- We have a path to the majority.
I don't think anybody would ever say it was going to be easy,
but it exists, it is there.
I think that we've done a lot of work to give ourselves
the best chance of retaining our majority
and keeping the gavel out of Kevin McCarthy's hand.
- The 2022 midterm election will be a report card
for President Biden and what he's been able to do
with the Democratic Congress in the first two years.
- We just have to keep the faith.
We just have to persevere.
We just have to vote!
- But the catch is that the election
of a president's first term in office
usually does not bode well for his party.
- I have absolutely no intention of us losing this election.
- The truth is we simply cannot afford
two more years of Democrat control.
- The question becomes do Democrats
even have a chance this time around.
- In some ways there are two different elections
happening at once right now.
If the election is about inflation
and the economy and economic stress,
Republicans will win.
If the election is more about abortion, abortion rights,
extremism
and Trump's own position in the Republican party,
then Democrats are going to win.
- We did a poll at the end of September,
and we asked people what their top issues in voting were,
but we also asked them which party they trusted more
on a set of different issues.
More than half of registered voters stated they trust
Republicans more on crime, inflation and the economy,
and more than half of registered voters
say they trust Democrats more on climate change and abortion.
More Americans say that issues related to economy
are a bigger issue of their vote this midterm election
than issues like abortion and climate change.
- These competing political fronts
have pivoted campaign strategy on both sides of the aisle.
- When the Supreme Court reversed Roe v.
Wade, I think that did shift our focus,
and I also think it shifted the focus
for a lot of voters across the country.
That has become, you know, the defining issue of this election.
Not the only, but, you know, probably the biggest.
- Voters view Republicans as the more extreme of the two parties.
They don't love Democratic party,
but they do see the Republicans as more extreme on issues
relating to abortion, gay rights, immigration.
So that has given Democrats this opening.
- In case of a referendum on the party in power,
I think that the Dobbs decision kind of scrambled
that a little bit, because for most people,
they saw this huge precedent-shattering change
in their lives being brought by Republicans
and the Republican Supreme Court.
So, now this referendum is not just on the Democrats in power
but on Republicans and their policies,
you know, the policies they've been fighting
for over the last 50 years.
- If Democrats don't address inflation
and don't get voters convinced
that they are worried about inflation
and will work to try to curb inflation,
then their offensive work on abortion rights
and Republican extremism will be all for naught.
But Republicans, on the flip side,
they have to do a good job of not appearing extreme,
of trying to distance themselves from people in their party
who are talking about complete national bans
on abortion rights.
- Meanwhile, Biden himself
is suffering from low approval ratings.
- I'm an American president,
not a president of Red America or Blue America,
but of all America.
- As the face of the Democratic party,
he could prove to be a liability at the ballot box.
- President Biden is dragging down
the Democratic candidates a bit
because he's got these low approval ratings.
So it's challenge for people running for office
to tie themselves to the President.
- Our focus is on, you know,
making sure that our members have a record
that they can run on separate and apart from anybody else.
Regardless of what the national mood is or the national,
you know, feelings, they have their own piece they can run on.
- Even with changing political landscapes and the Biden factor,
Democrats are hopeful about their chances
in keeping the house,
or at least limiting their loses.
That level of optimism was not present at the start of 2022.
It's a late glimmer of hope that Democrats are trying to ride
through all the way to November.
- The environment going in to these midterm elections
was not looking very good for Democrats
and it's still not necessarily looking great for them,
but with some issues that have been happening
and the attention on different issues
for the voting population,
it could bode slightly better for Democrats
than I think a lot of analysts were expecting
when were coming in to this election season.
- Democrats went from really feeling
is if there was no chance at keeping the majority
and just trying to mitigate the loses as much as possible
to now actually thinking that,
you know, it's not likely but they still --
they have a chance.