The Nov. 4 campaign represents the clearest political judgment yet about Trump’s power, the fate of MAGA, and both parties’ signals for future elections.
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President Donald Trump’s huge second-term agenda, which has swept the nation, will undergo its first major referendum as millions of voters flock to polling stations for one of the few crucial off-year elections.
Locked out of power in Washington since January, Democrats and their allies have scrambled to organize opposition in a variety of ways, including marathon speeches in Congress, filing lawsuits against controversial administration moves and filling the streets with mass protests.
But the Nov. 4 campaign marks the clearest political judgment yet on Mr. Trump’s growing control and will lay the groundwork for his Make America Great Again campaign, next year’s midterm elections, and the not-so-distant 2028 presidential election.
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In every election, including the two gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia, and the dramatic sprint in New York’s mayoral race. Or California’s bold entry into a redistricting arms race, a rallying cry for President Trump that often excites his supporters and alarms his opponents.
These elections will also be used as a gauge of the direction and success of the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party has two candidates, Abigail Spanberger of Virginia and Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey, who were instrumental in the party’s success against Trump in the midterm elections of his first term in 2018.
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“What’s interesting about both is that they really represent the first pieces of political resistance against Donald Trump,” says Matthew Dallek, a historian and professor of political management at George Washington University.
“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the two candidates coming out of the Trump 1.0 resistance movement are the favorites to win this very important off-year gubernatorial race,” he added. “This suggests that a type of patriotic, national security-focused, tough-on-law-and-order mold still resonates within the Democratic Party, and it may also resonate among ordinary voters.”
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But as part of the Democratic Party’s year-long rebranding, the radical, progressive populism embodied by New York Congressman Zoran Mamdani is on the rise. He is a socialist candidate who has won the support of mainstream Democrats and awakened the political left to take control of America’s largest city.
The implications for Republicans and Democrats will play out in these outcomes as the president tests the limits of executive power and takes a sometimes literal bulldozing approach to changing Washington and the country.
MAGA turmoil will undermine Democrats’ 2026 hopes
Political forecasters and pollsters have given Democrats an edge in nearly every race, and a landslide victory in those races would paint a more liberal picture heading into next year with Americans increasingly dissatisfied with President Trump’s harsh actions.
But MAGA activists and other conservative leaders believe Republicans can stop this rhetoric from taking root in 2026, when Democrats aim to take back the House.
“If Democrats don’t win New Jersey and Virginia by big margins, their momentum will slow down,” John Fredericks, a conservative radio host in Virginia and a Trump ally, told USA TODAY.
more: Understand why Virginia and New Jersey elections matter this year
Republicans have their highest hopes for New Jersey. In New Jersey, Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli has fully embraced Trump and MAGA’s presence in this campaign, after rejecting Trump, who narrowly lost his last run for governor in 2021.
Trump has had little involvement in the 2025 campaign, but Ciatelli told the USA TODAY Network that he speaks regularly with the president and stressed that any interaction with the commander-in-chief must be handled carefully.
Conservative commentators say liberals should coast to victory in these two states, given Trump’s loss in last year’s presidential election.
If Ciatarelli wins, the 63-year-old former congressman will become a MAGA star and be credited with strong-arming the Democratic Party.
more: Who is New Jersey Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli?
But most forecasters don’t think the vote will result in Lt. Gov. Winsome Earl Sears swaying Virginia’s Spanberger, and conservatives in the Old Dominion state are more likely to talk about other Republicans, such as lieutenant gubernatorial candidate John Reed, who has garnered attention for his MAGA rankings.
For example, in the final weeks of the Virginia attorney general race, Republicans spent more money supporting Republican candidate Jason Miyares than they did in the gubernatorial race.
But a Democratic victory in New Jersey would raise questions about the stability of the coalition without Trump in power. This may explain why some allies, like former White House chief of staff Steve Bannon, have pushed for an unconstitutional third term, and why the president has toyed with it at times and downplayed it at others.
The future of Trumpism will be as much a part of the national debate in 2026 for Republicans as it is for Democrats.
On the Republican side, cracks are emerging in the MAGA movement, whether due to right-wing grievances over U.S.-Israel relations or not. Complain about the release of files related to Jeffrey Epstein’s child sex trafficking case. Or, as the federal government continues to shut down, there are growing fears that millions of people will lose food benefits or face higher health insurance premiums.
But Federix said a strong showing by Republicans in any of these off-year races would give the president and his allies more enthusiasm and reverse concerns among Republican voters who worry that if Democrats regain control of either chamber of Congress, the remaining two years of President Trump’s term will be dragged out.
