The “iron law” of midterm congressional elections that the president’s party loses seats and control, if it has it, is about to be busted in 2026.
A handful of new reports are suggesting that Republicans could retain control of the House and Senate, and even add seats in the election.
What’s more, a GOP win would not be due to a surge in support for President Donald Trump, but because of the worsening image and standing of the Democratic Party, now caught up in a civil war over how to fight the White House.
That’s the finding in a new analysis of “citizen forecasting,” a polling style that has been “highly predictive” overseas, published by the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics on Wednesday.
It said that Republicans remain sky high about keeping control of Congress, while Democrats are in the dumps about their chances. If the predictions hold, it would be the first time since the 2002 midterm elections following 9/11 that a president’s party gained seats in both chambers, a feat not previously seen since 1934.
“The predictions, as they stand, indicate that this ‘iron law’ of incumbent party loss might be broken, with the Republicans keeping control of one, if not both, chambers,” said the analysis from three political scientists.
Voters expect..more of the same. If this is a bit counterintuitive, perhaps Democrats should question their intuition? Debra Leiter, Mary Stegmaier, and Michael S. Lewis-Beck for @LarrySabato @Center4Politics Bucking the trend of incumbent Midterm losseshttps://t.co/qACCJelXjU
— Syncopated Politics @syncpol.bsky.social (@SyncPol) May 14, 2025
That jibes with new polling from Cygnal showing congressional Republicans with a higher approval rating than Democrats at 49% to 44%.
Cygnal’s survey, shared with Secrets, also showed that Republicans and Democrats are tied at 47% in the midterm elections matchup. The analysis said, “This is the GOP’s best showing since February.” It cited gains for Republicans among married women, Hispanics, and union members.
The UVA study, shared by Center for Politics Director Larry Sabato, noted that the election remains far off and predictions can change.
The political media and even some key Republican insiders have said that they expect the GOP to lose the House in the midterm elections. Sabato noted that to Secrets and said, “What’s significant to me is that the political elite have reached a very different conclusion about the future than the general public at this preliminary stage. Who is correct? The historical record is mixed. As we get closer to November 2026, perhaps the two groups’ perspectives will converge. But that is far from certain.”
In the UVA analysis, for example, majorities expect the Republicans to keep control of the House and Senate. For the House, it was 58%, and for the Senate, it was 57%.
But the 1,000 adults polled said that they expect Trump’s approval rating to falter and are pessimistic about the economy, the nation’s No. 1 issue.
So, how could the GOP stay on top? The analysis said that a Democratic failure to add seats and possibly take control from the Republicans is the fault of the Democrats.
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“These results point to the challenges faced by the Democratic Party today; even with low levels of optimism about the economy, and expectations about declines in presidential approval, voters seem skeptical that they can translate these challenges for the incumbents into electoral success. In fact, it’s possible that the challenges faced by Democrats help to explain these findings: On both the House and Senate control questions, Democratic respondents were a little less likely to predict their own side would win majorities than Republicans were,” said the analysis.
It concluded: “The voting public, as of this spring, appears to expect that the Republicans will likely remain in control of both chambers of Congress in the 2026 midterm elections. These views are held by respondents who, at least collectively, know the current political composition of Congress. They believe that Republicans will maintain their majority, despite their perceptions of a rocky economic road ahead, led by a president with faltering in-office performance ratings. Moreover, they hold this belief in Republican congressional control in the face of the rule of midterm loss for the incumbent party, which points to a return of Democratic control.”