nationalization of racing
The Republican Party has suffered losses since Trump returned to office last year.
In the 2025 off-year elections, Democrats made several wins from Virginia to New Jersey. Wiles, a Trump aide, blamed the Republican Party’s defeat on Trump’s absence from voting.
“Typically, midterm elections aren’t about who’s going to be in the White House; they’re about keeping elections local and keeping federal employees out of elections,” Wiles explained to The Mom View.
“We’re actually trying to flip that and put him on the ballot, because a lot of those low-propensity voters are voting for Trump.”
Her strategy aims to capitalize on the strong loyalty that Trump has generated within the Republican Party.
A YouGov poll found that conservative voters approve of his job by an overwhelming 82%. A mid-January CBS News poll found support even higher among American adults who identify as Republicans, at 90 percent.
“Since 2016, all of our polls have been off, because we consistently underestimate President Trump’s vote,” said political scientist Rona Rae Atkeson.
“Mr. Trump has definitely garnered more support from undocumented voters, people who don’t normally go to the polls, during the presidential election.”
But she questioned whether Trump’s support would translate into increased support for down-ballot races.
“I’ve never seen that carry over well into the midterm elections,” Atkeson said. “So it might not work out for him.”
But putting Trump on the ballot, as Wiles suggests, also risks shifting the focus of the midterm elections away from local issues.
Rather, experts like Gillespie believe that “nationalizing” midterm elections can homogenize both the candidates who vote against them and their policy platforms, as they seek to reflect national rather than local priorities.
“One manifestation of the polarization in American politics is that domestic issues are increasingly supplanted by local issues,” Gillespie said. “As national politics permeates state and local elections, it becomes harder for federal candidates to differentiate themselves from Washington.”
