POLITICO Nightly: The midterms won’t save the Democrats
By Calder McHugh and Charlie Mahtesian Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) questions Pete Hegseth during his Senate Armed Services confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill on Jan. 14. | Andrew Harnik/Getty Images UNFRIENDLY MAP — If there’s any silver lining for Democrats in the gray storm cloud that is GOP-dominated Washington, it’s that in two years there’s likely to be a backlash. That’s not an assessment of Trump’s first two months in the White House so much as it is a historical fact. Midterm elections tend to be unkind to the party in power. The sitting president’s party has lost House seats in every midterm but two dating back to 1950. The last time Donald Trump was president, during the 2018 midterms Democrats flipped the House and picked up 41 House seats. The prospect of an epic comeuppance in 2026 — as in 1994, 2010 or even 2018 — gives many Democrats hope in what is otherwise a dark time. But this week brings yet another reminder that the midterm isn’t ne...