Trump specifically cited in pulling the nomination the need to protect House Republicans’ slim majority rather than any problem with Stefanik herself.
The House has key votes coming up on Trump’s agenda, and the GOP could not afford to let Stefanik’s seat remain vacant — there have been reports that Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY) planned to delay a special election to replace her for as long as legally possible — or fall to the Democrats.
Republicans are panicked by polling showing a special congressional election in Florida next week too close for comfort. A private poll taken by a top Trump 2024 strategist has GOP candidate Randy Fine trailing after enjoying a 12-point lead in February.
Trump carried this congressional district by 30 points last year. He won statewide in Florida by 13.1 points. Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), with whom Fine has feuded, was reelected by a 19.4-point margin in 2022. DeSantis has warned that Fine, a state senator, will underperform — a “way underperformance,” he said — on Tuesday.
“They’re going to try to lay that at the feet of President Trump,” DeSantis told reporters. “That is not a reflection of President Trump. It’s a reflection of the specific candidate running in that race.”
But it is not an entirely isolated incident. Democrats narrowly won a special election for a state Senate seat in a heavily Republican district this week. Democrats also won an Iowa state Senate seat in a special election in an overwhelmingly Republican district earlier this year and came close in another.
Democrats hope this is a sign of backlash against Trump and his Department of Government Efficiency sidekick, Elon Musk. They have warned on the campaign trail about billionaires trying to cut social programs to pay for tax cuts for the rich.
There is a likely Trump connection, with Democrats extremely angry and motivated to turn out after he returned to the White House. But in the Trump era, many Democrats are now high-propensity voters who show up for special elections while many working-class converts to the GOP skip them.
Trump was reelected in 2024 with a special focus on low-propensity voters, spearheaded by Musk and conservative activist Charlie Kirk. But it is difficult to motivate these voters to turn out in off-year elections without Trump on the ballot.
This is a stunning reversal from when Barack Obama was running for president. He won two terms in the Oval Office in part by getting younger and minority voters to turn out in record numbers. But he was unable to mobilize them in the midterm elections. Republicans easily took the House in 2010 and then captured the Senate in 2014. Democrats took a beating in down-ballot races during Obama’s presidency.
There has been tremendous Democratic energy and anger in recent weeks, with progressives disrupting Republican lawmakers’ town hall meetings and holding huge rallies. Some of this may reflect superior organizing skills. It is unlikely that the demonstrators who chanted about Jan. 6 at an event for Rep. Harriet Hageman (R-WY) are especially representative of local conditions.
Wyoming was Trump’s best state for the second consecutive election in 2024. He won 71.6% of the vote. Jan. 6 was thoroughly litigated in Hageman’s 2023 GOP primary for the seat, when she beat former Rep. Liz Cheney by 37.4 points.
But discrepancies between the parties in organization and enthusiasm can make a big difference in special elections.
The Florida congressional seat Republicans are most worried about on April 1 was vacated by former Rep. Mike Waltz to become Trump’s national security adviser, a position that doesn’t require Senate confirmation. Stefanik’s confirmation hearings were repeatedly delayed before her withdrawal in order not to detract from Republicans’ slender House majority further. Now, she must stay in Congress to shore up her party’s precarious position, though a recent Politico poll showed a generic Republican faring well against the Democratic candidate in her district.
Waltz was at the center of a Signal chat group leak of details about a Yemen military strike that accidentally included fervently anti-Trump journalist Jeffrey Goldberg, who later reported on some of the contents.
Republicans are going to have to figure out a way to address their turnout deficit ahead of next year’s midterm elections, in which their small House majority could be wiped out entirely. They underperformed in the 2022 midterm elections, which were widely expected to be a red wave.
WARNING SIGNS FOR DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICANS AHEAD OF NEXT ELECTION
That year, Florida was a rare exception where Republicans met and even exceeded electoral expectations. They will need some luck to replicate that on Tuesday.
The Stefanik move shows that Republicans all the way up to the White House aren’t leaving anything to chance.
