By Joyce McClure, Bridge2Blue
That’s what makes the nonstop anxiety surrounding next year’s midterm elections so revealing. The White House is telling Americans every day—sometimes every hour—that everything is going wonderfully. The economy is supposedly booming. Foreign adversaries are supposedly trembling. Government efficiency is supposedly being restored. The country, we are told, is “back.”
So why the panic?
Why the endless Republican emails and social media pronouncements warning of catastrophe? Why the constant attacks on universities, judges, journalists and pollsters? Why the insistence that opponents are not merely wrong but dangerous enemies destroying America from within? And why the recurring suggestion that election losses could only happen through cheating, sabotage or betrayal?
Here in Virginia, we’re seeing another version of that anxiety play out in real time. The state Supreme Court’s ruling striking down the recent voter-approved redistricting referendum has fanned the flame of the already ugly Republican-lit fight over gerrymandering and who gets to shape congressional districts before the midterms.
When a political party and administration become more focused on engineering elections than persuading voters, people begin to wonder what they’re so afraid of.
Confident governments ask voters for a report card. Nervous regimes tell supporters to stay angry.
Midterm elections have always served as a referendum on those in power. If an administration truly believes the public is thrilled with its performance, the normal response would be calm confidence: “Look at the results. Reward us.”
Instead, the country remains trapped in permanent campaign mode—a state of perpetual emergency in which supporters are constantly told disaster is just around the corner unless they donate, rally, repost and fight harder.
That’s the part that doesn’t add up.
Political movements built on grievance face a unique problem once they gain power. Anger is easier to sustain than satisfaction. Outrage keeps audiences engaged. Crisis keeps ratings high. Fear keeps donors opening their wallets. Success, oddly enough, can drain energy from a movement that depends on constant conflict.
So even while claiming victory, White House messaging must continue sounding apocalyptic. And we all know who’s a master at that.
For those of us who watched Trump long before politics entered the picture, none of this is new. In New York City during the 1980s, image was everything. Trump projected absolute confidence, relentless winning and unstoppable momentum But behind the branding was a deep sensitivity to criticism, an obsession with loyalty and constant concern about image.
His attorney and mentor, the notorious Roy Cohn, famously said, “Power is not given, it is taken. And I will take it.” That same mantra now shapes national politics through bluster, bullying, and intimidation. Strength is proclaimed constantly because reassurance is constantly needed.
If things are truly going as well as advertised, midterms should not inspire this level of dread. Administrations confident in public approval generally spend less time attacking the legitimacy of every institution that might question them.
That doesn’t mean midterm worries are irrational. Every president faces them. History is filled with governing parties that lost seats two years into an administration. But there is a difference between ordinary political concern and an administration that seems unable to function without warning supporters that the sky is falling.
Americans should ask why the White House that speaks endlessly about winning appears so rattled by being judged. Because they know Virginians—like many Americans hit hard by White House and Republican policies—may start asking a dangerous question: Is any of this actually making our lives better?
Beyond the slogans, the outrage and the political theater, voters are measuring these policies against their own paychecks, healthcare costs, schools, retirement accounts and daily lives. And that is the judgment the Republicans fear most heading into the midterms.
A government confident in its achievements earns citizens’ approval. This one is more interested in keeping them afraid.