“The national narrative starts from, ‘Oh, Trump is done, they’re going to impeach him,’ and then you lose 25 seats, and then you go, ‘That’s crap, here are two states that aren’t red, but they really seem to like what the president is doing,’ and maybe they’ll win back some seats,” he said.
Democratic campaign offers different paths to recovery
Democrats are coming up with their own puzzle, even more compelling and complex, for next year, as Nov. 4’s results help show how the party thinks it can outperform MAGA as President Trump’s powers expand.
In one lane is Mamdani, a 34-year-old member of the Democratic Socialists of America. Online fluency and a pledge to attack rising prices for ordinary New Yorkers has awakened a new generation of progressives ready for their own populist movement.
The gains are in sharp contrast to races in Virginia and New Jersey, where Democrats fielded less popular but more predictable candidates in Spanberger and Sherrill.
more: Will Trump be on the ballot next week? How will he fare in key elections in Virginia, New Jersey, New York City and California?
The two former Capitol Hill roommates both have backgrounds in national security, which also gives them a platform to talk about the affordability crisis. But their message avoids harsh class attacks on billionaires and is aimed at winning over unstable voters rather than winning over new supporters with progressive leanings.
Sherrill initially praised Mamdani’s focus on raising cost and government efficiency standards, for example. But the 53-year-old Democratic congressman, who currently represents the New Jersey suburbs west of New York, withdrew in the final stages of the gubernatorial race after a series of Republican attacks, telling reporters after his Oct. 9 debate with Ciatelli that he would “not be involved” in the New York mayoral race.
How Democratic candidates and incumbents responded to Mamdani was a source of conflict during his campaign.
Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York ultimately endorsed Mamdani after weeks of questions and demands from liberal voters. Comedian Jon Stewart mocked Jeffries’ lateness in an October interview, calling it a “brave and courageous endorsement” by the Democratic establishment.
“We’re living in an outsider moment,” Adam Green, co-founder of the influential Progressive Change Campaign Committee, told USA TODAY. “Politics today is not about left versus right. More precisely, it’s about outsider anger versus insiders.”
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Progressives running for office after 2026 are focusing on the possibility that Mamdani will win with more than 50% of the vote, but that Sherrill will lose. If that happens, we expect the left to take bolder positions on populist values, such as challenging the role billionaires play in politics and the economy.
If Mr. Sherrill prevails (though polls show New Jersey to be a close race), it will give rise to a growing chorus of moderates who argue that the party will have to fight for ideologically disaligned voters outside of urban centers like New York City in next year’s midterm elections and beyond.
An Oct. 29 Quinnipiac University poll found that Mamdani holds a 10% lead in the overall race against Cuomo and a commanding 28% lead among Democratic voters. However, among independents, the two were tied at 34%.
California enters redistricting war as horse racing begins in 2028
Beyond the candidate-versus-candidate race, California’s entry into the redistricting battle has far-reaching implications going forward.
Voters in the Golden State will decide on a Nov. 4 ballot measure known as Prop. 50 that would allow lawmakers to redraw the boundaries of the 52-member House seat instead of a bipartisan commission. Democrats want to create five new seats from California that would be advantageous to them.
California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom is spearheading the fight, making it a national test of his political prowess and set up as a bold challenge to Trump and his allies, who are pressuring several Republican-controlled states to redraw their maps to maintain their legislative majorities.
more: President Obama says ‘democracy is on the ballot’ in new California Prop 50 TV ad
Recent polls have Prop. 50 in the lead heading into Election Day, but political experts say California’s governor will win big or risk losing his luster as he navigates a shadowy 2028 presidential primary with currently no clear favorite.
Other White House candidates have already made their own moves in the fall election, which could help set up a possible 2028 presidential run.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris, also from California, did not rule out the possibility of running for the White House again during her book tour, but she, like President Trump, is out of the 2025 campaign as the Democratic Party is still digesting last year’s defeat.
Others, such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D.N.Y.) and Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, are taking on more prominent roles and raising their profile. Ocasio-Cortez has endorsed Mamdani in the New York mayoral race, and Beshear, who heads the Democratic Governors Association in 2026, has given Spanberger a say in Virginia.
Then there’s Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, who is rumored to be one of the top candidates for re-election in 2026. Polls show he has a 60% approval rating in the state, and he is banking on that popularity in November’s state Supreme Court election, and the national Democratic Party is working hard to protect Pennsylvania’s 5-2 liberal majority.
Voters in the Keystone State will decide on November 4 whether to extend the terms of three Democratic-leaning judges in a race that Mr. Shapiro proposed as a “threat to liberty” referendum.
“They have proven that we can rely on them to protect women’s access to abortion and contraception and protect all of our freedoms,” Shapiro said in a 30-second spot supporting the justices.
Contributor: Zach Anderson
