House majority.
The
run-up to the election, widely seen as a referendum on Mr. Trump’s
divisive persona and hard-line policy agenda, has revealed deep strains
in the president’s political coalition and left him confined to campaign
in a narrow band of conservative communities. Republicans’ intermittent
focus on favorable economic news, such as the Friday report showing strong job growth, has been overwhelmed by Mr. Trump’s message of racially incendiary nationalism.
While
Mr. Trump retains a strong grip on many red states and working-class
white voters, his jeremiads against immigrants and penchant for ridicule
have proved destabilizing, with the party losing more affluent whites and moderates in metropolitan areas key to control of the House.
Note EU-Digest: Amazing, but also very sad, what has happened to the US since January
20, 2017, when Trump became President. Despite claims by the US
President (who has been found to have lied by independent research
tanks more than 6400 times since his inauguration) and his Republican
base, that the economy is doing fantastic, the truth is quite different -
see https://www.chicagotribune.com/…/ct-perspec-trump-economy-j… -
Basically just about every thing the Trump Administration has been tampering
with has been a disaster, starting with the appointment of his
dysfunctional scandal ridden Cabinet - Affordable healthcare for
everyone including for those with existing preconditions - US Foreign
Policy - Clean Air Policies - Gay Rights-Equal Rights - Curbing white
supremacy and pro-neo-Nazi groups/hate crimes-Gun Control -migrant and
immigration policies - Freedom of Speech and the list can go on and on.
AMERICAN VOTERS ARE STILL ABLE TO MAKE THE COUNTRY CHANGE COURSE, AWAY
FROM TUMBLING DOWN THE CLIFF - BY USING THEIR RIGHT TO VOTE ON TUESDAY
NOVEMBER 6.