Or will stolen elections in the 2026 midterms overcome the effect of deeply unpopular policies?View this email in your browser [link removed]

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****JUNE 30, 2025****

**On the

**Prospect **website**

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Trump Tax Cut Magic Wand Kicks Off Vote-a-Rama [link removed]

After the Senate made $3.76 trillion in tax cuts go away, amendments will determine if there are enough votes to pass the Big Beautiful Bill.

**BY DAVID DAYEN** [link removed]

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Labor Lines Up Behind Mamdani After Decisive Win [link removed]

Three major unions backed New York Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani on Friday, a day after his main rival, disgraced ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, reportedly decided to remain in the race for mayor.

**BY WHITNEY CURRY WIMBISH** [link removed]

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Murkowski’s Alaska Gold Rush Loses Some Gold Plating [link removed]

Several perks for Alaska are thrown out of the bill. Will the senior Senator from the state remain loyal?

**BY DAVID DAYEN** [link removed]

****Kuttner on TAP****

**How Much Will Trump’s Budget Bill Hurt Republicans?**

**Or will stolen elections in the 2026 midterms overcome the effect of deeply unpopular policies?**

It took every ounce of Trump’s political muscle to overcome Senate Republican unease at some of the cuts in the Big Beautiful Bill, most notably to Medicaid, food assistance, and support for renewable energy. In the end, several critics, including Sens. Susan Collins (R-ME) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), agreed to support a procedural vote to allow the bill to come to the Senate floor. It remains to be seen whether the bill will pass in its present form, and it faces even tougher going in the House. My colleague David Dayen **has the latest** [link removed].

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), who voted against it, was immediately threatened by Trump with a primary opponent next year. It took Tillis less than a day to announce that he would not run for re-election.

The Democratic talking points write themselves: My opponent voted to gut your medical care in order to finance tax cuts for billionaires.

In principle, the wildly unpopular bill sets up Democrats to take back the House in 2026. **A great deal of organizing** [link removed] is already being directed toward that goal.

Even the Senate could be in play, with the Tillis seat open and popular former governor Roy Cooper eyeing a run; Iowa’s Joni (“**We are all going to die** [link removed]”) Ernst up for re-election; Mainers increasingly fed up with Collins feinting in the direction of challenging Trump but hardly ever following through; plus a couple of wild cards like Ohio, where Sherrod Brown may contest the seat formerly held by JD Vance.

But of course, this hopeful calculus leaves out the other part of the Republican strategy: stealing elections. **Lauren Egan of the xxxxxx points to** [link removed] the coming “legal fights ahead around voting rights, election laws, and election certifications,” and suggests that Republicans hope to force Democrats to spend too much money on court fights that resources are diverted from actual elections.

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Her case in point is the six-month battle in North Carolina to defend Justice Allison Riggs’s November election to the state supreme court. Riggs’s Republican opponent, Judge Jefferson Griffin, spent six months attempting to get thousands of votes disqualified. Griffin **finally conceded in May** [link removed]. But the Riggs campaign had to spend at least a million dollars in legal fees and the state Democratic Party spent more.

This is a preview of things to come in 2026. The relative good news is that most contestable seats are in blue or purple states, where elections and voter registration will be relatively honest.  But at least eight close House races are in states that Republicans control or partly control, including districts in Iowa, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, and Texas.

In addition, Trump will continue to use executive orders to try to weaken voting rights. In March, Trump issued an order usurping state control over voting procedures, requiring that voters show proof of citizenship. **This was blocked by two federal district courts** [link removed]., but the recent Supreme Court ruling in

**Trump v. CASA** [link removed], overturning nationwide injunctions by lower courts, leaves the Trump order in limbo.

Democrats may also be weakened by dark money, of the sort that originates with the crypto industry or pro-Zionist PACs, aimed at taking out progressive Democrats, who often have a better shot against Republicans in the general election.

And finally, there are the structural disadvantages that force Democrats to win in places like Ohio and Iowa that have shifted to the right in order to win a Senate majority. The wave of discontent with Trump policies might make that achievable but it’s going to be difficult.

An honest referendum on Trump’s policies would be bad news for Republicans in 2026. It will take a huge amount of organizing to overcome the structural biases and the potential margin of theft.

**– ROBERT KUTTNER**

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