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What Is the 2026 Midterm Election Going To Be About?
In the 2024 election, the electorate sent the message that Republicans had one job: fix the Biden economy. The 2026 election will largely be about the progress that has or hasn’t made on the economy. Since the 2024 election, voters are not seeing much progress on the economy, and this was the case even before the conflict with Iran began earlier this spring. As we pointed out last week, Republican leads on handling of economic issues
Latest Posts
Economic Issue Handling Slips For Republicans
Good News and Bad News from the Long Term Trends NAEP
Who Are Independents?
Roll Call: An autopsy of the DNC campaign autopsy
Policy and Politics
What Is the 2026 Midterm Election Going To Be About?
In the 2024 election, the electorate sent the message that Republicans had one job: fix the Biden economy. The 2026 election will largely be about the progress that has or hasn’t made on the economy. Since the 2024 election, voters are not seeing much progress on the economy, and this
Who Are Independents?
We talk about independent voters on a frequent basis, and one of the questions we get most often is about understanding who independents are. In recent elections, there have seen sizable increases in voters identifying as independent rather than as Republicans or Democrats. In the 2024 election, independents surpassed Democrats
Texas Senate Tip Sheet: What Will It Take For Republicans To Hold?
With Ken Paxton’s victory in the Texas GOP runoff, this week we look at the vote history in the state and what it will take for Republicans to hold this Senate seat. The chart below shows exit poll data from past elections going back to 2016. Vote History • Republicans
Economic Issue Handling Slips For Republicans
Throughout the conflict with Iran, the economy has stumbled and we have seen Republican leads on the economy erode. But from our trending for Winning the Issues, slippage on economic issue handling started last year and before the conflict started in late February. Our new numbers (May 30-June 2) confirm
Inflation Creeps Back Up: What Republicans Should Expect
In the last CPI report released last week, year-over-year inflation ticked up to 3.8% — the highest CPI of President Trump’s term. This is the highest CPI since May 2023, meaning that it is higher than when President Biden left office (3%). We have been tracking the cumulative effect of
Progress On The Economy
One of the key questions going into the midterm election will be this: have Republicans made progress on the economy? Since November of last year, we have seen the direction of economy improve slightly from 31-58 to 36-51 in January. This is still a negative view, but going in the
Good News and Bad News from the Long Term Trends NAEP
The findings from Wednesday’s release of the latest NAEP Long Term Trends data were a mixed bag. On the one hand, nine year olds posted some real improvements in reading and math from 2022 to 2025. Thirteen year-olds, on the other hand, were virtually stagnant or had declined from 2023
Education Next: The Yale Report and the Value of the Liberal Arts
The Winston Group’s David Winston and Caitlin Peartree are out with a new essay at Education Next. In this piece, they consider the recent report on trust in higher education from Yale University and the importance of the kind of broad-based, liberal arts education an institution like Yale provides. A
Five Proposals For The Early Childhood Years
In the larger conversation about student achievement and outcomes, one important element is the experience of students before they ever enter a classroom. The early childhood years are a crucial window for brain development and other important skills. Research conducted by The Winston Group on behalf of the Clapham Group
Roll Call: The voters’ voice: Gerrymandering and the state of democracy
In the first of two columns for Roll Call, the Winston Group’s David Winston discusses the current state of redistricting (and gerrymandering), and the challenge of ensuring the central role of voters’ voices by producing maps that honestly reflect the electorate’s public will. Over the past decades, gerrymandering by both parties
Roll Call: Blue Wave? Or Red Save?
The Winston Group’s David Winston writes in today’s Roll Call about the difficulty of predicting wave elections for either party. Yes, we’ve seen a string of GOP losses in special elections, with the media contrasting the winning percentages against President Donald Trump’s performance in 2024. But political waves are more
Roll Call: Artemis II: Back to the Future
The Winston Group’s David Winston writes in today’s Roll Call about the Artemis II and the unifying optimism of its historic lunar fly-by mission. Given the nation’s current political and ideological division (Real Clear Politics average right track/wrong track is at 34 percent/59 percent), it’s been hard to imagine what