If the Republicans Lose the Midterms, Who's Really to Blame?

I agree with Speaker Mike Johnson to a point: if the Republicans lose the midterms, it really could mark the end of the Trump presidency. But he's wrong about the why.

A president's agenda only becomes durable when Congress codifies it. Executive orders are a great tool. But they can be wiped out with the stroke of a pen.

Remember day one of the Biden administration? Anyone?

Johnson's latest remark on the midterms suggests Republicans might lose because of Trump's recent State of the Union remarks about potentially cutting federal Medicaid funding in Minnesota over fraud concerns. And sure, that may influence some voters. But it's not the real issue.

The real problem is that Republican voters are frustrated. They feel like the party has been sitting still since Trump was elected. What major legislation has been passed? How much has Congress actually done to advance the president's agenda? Did they codify the DOGE findings?

No.

What did they do to eliminate the filibuster—something they could have done during the prolonged government shutdown? Something they should have done, given that Democrats have made it abundantly clear they have zero interest in helping Trump move anything forward. Compromise of any sort is out the window, even if it something actually makes sense.

Sure. The filibuster does have its purpose. Even I can agree with that. It encourages debate and compromise. In a rational political climate, it even makes sense. It's a way to balance power and give both sides a voice on bills.

But we're not in that climate. Democrats are angry, defiant, and convinced Trump is an existential threat. They're not budging on anything, even if it's reasonable. They couldn't even stand in support of putting American's safety in front of the safety of illegal immigrants, for Heaven's sake.

Ending the filibuster would have allowed the Republicans to pass the SAVE Act and other key parts of Trump's agenda.

What Johnson—and frankly much of the GOP leadership—seems to miss is that voters elected Trump for a reason. Despite what the media suggests, and what Democrats want to deny, it was a mandate. Yet Republicans in Congress have often acted just as resistant to Trump's agenda as Democrats. That's a problem, because Republican voters don't show up just to keep a party in power. They want results. And when they don't see results, they hold their own side accountable.

So, if Republicans lose the midterms, it won't be because of anything Trump said. It will be because Congress refused to act.

Johnson is right about one thing: if Democrats win in November, they've already told us what's coming—two years of investigations and potential impeachment hearings, their own end to the filibuster, endless legislation designed to box in the president, and total gridlock. It would turn this administration into one of the most powerless lame-duck presidencies in modern history. Any hope of advancing Trump's agenda at all would evaporate.

That's why Johnson's comments concern me. They suggest he doesn't understand why Republicans are actually at risk. If you don't know why you're losing, you can't possibly strategize how to win.

It's not too late. The SAVE Act is already in the Senate. It just needs to be brought to a vote. Yes, getting 60 votes under the current filibuster rule is unlikely. Even reverting to a talking filibuster might not be enough. But at least voters would see Republicans trying—showing urgency, showing fight, showing they understand the stakes.

If the Republicans lose the midterms, it won't be because of Trump. Forget what the polls say. Americans want Trump's agenda. That was made clear when he was elected, because his agenda is exactly what he campaigned on that got him elected. If the Republicans lose it will be because they refused to hear the voters who elected them to do the work to codify the mandate.

Voters gave Republicans their trust in 2024. They expected action. They expected progress. They expected the mandate to be honored. If Republicans squandered that, and they mostly have, they shouldn't expect voters to hand them another chance.

Republicans only win when they act. They don't get the free passes Democrats do. They have to listen to their voters. They have to do the work. And they have to earn every vote.

So, to Speaker Johnson and Leader Thune, the question is simple:

What are you going to do to win the midterms? We, the voters, are ready to do our part. When will you do yours?

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© 2026 Jim Bauer

The Border Debate We Should All Be Questioning

The debate over the border has become so tangled lately that I find myself pausing hard to make sense of it. Honestly, maybe we all should. The idea of maintaining a secure border was never a uniquely Republican talking point. At least, not until 2016 when Donald Trump elevated it to the center of his presidential campaign.

Yet if you listen to many Democrats today, you'd think the party has always been firmly opposed to strong border enforcement. It's such a dramatic reversal that I sometimes wonder whether they remember their own positions before Trump entered the scene.

And that raises a few questions.

