Democrats Keep Winning Elections They Weren't Supposed to Win
Wisconsin voters elected a liberal justice to the state supreme court on Tuesday, expanding the court’s liberal majority in a race that continued a pattern Democrats have been quietly building since 2025: consistently outperforming their presidential race margins in every special and off-cycle election that comes up.
The pattern started in 2025 and has continued without interruption. Democrats are winning races in competitive states, flipping seats in districts that went for Trump in 2024, and doing it in low-turnout environments where motivated opposition voters typically dominate.
Georgia’s special House election ran the same night. Results there also trended toward the Democrats’ preferred outcome.
Whether this translates to 2026 midterm performance or collapses under the weight of higher turnout and different dynamics is the central question American political analysts are running through. The sample size of off-cycle elections is not the same as a midterm. But a trend that doesn’t break across a dozen consecutive races is at minimum worth taking seriously.
The White House is watching. So is everyone else.