From 2021 onward, I was telling people around me to expect a big Republican wave in the 2022 midterms elections. Even though Joe Biden had just won a sizable victory over Donald Trump in November 2020, and inflation had yet to emerge at that point, any political scientist or historian could tell you that the President’s party almost always loses seats in their first midterm election. (The only notable exception was in 2002, when George W. Bush coasted on the popularity he gained after 9/11 and Republicans picked up both houses of Congress). Even in February 2021, but especially after the messy retreat from Afghanistan and economic turmoil, it seemed inevitable that the Republicans would win the Senate and House–it was just a question of how big that would be. Many Republican pundits prophesied a “Red Tsunami,” a historic win demolishing the Democrats across the board.
Instead, what we saw in the 2022 midterms was barely a red trickle. Republicans failed to secure the Senate, and barely eked out a narrow majority in the House. Why was that? I have four reasons why I think that Republicans underperformed in the midterms. Most of these reasons are fairly well sourced and accepted by other political scientists, but I wanted to gather them in one place for posterity’s sake. Interestingly, many of these reasons will continue to apply in future elections in 2024 and 2026, no matter who the candidates are, so they’re worth paying attention to.
Before we dive in: Let me must first note that America is a deeply polarized nation and that the margins between the two parties are very tight. Even just changing a few thousand votes can make the difference between victory and defeat. So as I go through these four reasons for the Republicans’ lackluster performance, know that even if they only affected 1% or even .1% of the population, that can be enough to swing many close elections.
#1 – Trump — and his handpicked candidates– turned off many voters.
Even though Trump wasn’t on the ballot, many voters explicitly rallied against candidates that were seen as too “Trumpy”, extreme, or otherwise hateful. Moderate Republicans won big in many races, while more radical candidates were rejected. It became clear that some voters even engaged in “ticket-splitting”, where they voted straight Republican for more local races but voted against people they didn’t trust at the top of the ticket, like Dr. Oz in PA, Heschel Walker in GA, and others. While a majority of voters dislike Democrat policies and politicians, they fear extreme Republicans even more and are willing to vote accordingly. What should have been a referendum on Biden-who is very unpopular-became a referendum on Donald Trump, who is even more unpopular. [This is the main reason I believe that if Trump runs in 2024, he will probably lose, whereas any other Republican seen as less Trumpy would definitely win.]
#2- The Republican cries against mail-in ballots (and trust in elections overall) may be driving down their turnout in otherwise winnable races.
Mail-in ballots have been used for over a decade in places like Colorado, where they were seen as trustworthy, non-partisan, and secure. On the whole mail-in ballots SHOULD privilege Republicans, who tend to be older and have more stable mailing addresses. (I know many young Democrats who don’t know how to address an envelope and who move every 6 months, and I know many elderly home-bound Republicans who would strongly benefit from being able to vote by mail.) Unfortunately, because of the Republican turn against mail-in ballots, most Republicans refuse to use them. That’s a shame, because that means that when election day comes around, if an inconvenience comes up that makes voting difficult, a certain percentage of Republicans just won’t vote at all, whereas Democrats would have already locked in their votes weeks prior.
Or even setting aside mail-in voting; there are so many Republicans who now believe that elections are completely rigged and that their votes don’t matter even if they vote in person. These Republicans may decide to give up on elections altogether and either embrace apathy or alternative ways to engage with politics…for better or for worse. I think this dynamic is going to be a long-term drag on the Republican Party’s electoral prospects for at least a few election cycles.
#3- Shy Abortion Voters may be emerging from the woodwork (and pro-life voters may be about to lose some steam)
In 2016, many pundits wrote about “shy Trump voters”, AKA those who weren’t showing up in official polls but who nonetheless turned out to vote for him in his surprise win over Hillary Clinton. In 2022, we may be seeing the emergence of “shy abortion voters” who were reacting against the end of Roe v. Wade and the passage of very strong anti-abortion laws in some states. These voters may not have cared much about abortion before 2022 when it was generally legal with some restrictions, but when they saw that it might become totally illegal even in cases of rape and incest, they decided that was a step too far. Even in very conservative Kansas, voters overwhelmingly rejected an abortion ban. The more extreme the rhetoric that comes from Republicans, the more likely this will become a stronger driving force for Democrat turnout.
On the flip-side, now that Roe v. Wade has been overturned some Republicans feel a bit dazed. What do we do now? Overturning a the national legal right to abortion was an easy, singular cause to rally people around. But now that that’s been accomplished and any gains must come at the state level, it will be harder to motivate the base in future elections, especially when the gains seem more controversial.
#4- COVID killed more Republicans than Democrats
This point may feel a bit hard to believe, but the data actually bears it out. While when COVID first hit it primarily affected liberal cities, but now it’s infected 90+% of Americans. As I stated earlier, on average Republican voters are older than Democrat voters, and thus more susceptible to death from COVID. Additionally, once the vaccine came out thanks to the Trump administration’s “Operation Warp Speed”, on average Republicans rejected it at far higher rates than Democrats. (Even Democratic-leaning communities that have reason to be skeptical of government medical inventions, such as Native Americans, African-Americans, and other people of color, have generally received the vaccine at higher rates than Republicans.) It is well known that unvaccinated people die from COVID at far higher rates than vaccinated people.
The end result? Of the 1.1 MILLION Americans that have died of COVID, a disproportionate amount of them were Republicans. That’s an average of 22,000 people in each state. In close races where even 1,000 votes can swing an election, that’s going to have an impact. (For example, Lauren Boebert, Republican firebrand, won her election by less than 600 votes).
IN CONCLUSION, while many of the midterm elections in 2022 were clearly won at the local level based on local issues, there are a handful of reasons that the Republicans nationally underperformed. Unfortunately for Republicans, all four of these reasons look likely to continue to have an impact in 2024 and beyond. If Republicans manage to win elections, it will be based on them overcoming these hindrances and leveraging other strengths, such as their recent gains among Latinos. But in the meantime two key recommendations I might have for them would be to figure out a way to get their voters to trust in elections again, and to find a way to quietly ditch Donald Trump.