What Donald Trump will do after the midterms – lose or lose

October 30, 2026 — 8:30am

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The day after the midterm elections is a time of both reflection and projection. As America’s leaders and citizens begin to comprehend what happened at the ballot box the day before, they also start to predict how that will play out at the main event in two years’ time.

Two recent presidents got clobbered at their midterm litmus tests. In 2006, president George W. Bush, besieged by forever wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and with a weakening economy that would morph into the GFC, saw a Democratic tidal wave sweep control of both the House and Senate. Facing the media, Bush said the electoral defeat he’d suffered was “a thumping”.

In 2010, just two years into Barrack Obama’s first term, Democrats lost 63 seats in the House, obliterating Obama’s majority to pass legislation. Obama faced up to it: he said he got a “shellacking” and that the losses were “humbling”.

We will never hear those words from Donald Trump. When the incumbent president got his own shellacking in his 2018 midterms – with Democrats picking up 41 seats to win control of the House but Republicans keeping the Senate – Trump tweeted: “Tremendous success tonight.” The new Democratic majority in the House would lead to Trump’s impeachment twice over the next two years.

On the day after the midterms in 2006, Bush announced the resignation of Donald Rumsfeld, his secretary of defence and the official most identified with management of the forever wars. Trump will not fire his secretary of war, Pete Hegseth, over his management of the war in Iran, but before the new Congress commences on January 3, 2027, Hegseth will face a vote on his impeachment led by Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky whose career was ended by Trump earlier this year. And if that effort fails, the Democrats will try again later in January, with every prospect for Hegseth’s impeachment.

If the Democrats win the midterms, a lot of people are going to........

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