‘These are really tough times’: House Republicans confront voter fury over Trump’s Washington in final midterm stretch

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GOP operatives conducting a focus group in a traditionally red Midwestern state this month were taken aback by what they heard from their own party’s voters.

Asked what they blamed for rising gas prices, those voters pointed to “corrupt politicians” and “billionaires” — a response that surprised some longtime strategists who’ve never seen government corruption emerge as a top issue for so many Republican voters in congressional races, according to a person involved in the discussions.

Those observations in the reliably red farm belt are just one instance of a glaring pattern for Republicans, as their House battlefield expands into places like Kentucky, Wisconsin and Arkansas. Even some GOP lawmakers acknowledge their party needs to do a better job of making sure they’re responding to voters’ anger at what they see as a broken system of government — or risk losing them altogether.

“These are really tough times … Between their mortgage and their electric bill and the cost of everything else, they’re having a hard time making it. That’s real. That’s a lot more important than the other insider crap we deal with,” said GOP Rep. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey, who’s built a brand in Congress as a Trump-loving populist who’s willing to point out his own party’s failures on issues like rising healthcare costs.

And while many voters blame politicians on both sides of the aisle, some Republicans fear they could soon take out those frustrations on the ones in charge.

Republicans involved in House races from Texas to New York to Florida have privately acknowledged to CNN they’re troubled by flashes of anger particularly from working-class voters with kids, whose gas and grocery prices are skyrocketing. One GOP consultant working on congressional races described the theme of corruption as an “underappreciated fact” of this midterm, calling it a “two or three issue” in polling even in reliably red seats this cycle.

There are fears that Republicans could see a washout in parts of the country that are suffering the most from high fuel and grocery prices — where they worry many blue-collar workers are feeling ignored by the president who once pledged to drain the swamp and, instead, has made plans to build a ballroom in it with a price tag in the millions.

Republicans are mostly downbeat about holding onto the House, though they believe the Senate is still in reach, given that Democrats would likely need to win red states like Iowa, Alaska or Ohio.

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Even so, inside the GOP, multiple House Republican operatives say they are seeing some slight glimmers of optimism as internal polling in some races has improved from what many saw as a doomsday scenario a few weeks ago. Several believe they’re seeing evidence that some voters are coming “home,” especially in races with strong candidates, and that the hundreds of millions of dollars being poured into those contests may be starting to help.

“In some places the polls are moving in our direction,” one GOP operative involved in House races told CNN, declining to offer specifics because of the competitive nature of the campaigns.

But the House map is still not a rosy picture for the party, whose president is underwater in states he won by double digits two years ago. Top GOP super PACs have cut off funding for two incumbents so far, which CNN first reported was under consideration, as well as several seats they were attempting to flip.

Top Democrats, for their part, remain confident they will win the majority – and not by a small margin. They feel particularly good about defeating incumbent GOP Reps. Monica De La Cruz of Texas, Juan Ciscomani in Arizona, Gabe Evans in Colorado plus Ryan Mackenzie and Scott Perry in Pennsylvania. That’s on top of the two incumbents already abandoned by GOP groups, according to multiple people familiar with internal polling. They’re also confident they’ll win in the open seat in North Carolina’s 11th , where GOP leaders pressured Rep. Chuck Edwards not to seek reelection, and Nebraska’s 2nd, where Republicans also pulled resources.

Republicans are still spending in most of these races and say their own internal polling shows a path to victory, particularly for Ciscomani and Evans and possibly De La Cruz. There’s also hope of last-minute enthusiasm boost in seats like North Carolina’s 11th, where Vice President JD Vance is scheduled to visit early this week.

One GOP operative involved in House races described each of those Democratic targets as “pure tossups.”

There is some nervousness within the GOP conference about incumbents like Rep. French Hill in Arkansas and Brad Finstad in Minnesota who are in deep red seats, though few actually believe they will flip. They anticipate seats like those will be closer, and more expensive, than people in the party want — but most do not expect the worst.

One Republican operative, who also spoke on the condition of anonymity, stressed that he does not believe an incumbent like Hill is at risk of losing: “If French Hill’s losing, it’s a f**king bloodbath. I don’t see it.”

While Republicans have rolled their eyes at some of Democrats’ most ambitious targets, the party has increasingly put real money behind expanding the map. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a potential 2028 presidential candidate, is leading a $20 million effort to push into red territory, including by trying to flip French’s seat. In an interview, Pritzker said he was trying to divert GOP money from more traditional battleground races and “support candidates where it might be a Trump +10 (district), but honestly, our candidate is running even or even ahead.”

Trump hasn’t ruled out keeping the House, telling Van Drew in a phone call last week: “We still have a shot,” the lawmaker recalled. And Speaker Mike Johnson has said that the environment “feels like 2024” - when Trump won and Republicans kept the House and flipped the Senate.

