The Democratic Party could have a seven-point lead on Republicans in the 2026 midterms, according to a new set of findings from top Republican pollsters.
On a national general congressional ballot, Democrats were favored by a seven-point margin in 2026, according to a December 18 memo from FabrizioWard, the firm of former chief Trump campaign pollster Tony Fabrizio, based on findings from surveying 1,000 registered voters.
The result is consistent with other recent polling ahead of the 2026 elections.
As of Monday, December 22, Democrats had a 4.8 percent lead over the Republicans on a generic ballot, according to Race to the WH, which aggregates the findings of mainstream polls.
RealClearPolling, another aggregator, pegs that lead at 3.7 percent.
Making matters worse, Americans are increasingly growing weary with the actions and agenda of President Donald Trump himself, who remains the GOP’s defining force.
In the latest Quinnipiac University poll, 54 percent of respondents said they feel Trump has exceeded his authority, after a year that saw the president taking sweeping unilateral steps including launching worldwide tariffs that rewrote much of the global economy and sending military troops into U.S. cities.
Even among the president’s most likely supporters, approval is eroding.
A recent NBC News Decision Desk analysis found that among both mainstream Republicans and self-identified members of Trump’s MAGA movement, respondents were 6 percent more likely to say the country was heading in the wrong direction as they were in August.
Meanwhile, 57 percent of respondents to a recent NPR/PBS News/Marist survey said they disapprove of Trump’s management of the economy, as affordability looks set to be a defining 2026 issue, especially after Republicans allowed Obamacare health subsidies to expire without approving any plan to offset health costs for lower-income Americans.
Beyond these big-picture findings, voters are also frustrated with Trump’s handling of the Epstein files, with just 26 percent of respondents telling a recent Quinnipiac University poll that they approve.
This sour feeling mirrors the divisions within the Republican delegation itself, where a handful of GOP representatives such as Rep. Thomas Massie and the soon-to-retire ex-MAGA loyalist Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene have been leading voices criticizing the administration for not disclosing the Epstein files fast enough.
In the face of these tough 2026 odds, the GOP has taken a variety of strategies, ranging from pushing to carry out a rare mid-decade redistricting to boost Republican seats to Congress, to the White House pushing to inject more of Trump into local races.
“Typically in the midterms it’s not about who’s sitting at the White House,” White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said in a recent interview with The Mom VIEW web show. “You localize the election, and you keep the federal officials out of it. We’re actually going to turn that on its head and put him on the ballot because so many of those low propensity voters are Trump voters.”
