Key Point: “In 2025 alone, Democrats won or overperformed in 227 out of 255 key elections—nearly 90 percent of races,” noted DNC deputy executive director Libby Schneider, in a memorandum shared with The Nation. “In nearly every major contest, Democrats swept, from the Wisconsin Supreme Court race to the New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races, to the Georgia Public Service Commissioner race, to the Miami mayoral election, where a Democrat won for the first time in nearly 30 years. In state legislative elections, Democrats flipped a whopping 25 seats to Republicans’ zero.”

The Nation: Recent Democratic Victories Have Republicans Running Scared

By John Nichols

• While some retirements were to be expected, analysts are now anticipating a GOP exodus that could be unprecedented in modern American political history.

• It’s not just that Trump’s approval ratings have collapsed, or that general approval ratings for Republicans have tanked—after a year in which the GOP has, with full control of the federal government, provided a stark illustration of how dangerously and destructively it wields power. It is the practical reality of how voters have been casting their ballots in 2025—and are increasingly likely to cast their ballots in 2026.

• “In 2025 alone, Democrats won or overperformed in 227 out of 255 key elections—nearly 90 percent of races,” noted DNC deputy executive director Libby Schneider, in a memorandum shared with The Nation. “In nearly every major contest, Democrats swept, from the Wisconsin Supreme Court race to the New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races, to the Georgia Public Service Commissioner race, to the Miami mayoral election, where a Democrat won for the first time in nearly 30 years. In state legislative elections, Democrats flipped a whopping 25 seats to Republicans’ zero.”

• But the steadiest measure of disgust with Trump and the Republicans came in election results from regular odd-year elections and special elections. And as the year advanced, the evidence of popular objection to the MAGA agenda became overwhelming.

• “Across red, purple, and blue states, Democrats have gotten off the mat and proven that when you organize everywhere, you can win anywhere—in every part of the country,” says Schneider, who argues, as the critical 2026 midterm election season kicks off, that Democrats should “feel buoyed by the strong results we’ve seen up and down the ballot all year long.”

• The Democratic record in 2025 is compelling, as is illustrated by a month-by-month analysis of movement toward the Democrat column, which Schneider shared with The Nation.

• That was 2025. What about 2026? There are never guarantees for how upcoming elections will turn out. But there can be reasonable speculation based on patterns from recent elections.
  
  
• And as members of Congress and candidates from both parties are considering their prospects for 2026, more and more of them are taking note of what Schneider credibly describes as a “dominating trend of Democratic victories and over-performances.”