Where do Democrats actually stand on border security now? What's driving this shift toward resisting policies aimed not only at securing the border but also at addressing the millions of illegal immigrants already here?

It wasn't that long ago that former President Barack Obama was labeled the "Deporter-in-Chief." Bill Clinton oversaw the construction of the first 400-miles of border wall. Even Hillary Clinton repeatedly emphasized the importance of a secure border and supported immigration reforms that included enforcement.

Go back further, and the picture becomes even more interesting. During Ronald Reagan's presidency, Democrats criticized his administration for being too lax on immigration, accusing Republicans of prioritizing cheap labor over the well-being of American workers and communities.

Let me be clear about my own position, because I think it helps to illustrate part of my point, and perhaps explains some of my confusion. I have always believed in secure borders. That matters because it shows my stance wasn't shaped by party or political trends on my own side.

I took the side of the Democrats on this issue because their position more closely aligned with my own personal beliefs about how the border should be handled as a policy matter.

Trump taking on the border issue as strongly as he did was rather unexpected for me. When he elevated border security and made it a defining Republican issue, my party found itself aligned with me on a position I had long held—even when it meant disagreeing with them in the past. It didn't change my opinion. It simply put a checkmark in a box that wasn't check marked before that.

The same thing happened on other policy fronts as well. Take globalization. I believe it undermined stable, good-paying jobs, and I supported a more protectionist approach even when my own party did not. So, on this front as well, when Trump embraced protectionism, it didn't shift my views. It simply brought Republican policy closer to the stance I had already taken for years.

So, it raises an interesting question. Do our views genuinely shift with whatever "issue of the day" our party decides to elevate, or do most of us hold our beliefs independently of party trends? I tend to think most people fall into the latter category. We form our opinions on our own, and then we choose the party that happens to check the most boxes—not the other way around.

That's why, to me, the real question isn't whether Democrats have changed their position on the border. The question is what caused that change. I mean, even during the Reagan years, most Americans—across party lines—supported the idea of a secure border. It wasn't a deeply polarizing issue on Main Street. There was broad agreement.

At least on this issue, despite what anyone thinks overall about President Donald Trump, of all the issues, this one in particular should be that "common-ground" one that should be the least contested. 

Which leads to a more uncomfortable realization. Are those on the left now opposing the policy itself, or are they simply opposing the president associated with it? And why should that shape anyone's personal beliefs? It shouldn't—any more than the Republican party's shifting positions ever dictated mine. My stance is my stance, regardless of where my party happens to land at any given moment.

Think of it this way: if a preacher suddenly abandoned his own teachings and began preaching the opposite of what he once stood for, most people wouldn't change their beliefs to match him. They'd recognize that the preacher—not the principles—had gone off course. In the same sense, a political party shifting its message shouldn't automatically cause anyone to abandon their long-held views. Yet that seems to be exactly what has happened with the Democrat party's recent embrace of looser border policies. The change in rhetoric has led many to follow along, not because their core beliefs shifted, but because their party did.

Which brings me to the real danger here. What happens when people allow their reactions to be driven more by emotion than by common sense?

Some will say, "I don't oppose border security—I just disagree with the methods being used now." But how did we reach a point where such measures would even need to be on the table? What situation created the need for our extreme response in the first place?

It was the shift in policy that brought us here.

For years the United States maintained relatively firm—though imperfect—border policies. The situation was never ideal, but it wasn't spiraling out of control either. When Donald Trump, during his first term, made border security a central issue, he largely intensified efforts that were already well in place before him.

The real turning point came when President Joe Biden entered office and began dismantling not only Trump-era policies, but many of the enforcement mechanisms that Democrats themselves had put in place long before Trump arrived on the scene. That reversal opened the floodgates, and the consequences are what we're now struggling to manage.

In short, we created a crisis, and that demands a stronger response. It requires sharper focus, more decisive action, and solutions bold enough to rebuild the system from the ground up.

We should all feel a measure of confusion here, because if the Biden administration had simply maintained the existing border policies rather than dismantling them, we wouldn't be talking today about ICE sweeps or large-scale enforcement operations. The situation wouldn't have escalated to this point. In fact, border-security could have been one of the few issues capable of uniting both sides during Donald Trump's second term. Because again, a secure border was something Americans broadly agreed on—regardless of party.

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© 2026 Jim Bauer