Top five takeaways from Tuesday’s elections

OPINION:

Democrats had a big night Tuesday. What did we learn from the voters?

History repeats itself

The historical trend in New Jersey and Virginia is that the party opposite the incumbent president wins the gubernatorial race. With voters electing a Democrat for governor while Republican President Trump is in office, the trend continues.

That said, Republicans should not brush off the results as a routine trend. One, the margins of victory were larger than most expected them to be in the final results. Republican Glenn Youngkin won four years ago when Democrat Joseph R. Biden was president, but he polled just above 50%. Democrat Abigail Spanberger won with more than 57% of the vote. That helped other Democrats win close elections throughout the commonwealth.

Although the party opposite the White House typically wins the gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey, it can often serve as a bellwether for the midterm elections.

Voters elected Republican Christine Todd Whitman as governor a year after Democrat Bill Clinton was elected president. The following year, a wave of Republicans retook the House and Senate as well as many other governorships across the country. The same thing happened the year after Republican Chris Christie was elected governor in New Jersey, when Barack Obama was in his first year as president.

It also goes the other way. In 2017, Democrat Phil Murphy was elected governor of New Jersey when Republican Donald Trump was president. During the 2018 Democratic wave, Republicans lost the House and many gubernatorial races. The same thing happened after Democrat Jon Corzine was elected governor in 2005 while Republican George W. Bush was president. Voters in swing states seem to want to counter what they perceive as overreach by either party.

TDS is high in Democratic strongholds

Proposition 50 is the California ballot initiative that suspends the maps for congressional districts drawn by an independent commission and replaces them with a gerrymandered map adopted by the state Legislature, which Democrats control. It passed overwhelmingly Tuesday and will cost Republicans House seats from California.

An exit poll conducted by The Associated Press showed that roughly 7 in 10 voters in California said party control of Congress was “very important” to them. Those voters overwhelmingly supported Proposition 50. The exit poll also showed that approximately 80% of voters who supported the measure said it was necessary to counter changes made by Republicans in other states. Only 20% said it was the best way to draw maps.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom made his intentions clear before the vote when he said that if Democrats take the House majority in 2026, it will “end Donald Trump’s presidency as we know it.” This is just the latest phase in Trump derangement syndrome.

This phenomenon was also a clear factor in Northern Virginia. The voters in the suburbs of Washington not only gave a clear victory to Ms. Spanberger but also helped elect a Democrat who said he fantasized about putting two bullets in the head of a Republican House speaker. Usually, that would be a disqualification for a candidate seeking to be the state’s top prosecutor. Not in Northern Virginia. These people hate President Trump so much that they voted for Democrats across the board.

House majority is in jeopardy

Midterm elections are historically tough for the party of the incumbent president. That got much harder after Tuesday. New maps in California will likely cost the Republican Party several seats in the House. The massive blue wave in Virginia also will fuel the move to redraw boundaries there in a way that will make it very difficult for Republicans to hold on to several seats.

Personality matters

Zohran Mamdani is a charismatic candidate. His social media campaign was outstanding. He comes across as likable and was discussing issues that many voters care about.

After the 2024 elections, I warned that many of the inroads made with younger voters were based on personality, not policy. Authenticity is a big deal, and they viewed Mr. Trump as genuine and Vice President Kamala Harris as a fraud. Mayor-elect Mamdani embraced his personality-driven brand of socialism, and younger voters liked it.

That said, New York City is a liberal place. Ms. Harris received two-thirds of the vote there last November. Overall, the rest of the mayoral vote was split between a Republican and a disgraced former governor who was running under a third-party banner. Conservatives need to recruit charismatic candidates.

Wages and prices are the big issues

James Carville famously said during the 1992 presidential campaign, “It’s the economy, stupid.” He was right. Now it’s all about higher wages and lower prices.

To avoid a blue wave next fall, Republicans must focus on wages and prices. People are genuinely concerned about these issues. They must see results as well as plans for the future. Thankfully, conservatives have answers. Let’s get to work!

• Scott Walker is president of Young America’s Foundation. He served as the 45th governor of Wisconsin.