Democrats are poised to romp in today's election — easily winning the House and, according to most forecasts, flipping the Senate, too. Yet the party itself is less popular than the IRS. Even the GOP has a better brand, Axios' Mike Zapler, Alex Thompson and Holly Otterbein write.

• Why it matters: There's a difference between a blowout and a mandate. Confusing the two could tempt Democrats to overread the results and forget the serious credibility problem they still face heading into 2028.

🖼️ The big picture: Democrats have done a lot of things right to position themselves for a big night.

• They recruited candidates who've put red-state Senate races within grasp. Many of those candidates vastly outraised their Republican opponents.
• But polls across the board still show a lesser-of-two-evils election — or, as one Republican tied to President Trump's political operation described it, a contest of which party voters hate more. Voters are more eager to disempower Trump than to empower Democrats.

By the numbers: Just 29% of registered voters have a positive opinion of the Democratic Party, compared with 38% who view the Republican Party positively, according to a pre-election NBC News poll.

• Yet the same poll shows Democrats leading the generic congressional ballot by 7 points, 52% to 45%.

🔎 Zoom in: Many Democrats say they're determined not to repeat the mistake they made after the 2022 midterms. They defied predictions of a red wave and saw it as an endorsement of Joe Biden and their party.

• Voters were actually growing angrier, setting the stage for Trump's comeback in 2024.
• Democrats won the House in 2018 and impeached Trump the next year. This time, likely Speaker Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) is steering clear of impeachment talk, and his 100-day agenda is focused on affordability.
• Others say the party still lacks a winning pitch. "We have no economic message. And if we don't get one, we're not going to win," Democratic strategist Jim Messina told party leaders and operatives at a Third Way gathering in South Carolina earlier this year.

The bottom line: Many top Democrats believe it'll take a new presidential nominee — and likely one who wins in November 2028 — to fully repair the party's damaged brand.

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The threat of a blue tsunami is bearing down on President Trump's Washington, with virtually every major indicator forecasting a Democratic rout in today's elections, Axios' Zachary Basu writes.

• Why it matters: Expectations for the midterms have soared so high that some Democrats fear disappointment is inevitable, particularly if the party falls short of winning the Senate — a prize that seemed beyond reach just months ago.

Five key metrics help distill the extraordinary consensus taking shape on the eve of the midterms:

🔮 95% and 80%: The probability of Democrats winning the House and Senate, respectively, according to election forecaster Nate Silver, whose model projects an average gain of 25 House seats.

🗺️ 7 for 7: Democrats lead in every Senate battleground state surveyed in the final New York Times/Siena polls, including by 11 points in Michigan and seven in Texas. Trump carried six of those seven states in 2024.

🏛️ 240: The number of House seats Democrats could win on the upper end of Cook Political Report's forecast — potentially their largest majority since the first year of Barack Obama's presidency.

🎲 73%: The probability of Democrats winning both chambers of Congress, according to Kalshi.

🫏 +14: Democrats' lead on the generic congressional ballot in the final poll from AtlasIntel, which became the nation's highest-rated pollster after its remarkably accurate 2024 performance.

🥊 Reality check: Even the pollsters forecasting a Democratic landslide are haunted by the possibility that they're still missing Trump voters.

• New York Times polling chief Nate Cohn warned that white Democrats were roughly 30% more likely than white Republicans to respond to the paper's final surveys — a slightly wider gap than in 2020, when polls overstated Democratic support.

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Elon Musk is looking to shake up America's wireless industry — potentially bringing the first major new competitive threat in years to a business dominated by three companies, Axios' Ina Fried writes.

• Why it matters: The cellular industry has seen enormous technological change, but relatively little disruption to its competitive structure. Musk has the money, wireless spectrum and satellite network to attempt something different — though he faces daunting obstacles.

SpaceX is assembling the pieces to become a major U.S. wireless carrier, potentially building its own terrestrial network and buying available spectrum.

• Musk may have reason to move quickly while the current administration and its regulatory appointees remain in place.

🔭 Zoom in: SpaceX has held talks about acquiring Boost Mobile or gaining access to its network arrangements, according to a Washington Post report yesterday.

• The Post reported that Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile have all rebuffed Musk's efforts to gain access to their networks.

Between the lines: Musk also has a path to maneuver around them. The company could build its own network with towers and smaller rooftop antennas, though doing so would require substantial investment and time.

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The Pentagon's former top military planner is under federal investigation and may face a court-martial for allegedly leaking to reporters from The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, Axios' Marc Caputo reports.

• Why it matters: Former Army Lt. Gen. Brett Sylvia was fired by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth last week after being accused of misconduct as part of the department's war on leaks.

Sylvia failed four polygraphs and admitted to the incidents during two interviews on video that totaled more than two hours, according to details from an internal Pentagon report shared with Axios.

• He allegedly shared classified information about Ukraine and Iran, which the Justice Department is investigating.
• Neither reporter is suspected or accused of doing anything illegal, improper or unprofessional in their reporting.

Keep reading.

Republicans on the ballot this cycle have all but stopped mentioning President Trump in their campaign ads, according to an Axios analysis of broadcast advertising data from AdImpact.

• Why it matters: Trump has tried to make the 2026 midterms a referendum on his presidency. His party has run the other way, Axios' Sara Fischer writes.

🧮 By the numbers: Trump appeared in 66% of House Republicans' primary ads but shows up in just 3% of their general election ads.

• In Senate races, Republican ads mentioning him fell from 77% to 22%.

👓 Between the lines: This year's drop-off stands out given how hard Trump has pushed to tie himself to the midterms.

• He has urged voters to pretend he's on the ballot and essentially demanded ads running during the Republican midterm convention in September feature him.

Keep reading ... Get Axios Media Trends.

Tonight's complete results might not be known for days, Axios' Andrew Pantazi writes.

• AP didn't call control of the House until seven or eight days after Election Day in each of the past three elections.
• The Senate was settled at 12:06 a.m. ET on Wednesday in 2024. In 2022, it took four days, and in 2020, it wasn't called until Georgia's January runoffs, two months later.

More election count stats.

Above: In closing remarks at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool yesterday, President Trump focused more on his sweeping plans to remake Washington than on the midterms, Axios' Avery Lotz writes.

• He praised the newly reopened pool and a new White House helipad, and laid out plans for a "triumphal arch" and a promenade from the Lincoln Memorial to the Potomac.

Keep reading ... Watch the speech.

This historic Election Day, online and in print:

📺 The MS NOW chyron writers dashed off these updates during President Trump's remarks yesterday at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool: "OVER 10 MINUTES INTO TRUMP'S 'CLOSING ARGUMENT' SPEECH, TRUMP STILL TALKING ABOUT REFLECTING POOL."

• "OVER 15 MINUTES INTO TRUMP'S 'CLOSING ARGUMENT' SPEECH, TRUMP STILL TALKING ABOUT REFLECTING POOL."
• "OVER 20 MINUTES INTO MIDTERM 'CLOSING ARGUMENT' SPEECH TRUMP YET TO MENTION THE ELECTION."

🦊 Fox News showed an aide handing Trump another Reflecting Pool photo with the chyron: "NOW: TRUMP SPEAKS ONE DAY BEFORE PIVOTAL MIDTERMS."

DJs are playing music at about 5,000 polling places across 24 states during this year's election, Axios San Antonio's Madalyn Mendoza writes.

• The nonpartisan initiative, DJs at the Polls, started at a single Philadelphia polling site in 2009. It focuses on communities with historically low turnout and aims to draw young and first-time voters.
• In the San Antonio area alone, DJs will set up at 79 polling locations.

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