

What is redistricting? Redistricting is the process of drawing congressional and state legislative maps to ensure everyone’s vote counts equally. Dozens of House members have already announced they will be retiring from Congress instead of seeking reelection. Which seats are up for election? Every seat in the House and a third of the seats in the 100-member Senate are up for election. Thirty six governors and thousands of state legislators are also on the ballot. Why are the midterms important? The midterm elections determine control of Congress: The party that has the House or Senate majority gets to organize the chamber and decide what legislation Congress considers. Up next: Georgia, Alabama and Arkansas primaries and a runoff in Texas on May 24. Here’s a complete calendar of all the primaries in 2022. 8, but the primary season is already underway. When are the midterm elections? The general election is Nov. November’s midterm elections are likely to shift the political landscape and impact what President Biden can accomplish during the remainder of his first term. If the leaked draft of the Supreme Court’s abortion decision foreshadows its final judgment, however, the backlash among previously dispirited Democrats may be enough to bring them to the polls in November." “Now it’s as though a dam is leaking in multiple places and there are not enough Dutch boys with fingers to hold the water back. 20, 2021,” said William Galston of the Brookings Institution. “The story, one might say, is the way in which Democrats’ choices have combined with unanticipated events to a create a degree of political vulnerability that they could not imagine on Jan. Whether the Supreme Court changes that with its pending abortion decision is the major, unanswered, question.

Democracy itself will be part of the choice for voters this November.įor most of this year, 2022 has been an election about broken confidence between the president and many of the voters who helped elect him rising inflation that the administration initially underestimated a Democratic Party whose cultural liberalism has met resistance outside of the biggest cities and suburban voters, particularly women, who shifted to the Democrats during Trump’s administration and now are up for grabs.

And in many states, followers who believe those lies are running for office, including for secretary of state positions overseeing the administration of elections. Trump continues to tell lies about what happened in 2020. One other factor contributes to the backdrop of this election year: the future and fate of democracy. Democrats also will seek to offset their disadvantages by mobilizing voters around abortion and other cultural issues. Their story now also includes confirmation of the first Black woman to the Supreme Court - a promise kept by the president to one of his party’s most loyal constituencies. Their narrative will highlight passage of a major economic stimulus package and a bipartisan infrastructure bill, the creation of roughly 8 million jobs and the lowest unemployment rate in a half-century. Such a decision in the case involving Mississippi’s restrictive abortion law could cut into what is now a Republican advantage in enthusiasm to vote in November.īiden administration officials and Democratic candidates will offer their own story as a counter to the prevailing gloomy predictions. Wade, a monumental action that would elevate a battle over the future of abortion rights into the campaign debates. There is another element that now threatens to affect the direction of these elections: the prospect that the Supreme Court will overturn Roe v.

Escalating prices at the pump are one of several factors contributing to President Biden's low approval rating. A motorist fills his gas tank in Encinitas, Calif.
