With only two months until the American midterm elections in early November, it’s time for an update on the big things happening in America. And let’s start with those midterms. What you’ll hear from ‘our’ ABC and the rest of the left-leaning legacy media is that the Republicans are in huge trouble and that their preferred Democrats are well placed to take back both, but certainly one, of the legislative chambers. Speaking personally, I’d recommend being as sceptical of that as you should have been of their fearmongering coverage during the Covid lockdown thuggery.

Now it’s true that in 39 of the last 41 midterm elections the President’s party lost seats, often a lot of seats. It happened to Obama both times and it happened to Biden. All things being equal we should indeed expect Trump and the Republicans to lose Senate and House of Representatives seats. Given the razor-fine advantages they have, the Republicans can hardly afford this. But I am far from convinced the conventional view is right. Why? Well, the generic polls show about a seven-point Democrat advantage. But many of these pollsters over-favoured the Dems back in 2024. And much more recently they got the Michigan Democrat primary way wrong, showing Abdul El-Sayed up ten when he won by just one-and-a-half points. Ditto as regards Hung in the Wisconsin Governor Democrat primary. And ditto in the Florida Democrat Senate primary where the polls had Alexander Vindman comfortably over Angie Nixon, the Democrat socialist radical. Yet he lost. Let’s just say there are grounds to doubt these generic polls.

Secondly, the Republicans are cashed up this time. When Trump won in 2024 he was massively outspent by Kamala but won anyway, also helping the Republicans take the Senate, the House and the popular vote. This time the Republicans are likely to outspend the Democrats. They have more in the bank, by a fair bit. And Elon Musk has pledged that if the usual Democrat-supporting oligarchs pour money into the Dems then he will match that dollar for dollar. And notice that the Republicans have yet to start spending.  That typically happens after the early-September Labor Day holiday. So right about when you’re reading this.

Thirdly, the Senate map and which states have Senate races this time around is moderately favourable to the Republicans. There are 34 Democrat Senate spots not being contested this time around plus ten sure wins.  That’s 44 near-certain to them. Conversely there are 31 Republican Senate spots not being contested plus 16 sure wins. That’s 47 near certain to them. Given that the Vice President has the casting vote when the Senate is 50-50, that means that the Democrats need seven of these nine states to take the upper house: Georgia, Ohio, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Alaska, Iowa, Michigan, Maine and Texas. Despite all the legacy media puffery it’s going to be a big ask for the Democrats to take all but two of those. They have nominated self-describing socialists in Maine and in Michigan (where their candidate is also a seeming Islamist). In Texas they’ve nominated a man who will massively struggle to get men to vote for him and seems wholly out of place there. And winning for the Dems in Alaska, Iowa and Ohio is just plain tough these days. Plus the Republicans have shots in most all of the rest.

Then there is the fact the US Supreme Court has struck down racial gerrymandering and that the Republicans have at last decided to copy the Democrats and gerrymander big time. (Note that although in New England states about 40 per cent of votes are Republican there have been zero Republicans elected to Congress for some time, save for Senator Susan Collins in Maine. The Dems perfected the dark arts of gerrymandering first.  Trump, who is a fighter, simply insisted that his side get into the same game and start fighting back.) So that makes a surprise win in the House far more possible than many are suggesting.

Oh, and don’t forget the court fight over unsolicited mail-in ballots. In my native Canada (hardly a right-of-centre country) you show up, show ID and vote. Or you ask for a postal ballot with some sort of perfunctory reason. Since the Covid thuggery in 2020 a good few Democrat states in the US – who run and set procedures for all elections – allow unsolicited mail-in ballots; third party ballot harvesting; and ballot drop boxes. These are the loosest, most open to abuse, indefensible voting procedures in the democratic world. Of course not all Democrat-run states practice these things but where you find them the Dems are in charge.  Trump is fighting back on this because the Rino Republicans in Congress, and especially in the Senate, refuse to pass the Save Act. So Trump is trying to accomplish some sort of checks by executive order, including by making the postal service use bar codes to show that the ballot and the voter align, as well as by seeking the voter rolls from the states to check that those voting by post are indeed eligible voters. Activist groups and some Democrat states are going to court. And right now some lower federal court judges (appointed by Dems, surprise, surprise) are trying to block this Trump initiative. The Supreme Court has given a procedural win to the President.

Still, I have no idea what will end up happening, but if Trump prevails on this then the House is most definitely in play for the Republicans. And as I believe anyone making predictions ought to put his money where his mouth is, I can say to all readers that I have a few bets for superior bottles of wine on Republicans retaining the Senate, and one bet on the House.

Two last points. Even many Republicans lament the Iran war and think it will cost the Republicans in November. Again, I have some doubts. Twenty-odd US soldiers have died to basically stop Iran from getting a nuclear bomb any time soon. The last seven US Presidents have said Iran was an existential threat and done nothing. Trump did something with no boots on the ground and now Iran isn’t a threat. Sure, as with all things Trump, there is self-puffery and chaos. But gas prices are far lower than experts predicted (you are shocked, I know). The Strait of Hormuz is more or less open again. And the Trump administration has settled on the plan that helped Britain defeat Napoleon, namely slow economic strangulation with threats as well to any country that trades with the mullahs. He doesn’t get anywhere linearly, but Trump fights. And that very rare, near unique, quality on the right side of politics will win him a lot of grace I reckon.

Last thing. Trump is taking the mickey out of Canadians and Democrats by claiming to rename Lake Ontario Lake America.  What is delightful is to watch all the many woke lefties who have spent the last decade renaming every street, military base, geographical feature with any associations they dislike – including in Canada cancelling the first prime minister and removing his name from everything for effectively nothing (the lefties of the day having been worse on all similar counts) – complaining about Trump’s renaming. They have zero self-awareness.  But you all knew that already.