With polls showing signs of recovery after a popularity slump, Tuesday’s results will test whether the party can rebuild
One year after Donald Trump won his way back into the White House, voters are going back to the ballot box in a test of the president’s popularity and whether Democrats are able to rebound from their catastrophic losses of 2024.
With governor’s mansions, mayoral offices, statehouses and mid-cycle redistricting on the line in closely watched contests from Trenton, New Jersey and Richmond, Virginia to New York City and beyond, the party is pinning its hopes on locally rooted campaigns aiming to blunt a national conservative message that has surged in recent years.
The contests come as Democrats face their deepest popularity crisis in decades. The party’s favorability rating has plunged to historic lows, hitting 27% in one NBC News poll in March, the worst since tracking began in 1990, driven by frustration among Democrats themselves over the party’s response to Trump’s 2024 victory and perceptions that the party has lost touch with ordinary voters.
But September polling from Gallup and October analysis by pollster G Elliott Morris shows a correction may be underway, and that Democrats are pulling ahead of Republicans on their handling of the economy – Trump’s signature issue.
