What're The Odds the 2026 Midterms Are The Answer?
So you're sayin' there's a chance?
Take a long moment and think of all the damage Republicans have done in 2025. They likely have another year of unimpeded authoritarian consolidation. Maybe two more after that.
The 2026 midterms might be the last chance to stop Trump through the existing system’s mechanisms, in what some experts say could be a final chance for the system to fix itself.
Currently, Republicans control both chambers of Congress. A simple Democratic majority in 2026 can impeach. Of course, his previous two impeachments didn’t impact his support or seem to mitigate his destructive actions. Impeachment without conviction is empty symbolism. But conviction requires 67 Senate votes. Trump still vetoes every bill. His Cabinet remains in place. His Supreme Court justices still serve for life. That means Democrats need supermajorities large enough to override every veto, convict in impeachment trials, and remove the entire corrupt apparatus Trump has installed across the federal government. Numbers large enough to clean house.
That means 67 Senate votes. Enough to convict in impeachment trials and remove Cabinet secretaries who have committed innumerable offenses. Enough to remove Supreme Court justices who invent constitutional doctrines granting Trump immunity from law. Enough to remove the federal judges he appointed who dismiss cases against him.
We also need 290 House votes. Enough to impeach every official Congress must remove. Enough to override vetoes. Enough to pass constitutional amendments limiting presidential power with two-thirds majorities.
The ability to pass Constitutional amendments would change everything. An amendment guaranteeing equitable elections could end gerrymandering, mandate independent redistricting commissions, protect voting rights from state-level suppression, and ensure every American has equal access to the ballot.
An amendment establishing that no president is above the law would eliminate immunity doctrines, make clear that presidents face prosecution for criminal acts, and create enforcement mechanisms that don’t report directly to the person they’re supposed to be prosecuting.
Also, an amendment removing money from politics could overturn Citizens United, establish public financing for campaigns, and break the corporate capture of democratic institutions so we don’t just end up back here again.
These three amendments would rebuild the constitutional foundation Trump has shattered. With 67 Senate votes and 290 House votes, Democrats could propose amendments that 38 state legislatures might just ratify given the political earthquake that produced such congressional supermajorities.
Republicans currently hold 53 Senate seats. Democrats would need to flip 20 of the 22 Republican seats up for election. Every competitive race plus seats in states Trump won by 20 to 40 points. Wyoming, Oklahoma, Arkansas, West Virginia, Alabama. States where Democrats haven’t won statewide races in decades.
Republicans hold 219 House seats. Democrats need to gain 76 seats. The largest House swing in modern history was 63 seats in 2010. Democrats would need to exceed that record while overcoming gerrymandering that gives Republicans a 16-seat structural advantage according to the Brennan Center for Justice. Only 30 to 40 seats are considered genuinely competitive. Democrats would need to win all of them plus flip 40 seats currently rated Safe or Likely Republican.
These numbers would represent the largest congressional gains in American history. A political earthquake requiring nearly unanimous Democratic turnout, significant Republican defections, and victories in dozens of districts where Trump won by double digits.
But sure, it could happen. Economic collapse, catastrophic foreign policy failures, or domestic crises severe enough to break Republican loyalty might create the conditions. The 2026 election could produce the supermajorities needed to remove Trump and his corrupt appointees while also restoring our constitutional government.
If it happens. And if Republicans honor the results.
Remember, Trump already attempted to steal an election once; but maybe he got it out of his system. In 2020, he was recorded telling Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to ‘find 11,780 votes.’ He pressured officials across multiple states to refuse certification. When that failed, he incited the January 6th attack to prevent certification by Congress. He pardoned the 1,500 January 6th participants who acted on his instructions, rewarding those who tried to overturn election results through violence. He wants them to try again, that’s why they were pardoned. He faced no criminal consequences. Republican officials who refused to help him faced primary challenges and death threats. Those who complied faced no punishment. The lesson was clear: helping Trump steal elections means you receive pardons and promotions, refuse to help him and face retaliation.
Trump has defied court orders in approximately one-third of lawsuits against his administration, according to Washington Post analysis.