Johnson also said he believed polling may be underestimating GOP voter enthusiasm.

“I am there on the ground in the swing districts that are going to decide the majority, and I am telling you something is happening right now,” Johnson said as part of a frenzied multi-state swing from Maine to Texas. “I’m telling you, the polling is not reflecting this.”

Not every Republican shares that level of optimism.

“This is a really bad time right now … Just how bad, we don’t know yet,” Van Drew added, though he predicted that Republicans could still avoid a blue wave.

GOP operatives add that the Democratic Party’s brand, too, remains unpopular with voters and several of their incumbents have been swamped by corruption attack ads on TV. (Republicans have gone after Reps. Marcy Kaptur of Ohio, Vicente Gonzalez of Texas and Adam Gray of California in particular.)

Scores of Democratic candidates across the country have also found the issue effective against Republicans.

Sam Forstag, a first-time candidate and labor leader, has run an insurgent populist campaign in Montana’s 1st district that’s forced Republicans to spend time and money defending the open seat.

“Corruption, like a lot of other things in last couple years, is something that used to be spoken about in polite terms and hushed terms and now it’s all out in the open,” Forstag told CNN. He argued that Trump won the presidency twice by talking about this same issue – but then failed to deliver.

“Trump told everybody one singular truth. He said the system is broken … While he was saying that, well, we had a Democrat in the White House telling us the economy is better than we think it is,” Forstag said, referring to then-President Joe Biden. “One of those two messages was a lot, had a lot more veracity to it than the other, and unfortunately, it turned out that [Trump] was lying about all the ways they were going to fix these things.”

CNN’s Patrick Svitek, David Wright and Arlette Saenz contributed to this report

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本月，共和党工作人员在传统上支持共和党的美国中西部州进行焦点小组访谈时，被他们从本党选民那里听到的话吓了一跳。

当被问及汽油价格上涨的原因时，这些选民指出是“腐败的政客”和“亿万富翁”——一位参与讨论的人士表示，这一回答让一些长期从事战略规划的人士感到惊讶，他们从未见过政府腐败成为国会选举中如此多共和党选民关注的首要问题。

在传统上支持共和党的农业带地区观察到的这些现象，只是共和党面临的一个明显困境的缩影。随着共和党在众议院的战场扩展到肯塔基州、威斯康星州和阿肯色州等地，这种困境愈演愈烈。甚至一些共和党议员也承认，他们的党派需要更好地回应选民对政府体制弊端的愤怒——否则就有可能彻底失去选民的支持。

“现在日子真的不好过……房贷、电费，再加上其他各种开销，他们日子过得很艰难。这是真的。这比我们处理的那些内部破事重要得多，”新泽西州共和党众议员杰夫·范·德鲁说道。他在国会树立了自己拥护特朗普的民粹主义者形象，并且愿意指出自己党派在医疗保健成本上涨等问题上的失败。

虽然许多选民将矛头指向两党政客，但一些共和党人担心他们很快就会把这些不满发泄到当权者身上。

从德克萨斯州到纽约州再到佛罗里达州，参与众议院选举的共和党人私下向CNN承认，他们对工薪阶层选民的愤怒情绪感到担忧，尤其是那些有孩子的工薪阶层选民，因为汽油和食品价格飞涨。一位参与国会选举的共和党顾问将腐败问题描述为本次中期选举中一个“被低估的事实”，并称即使在以往共和党占优势的选区，腐败问题在民调中也只占“两三个关注点”。

人们担心，共和党人可能会在受高油价和食品杂货价格影响最严重的地区遭遇惨败——他们担心，在这些地区，许多蓝领工人感到被总统忽视了。这位总统曾承诺要清除华盛顿的腐败，但实际上却计划在华盛顿建造一个耗资数百万美元的宴会厅。

共和党人对保住众议院的控制权大多感到悲观，但他们认为参议院仍有可能被拿下，因为民主党人可能需要赢得像爱荷华州、阿拉斯加州或俄亥俄州这样的红色州。

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即便如此，共和党内部多位众议院共和党人士表示，他们看到了一丝乐观的曙光，因为一些选区的内部民调结果有所改善，而几周前许多人还认为形势非常糟糕。一些人认为，他们看到了一些选民“回归”的迹象，尤其是在候选人实力强劲的选区，而投入这些选区的数亿美元资金可能开始发挥作用。

一位参与众议院竞选的共和党人士告诉 CNN：“在一些地方，民调结果正朝着我们这边发展。”由于竞选竞争激烈，他拒绝透露具体细节。

但众议院的选情对共和党来说仍然不容乐观，该党总统在两年前以两位数优势获胜的几个州，如今却处于劣势。据CNN报道，共和党的主要超级政治行动委员会已经停止了对两名现任议员的资助，此外，他们还停止了对几个共和党试图翻盘的席位的资助。

