AA Edit I Will Americans Vote To Deny Trump Control Of Congress?

Have the people of the USA seen through President Donald Trump’s actions as a threat to a free country and so vote in the midterms to rein in his powers that he has used thus far to undermine the soundest principles of American democracy? The pre-poll surveys seem to think so even as presidential ratings rank him as the most unpopular President since Harry Truman.

Democrats appear to have a cast iron chance to win a majority in the 435- member House of Representatives and a reasonable one to take control of the Senate in which the Republicans now have the support of 55 Senators, but with 35 of 100 seats up for election in this 2-year cycle there have been free predictions of several seats swinging. It is another matter altogether that, given his autocratic record in office, Mr Trump will find ways to steamroll the Congress if the Democrats win. Beginning with his old playbook of questioning the legality of polls, Mr Trump might refuse to recognise the legitimacy of the opinion of the public and their votes that may be ranged against him after 21 months into his second term. With the kind of political constraints like denying significant administrative and judicial appointments and keeping a tight fist on federal funds at a time when the US debt has crossed unprecedented levels of $40 trillion, the Democrats could impose on Mr Trump a lame duck term until the presidential polls of November 2028. It remains to be seen whether the loss of Congress will shackle Mr Trump or see the disruptor in him keep emerging to upend many things that the USA may have held dear in its 250 years of democracy. His record is revealing — he has done more damage to the rule of law and democracy than possibly any US President in history even as he attempts to rewrite the Constitution to favour his wishes.

Beyond damaging institutions like the justice department and trying to disenfranchise loads of people even as he has deported thousands of immigrants, Mr Trump has also fallen into the historical trap of US Presidents in going to war a whole continent away, in West Asia. His war on Iran might prove to be his Waterloo as its deleterious side effects are threatening to upend his party's hold on power dearly earned back from the Democrats after the Biden era.

The prices — of petrol and diesel at the pump and goods on supermarket shelves — may be said to be Mr Trump and the Republicans’ greatest enemy ahead of the midterms as Americans have been paying the price of the war in the Gulf, its chokehold on global oil supplies. His inability to see the reality and call off the most foolish misadventure of his time in office has come back to bite him and his MAGA crowd that voted him into office. Mr Trump may even have kept faith in his peace-making promises, but he has been seen bending over to accommodate the Russian President Vladimir Putin even as he considerably weakened Ukraine’s ability to fight. The current scenario is suffused over with the signs of diminishing of American power and impoverishment of its considerable armoury.

The cocktail of questionable handling of domestic and foreign affairs and clear as crystal signs of family making money leaves Mr Trump in danger of losing control of Congress and his party in a fight to hold on to power in the future after it had seemed the Democrats had been sent off into the wilderness. It is up to the 210 million American people with the vote to make their say count as they go to the polls today to elect Senators, members of the House of Representatives, Governors and other officials on Tuesday.