Updated Sep 16, 2025 - Politics & Policy

Trump announces Republican midterm convention

Avery Lotz

Trump holds his hand up as he speaks from behind a podium on the RNC stage. A large screen displays his movements behind him. — Donald Trump speaks after officially accepting the Republican presidential nomination on stage on the fourth day of the Republican National Convention on July 18, 2024, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images

President Trump on Tuesday announced that the Republican Party will host a convention ahead of the 2026 midterms — an event Axios previously reported senior Democratic officials are also weighing putting on their party's calendar.

The big picture: The conventions typically happen every four years to formally nominate presidential candidates, but the possibility of dueling midterm gatherings demonstrates the weight both parties are placing on 2026, which could determine whether Trump retains his GOP trifecta in D.C.

Just after Axios reported in August that Ken Martin, the Democratic National Committee chair, had been quietly pushing the idea of a smaller national convention ahead of the 2026 election, Trump floated doing the same on Truth Social the next day.

Driving the news: "The Republicans are going to do a Midterm Convention in order to show the great things we have done since the Presidential Election of 2024," Trump wrote in a Tuesday post.

"Time and place to be determined. Stay tuned, it will be quite the Event, and very exciting!" he added.

The other side: A DNC spokesperson said in a statement provided to Axios that "[t]o showcase our tremendous candidates running up and down the ballot and harness the amazing grassroots energy we're already seeing, several options are on the table for next year, including hosting a midterm convention."

The statement continued, "The sincerest form of flattery is imitation and we're amused the President is following our lead."

Flashback: Democrats used to hold such events before or after midterms in the 1970s and '80s, Axios' Alex Thompson reported, but they scrapped the event in 1986 after party leaders deemed it a waste of money and energy.

And months into 2025, the DNC is still shouldering the cost of last year's election. At the end of July, the DNC had some $65 million less cash on hand than its Republican counterpart.

Between the lines: Also indicative of the importance of the upcoming midterms is the redistricting race playing out in red and blue states across the country, sparked by a Trump-backed push for Texas to redraw its maps.

Per the U.S. Census Bureau, the voter turnout rate in the 2022 congressional elections, where the GOP flipped control of the House and Democrats held onto the Senate, was lower than in the historic 2018 elections but saw the highest voter registration rate in 30 years.

Go deeper: How Trump's game-planning for the 2026 midterms

Editor's note: This story has been updated with comment from the DNC.

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Trump announces Republican midterm convention

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