Welcome to Tuesday’s edition of Washington Secrets. Today, we look at a new bloc of voters and how they might impact the midterm elections, as well as more details on the new British government and how it might work with Donald Trump.
The nation is headed for an extreme set of midterm elections in November, fueled by high spending and marked by intense turnout, according to new data from pollster Jeremy Zogby.
And it will be driven by a particular type of voter: the “Armageddon Voter.”
The findings come from a new question slipped into the latest poll by John Zogby Strategies (the firm Jeremy runs with his father and friend of this newsletter, John).
“Do you believe humanity is experiencing end times between now and 2030?” it asks.
The answers are jaw-dropping. Some 13% of likely voters “wholly believe” and another 27% “somewhat believe” we are or will be witnessing the end times in the next five years.
What more motivation would you need to turn up at the ballot box than the idea that the end times are on their way?
“It can easily be argued that 13% of voters who believe we’re living in end times, possess the intensity to impact voter turnout beyond the modern record of 50% turnout in a midterm witnessed in 2018,” argues Zogby, in a post setting out the results and a profile of Armageddon Voters, who split 42% Democratic and 36% Republican, and more urban and suburban than rural.
He puts it all in the context of six cycles of U.S. election history.
- 1st Cycle: The Early Republic Surge: 1790 – 1840
- 2nd Cycle: The Gilded Age Peak & Progressive Era Collapse: 1840 – 1920
- 3rd Cycle: The Interwar Low & New Deal Recovery: 1920 – 1944
- 4th Cycle: The Postwar Civic Era: 1948 – 1968
- 5th Cycle: The Long Disengagement: 1968 – 2000
- 6th Cycle: The Hyperpolarization Surge: 2004 – present
“With 15 weeks counting until Election Day 2026, we can say comfortably that record levels of money spent on midterms campaigns is to be expected, voter turnout reaching or surpassing 50% of the eligible voting population is very possible, and ultra-high stakes emotion is a given,” Zogby concludes.
“And that a demographically diverse and sharply partisan 13% of the electorate believes entirely that we’re living in end times, means the hyperpolarization surge continues as we reach our sixth cycle’s apex in terms of voter turnout, money spent, and overall voter intensity,” he added.
Let’s see what happens and whether the approaching end times mean a record turnout or whether some voters will simply stay in their basements in November.
Oh dear
No sooner had Secrets written a glowing assessment of the new British prime minister’s careful approach to working with Donald Trump than Andy Burnham went and appointed Ed Miliband as his Foreign Secretary.
Here is how Miliband marked Trump’s 2016 election victory during a BBC interview: “The idea that we have shared values with a racist, misogynistic self-confessed groper beggars belief.”
In case you are confused, this is not the Miliband who was close to Tony Blair and was marked out back in the day as the sensible, electable future of the Labour Party. That was David.
This is Ed, who beat his brother to the party leadership in 2010 and then led Labour into oblivion, hamstrung by his inability to eat a bacon sandwich on camera and his naive politics. Most recently, he has been the key figure in the U.K.’s drive to achieve net-zero carbon by 2050.
He might yet make a fine Foreign Secretary. But don’t expect him to be at the center of a harmonious relationship with the Trump administration.
Instead, Secrets’ take (hot or otherwise) is that Burnham will keep a tight hold over trans-Atlantic affairs. He has, after all, kept on Jonathan Powell as national security adviser, aware that he is a man deeply trusted by the White House. Miliband can have the rest of the world.
Calling scholars of international law
Zohran Mamdani has repeatedly promised to arrest Benjamin Netanyahu if he sets foot in New York. The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for the Israeli prime minister for crimes against humanity related to Israel’s war in Gaza.
“I believe that Prime Minister Netanyahu belongs in The Hague,” the New York mayor told The New York Times. “He’s a war criminal who has been charged by the International Criminal Court.”
But the U.S. is not a signatory to the Statute of Rome, which set up the ICC. Mamdani himself has qualified his plans by saying any actions would be in line with local laws, suggesting he is not even sure he could get the New York Police Department to act.
So Secrets appeals to our readers. Can Mamdani actually have Netanyahu arrested? How would it work? Surely it’s not all political posturing?
Lunchtime reading
Why Trump and Mamdani might both welcome a fight over Netanyahu: Never mind the thousands of dead in Gaza or the Israelis killed by terrorists on Oct. 7, 2023, or the questions about the international rule of law and its remit — it can now all become a political squabble in New York.
The sheer awfulness of CPAC GB: This is paywalled, I’m afraid. But if you need to know the differences between the Right in Britain and the U.S., it is all here.
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