Because contempt enforcement requires U.S. Marshals to execute orders, and Marshals report to Trump’s Attorney General. Retired federal judge Nancy Gertner identified the fatal flaw directly in an interview with NPR: “If Trump wanted to fully not comply, he could direct the Department of Justice not to comply. At that point, you have a full-on constitutional crisis.”
The system barely held together in 2020, when Trump lost and faced resistance from his own party. In 2026 and 2028, Trump will be the sitting president with full control of federal enforcement. Republican officials refusing certification will face protection, not prosecution.
They’re all complicit now, defection has been punished and loyalty rewarded.
America has never postponed federal elections. Not during civil war, world wars, or pandemics. Constitutional safeguards exist. The system has checks and balances. Institutions should hold. Because those have stopped Trump so far, right?
Expecting that it will just “work itself out” treats law as self-executing. It assumes constitutional text prevents actions simply by existing. It ignores that legal protections mean nothing without enforcement mechanisms. It ignores that enforcement mechanisms mean nothing when those willing to defy them seize control. It ignores that every authoritarian takeover happens through exactly this process: the gradual discovery that institutions won’t defend themselves, that norms carry no force, that law becomes whatever the party says it is.
A final note. Vote. We need more Zohran Mamdanis and Katie Wilsons. We need people ready to fight relentlessly and with conviction at every level of our government from citizen to dog catcher and everyone on up. Get involved because we need every single tool available for this fight. It’s far from over, but there are real paths to making it out to the other side. Read more below.
State attorney general prosecutions create accountability when federal enforcement fails. Federal officials committing crimes within state borders face state prosecution. Corruption, bribery, fraud, contempt of court. Trump cannot pardon state crimes. For complete details on this and other state-level resistance strategies, subscribe to The Existentialist Republic. If you want to go a step further in fighting you can click this text for the Intro to Soft Secession Booklet. All the booklet info is available for free in articles on The Existentialist Republic Substack, the booklet just organizes them into a handy introduction and supports our efforts at The ER.
References
Brennan Center for Justice. (2024). How gerrymandering tilts the 2024 race for the House. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/how-gerrymandering-tilts-2024-race-house
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. (2025, January 8). Election certification under threat. https://www.citizensforethics.org/reports-investigations/crew-investigations/election-certification-under-threat/
Congressional Research Service. (2025, August 4). Membership of the 119th Congress: A profile. Library of Congress. https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R48535
Gertner, N. (2025, February 11). Nancy Gertner reacts to a recent court order against the Trump administration [Interview]. NPR Morning Edition. https://www.npr.org/2025/02/11/nx-s1-5292199/retired-federal-judge-nancy-gertner-trump-federal-funding-freeze-restraining-order
Marimow, A. E., & Sacchetti, M. (2025, July 21). Trump accused of defying about a third of major court orders since taking office. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/07/21/trump-court-orders-defy-noncompliance-marshals-judges/
Rosenberg, E., & Bredderman, W. (2024, August 20). These swing state election officials are pro-Trump election deniers. Rolling Stone. https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/trump-swing-state-officials-election-deniers-1235069692/
If the Dems get a majority in the House and Senate next year (a stretch, but not impossible) they’d have enough power to effectively stop Trump’s inroads on Democracy. That doesn’t speak to repairing the considerable damage that’s already been done, but it’s at least a start
Getting a “trifecta” of our own in 2028 would make it possible to pass a few pieces of legislation that could enable Chris’ “soft secession” vision by effectively permanently kneecapping the federal government’s ability to fund itself.
This assumes the only way is through the Democratic party. What if a coalition could form between all who are against corruption in politics and who abhor the Epstein elites? The path could be to find Republicans who stand against corruption (hard as that might seem), and then organize mass recall elections in red states, in which Republicans who are complicit in corruption are removed from office. Get a large enough coalition and corrupt politicians in Congress can be removed from office with a 2/3 majority, and special elections would follow to replace them.
Sure, having more Democrats is part of the process, but as long as it remains a tribal approach, the tribalist problems will persist. As you say, the kinds of majorities needed are very unlikely to happen with Democrats running the table, especially when our elections systems are still not secure. It's time for America to come together.