President Trump's approval rating has fallen to 34 percent among registered voters nationwide, the lowest mark recorded in any New York Times/Siena College poll of his presidency, while Democrats have built an 11-point lead on the 2026 generic congressional ballot just two weeks before Election Day.
A Historic Polling Snapshot
The survey, conducted October 12 through 19 among 3,494 likely voters with a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 1.9 percentage points, found respondents favoring the specific House candidates in their districts by 52 percent to 41 percent, according to The New York Times. That 11-point edge has grown from nine points since September, and nearly 99 percent of respondents were reached by cellphone, per the same survey as detailed by GV Wire.
Trump's approval among likely voters stood at 36 percent, while the broader registered-voter figure of 34 percent marked a three-point drop since September, the Times reported.
What's Driving the Drop
Economic frustration appears central to the slide. Per The Guardian, 73% of voters in the same Times/Siena poll disapprove of Trump's handling of gas prices, 69% disapprove on the cost of living, 64% disapprove on the overall economy, and 65% disapprove of his handling of the ongoing war in Iran. Those four issues together paint a portrait of an electorate squeezed by rising household costs and unsettled by overseas conflict.
The Times also found that Republican losses, initially concentrated among young and nonwhite voters who had shifted toward Trump in 2024 before swinging back toward Democrats, have since spread to men, white voters, and other traditionally Republican-leaning groups. Using past voting records and stated intention to vote, the paper's turnout model found Democrats leading by nine points among those who voted in a prior midterm or primary, and by 14 points among voters very likely to cast a ballot or who already have — while Republicans led only among people who said they were not at all likely to vote at all.
A Map That Still Favors the GOP
Despite the lopsided national numbers, the battlefield for House control remains narrow. The Cook Political Report classified just 21 of the 435 House seats as true toss-ups in October — 16 held by Republicans and five by Democrats — a crunch driven by mid-decade redistricting and geographic sorting, according to CNN. The Times itself cautioned that polls have overestimated Democratic support before, in 2016, 2020, and in crucial red states in 2018, though it noted the current lead would still represent a significant Democratic victory even if polling error repeated at that scale. Republicans, the paper added, could still avert a worst-case outcome by winning back reliable GOP voters in the campaign's final two weeks.
The Senate landscape has shifted further than many expected. Cook Political Report updates this month listed six Republican-held Senate seats as toss-ups — Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Ohio, and Texas — against just one Democratic-held seat, in Michigan, as reported by PBS News. Those are states Republicans have typically carried comfortably, and the Times noted that if the national poll numbers were replicated at the ballot box, Democrats could flip red states to retake the Senate entirely.
An Expensive, Historic Cycle
If an 11-point margin holds, it would exceed the 8.6-point national victory House Democrats achieved in 2018 — previously the largest midterm margin for either party in the 21st century — and would approach the 11-point national win Democrats posted in 2008, according to the Times. The Nation notes no major party has won a midterm popular vote by double digits since 1982.
Money is pouring into the fight at a record pace. Total campaign fundraising for the 2026 cycle has topped $15 billion since early 2025, with advertising spending exceeding $4 billion by mid-October, putting this midterm on track to be the most expensive in U.S. history, per KERA.
Cracks in the Republican Coalition
Some of that erosion shows up in how vulnerable Republican candidates are running their own campaigns. A review of 62 competitive House and Senate races found that two-thirds of Republican candidates — 41 of 62 — have publicly broken with Trump on specific policies or quietly scrubbed his name from campaign materials, Hoodline reported in earlier coverage. A separate September Wall Street Journal poll found 11% of 2024 Trump voters now say they regret that vote.
Sixty representatives, 36 Republicans and 26 Democrats, have announced retirements ahead of the midterms, opening contests in a political climate where the president's party has lost House seats in 20 of 22 midterm cycles since 1938. Against that backdrop, House Minority Leader Hakeim Jeffries has predicted Democrats will retake the chamber, while cautioning that individual races like New York's 17th District will be decided on the ground rather than by national trends.
Doubts About the Count Itself
Even as the numbers break toward Democrats, confidence in the voting process has slipped. A September UC San Diego survey of 5,016 American adults found only 49% expected the 2026 midterms to be free and fair, and confidence in accurate ballot counting fell to 55% from 77% in late 2024, cutting across party lines for different reasons. A New York Times graphic charts Trump's approval across five polling periods, including October 2020.