民主党高层仍然信心满满，相信他们能够赢得多数席位，而且优势不会很小。他们尤其看好能够击败现任共和党众议员，包括来自德克萨斯州的莫妮卡·德拉克鲁兹、来自亚利桑那州的胡安·西斯科马尼、来自科罗拉多州的加布·埃文斯，以及来自宾夕法尼亚州的瑞安·麦肯齐和斯科特·佩里。据多位知情人士透露，共和党方面已经放弃了对两位现任众议员的支持。此外，他们也对赢得北卡罗来纳州第11选区的空缺席位充满信心。此前，共和党领导人曾施压要求该选区众议员查克·爱德华兹放弃竞选连任。他们还对赢得内布拉斯加州第2选区的空缺席位充满信心，共和党也曾撤回对该选区的资源。

共和党仍在大多数选区投入资金，并表示其内部民调显示他们有获胜的可能，尤其是西斯科马尼、埃文斯以及德拉克鲁兹。此外，他们还寄希望于北卡罗来纳州第11选区等地的选民热情能在最后时刻得到提升，副总统万斯计划于本周初访问该选区。

一位参与众议院竞选的共和党人士将民主党的每一个目标都描述为“势均力敌”。

共和党内部对像阿肯色州的弗伦奇·希尔和明尼苏达州的布拉德·芬斯塔德这样来自深红选区的现任议员感到有些担忧，尽管很少有人真正相信他们会翻盘。他们预计这类选区的竞争会比党内人士预想的更加激烈，竞选成本也会更高——但大多数人并不认为情况会恶化。

一位同样要求匿名的共和党人士强调，他不认为像希尔这样的现任议员有落选的风险：“如果弗兰奇·希尔落选，那简直就是一场血腥屠杀。我不认为他会落选。”

尽管共和党人对民主党一些雄心勃勃的目标嗤之以鼻，但该党却越来越多地投入真金白银来扩大版图。伊利诺伊州州长JB·普里茨克（JB Pritzker）是2028年总统大选的潜在候选人，他正领导一项耗资2000万美元的行动，旨在进军共和党传统票仓，其中包括试图拿下弗伦奇（French）的席位。普里茨克在一次采访中表示，他正试图将共和党的资金从更传统的摇摆州选区转移出去，“支持那些可能特朗普领先10个百分点的选区，但说实话，我们的候选人支持率与特朗普持平甚至领先。”

特朗普并未排除保住众议院的可能性。这位议员回忆说，上周他在与范·德鲁的电话中表示：“我们仍然有机会。”众议院议长迈克·约翰逊也表示，目前的形势“感觉像2024年”——那一年特朗普赢得了大选，共和党保住了众议院，并赢得了参议院的控制权。

约翰逊还表示，他认为民调可能低估了共和党选民的热情。

“我现在就在那些将决定多数选票归属的摇摆选区，我可以告诉你，现在正在发生一些事情，”约翰逊在从缅因州到德克萨斯州的密集多州巡回演讲中说道。“我可以告诉你，民调并没有反映出这一点。”

并非所有共和党人都抱有如此乐观的态度。

“现在的情况真的很糟糕……到底有多糟糕，我们还不知道，”范·德鲁补充道，但他预测共和党人仍然可以避免“蓝色浪潮”。

共和党人士补充说，民主党的品牌形象也依然不受选民欢迎，其几位现任议员遭到电视上铺天盖地的腐败攻击广告的围攻。（共和党人尤其针对俄亥俄州的众议员玛西·卡普图尔、德克萨斯州的众议员维森特·冈萨雷斯和加利福尼亚州的众议员亚当·格雷发起攻击。）

全国各地许多民主党候选人也发现，这一议题对付共和党人非常有效。

首次参选的工会领袖萨姆·福斯塔格在蒙大拿州第一选区发起了一场民粹主义的竞选活动，迫使共和党人花费时间和金钱来保住这个空缺席位。

“腐败问题，就像过去几年里很多其他事情一样，以前人们谈论它时总是小心翼翼、讳莫如深，而现在却完全公开了，”福斯塔格告诉CNN。他认为，特朗普两次赢得总统大选都是靠谈论这个问题，但最终却未能兑现承诺。

“特朗普告诉所有人一个事实。他说，体制已经崩溃了……与此同时，白宫里坐着一位民主党人，他却告诉我们，经济状况比我们想象的要好，”福斯塔格说道，他指的是当时的总统乔·拜登。“这两个说法中，一个更有分量，也更可信，但不幸的是，事实证明，（特朗普）在所有解决问题的方案上都撒了谎。”

CNN的帕特里克·斯维特克、大卫·赖特和阿莱特·萨恩斯对本报道亦有贡献。