As we survey the wreckage of Republican political fortunes, it’s clear what comes next. Payback is the first priority of Democrats who want to use their victories to grind Republicans into the mud. 

You saw it in the gloating, Mamdani-esque victory speech from Michigan Sen.-elect Abdul El-Sayed, in which he sarcastically referred to Vice President JD Vance as “habibi” who will have to eat crow when the VP swears him in. 

You saw it in Minnesota Sen.-elect Peggy Flanagan’s speech: “We will rip ICE apart.” 

You saw it in the salivating from Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) about impeaching Trump. 

You saw it in the ugly threats against Elon Musk and “greedy billionaires.” 

Musk is a “traitor to the West,” said NYU marketing professor Scott Galloway, suggesting Musk should be executed: “We lined up the Rosenbergs against a wall.” 

The only upside of Democrat hubris is that it will surely lead them to overreach and turn off a volatile electorate before 2028. 

Good luck to incoming House Speaker Hakeem Jeffries keeping the incoming new radical socialist hate-America brigade on message. 

Democrats papered over their civil war during the campaign, apart from a last-minute Haley Stevens defection in Michigan, when a cocky El-Sayed brushed off his former primary rival’s charges of antisemitism. 

The party establishment’s punishment of Stevens was brutal, with some saying she was mentally ill and others suggesting her Jewish fiancé was controlling her. 

James Carville said she wasn’t even “worth a used condom.” 

She served as a warning to any Dem who tries to rebel against the socialist takeover. The party has made its choice. 

No pretending 

But President Trump can’t pretend the electoral rout wasn’t a referendum on him and his smashmouth politics that needlessly alienates people. 

He told voters to pretend he’s on the ballot. He handpicked dud candidates. He can’t wipe his hands of the calamity. 

Exit polls show Tuesday was a referendum on Trump, with his approval at 38%, the lowest for a president in almost 20 years. Voters blamed him for high prices and gas costs and called the Iran war a ­mistake. 

After such a mighty shellacking for the Republicans, theories for what went wrong are like a Rorschach inkblot test. 

For Vance, it was the Iran war. For others, it was immigration. 

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich picked the problem in May when he told “Pod Force One” that the price of gas would be the “biggest single factor in the election. . . . If you tell me the price of gasoline on Labor Day, I’m pretty confident I can tell you about the election.” 

On Wednesday, he recalled: “The price of gasoline on Labor Day was something like $4.55 a gallon on average. What that meant was every American would be angry. Gasoline, in my mind, has always been one of the central issues in American politics. We’re still a country that relies very heavily on driving. So you start out with the idea people were very unhappy economically.” 

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Gingrich also said Trump never quite explained the Iran war to voters. 

At a town hall in Maine last week, Troy Jackson encapsulated all the messages that Democrats successfully injected into the campaign and that later showed up in exit polls: the cost of living, gas prices, immigration enforcement, corruption and the war. 

A majority of Maine households use fuel oil as their primary heating source and the cost has almost doubled in the last year, from an average of $3.31 per gallon In October 2025, to $6.05 last month. 

Blame game 

As people filled their tanks, cost was top of mind, and Jackson hammered home the blame to Trump. 

“I think we’re at 83% higher than we were last year . . . that’s directly because of the Iran war. And it means that people this winter are going have an incredibly hard time getting their home heated . . . Now you’re talking about $1,800, $2,000, to fill your tank.” 

He blamed “Elon Musk and his merry band of scumbags” for Mainers’ affordability problems. 

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“The billionaire class is not going to get what they want if we change the people that are capitulating to Donald Trump.” 

Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey, appearing with Jackson in Scarborough, Maine, chimed in with more gibes to an appreciative audience. 

“We have a Trump administration which is . . . an all-you-can-eat buffet of corruption, for the president, for his children, for his cronies, for his corporations, and the impacts are being seen right here in the great State of Maine.” 

During the campaign, story after story broke to illustrate the Democrats’ corruption theme, showing that Trump has been ill-served by those closest to him. 

The news that Don Jr.’s wedding party on a private island in the Bahamas was paid for by a Russian oligarch broke in mid-September. In October, his ex, Kimberly Guilfoyle, had to resign as ambassador to Greece over claims she asked a Trump donor to pay off her credit card. In late October came allegations that former Trump lawyer Alina Habba had signed a $50 million deal with a Venezuelan billionaire before he was pardoned. 

Democrats weaponized these allegations skillfully and will dredge them up when they take control of the House and the Senate next year and start investigating and/or impeaching the president and everyone around him. 

Trump ended up being a turnout machine — for the other side. He spoke loudly and carried a small stick, when he needs to do the opposite. 

But he now has the opportunity of changing course. Finish Iran and get out. Focus on the economy. Quietly stay the course on immigration without acquiescing to demands for amnesty for illegal immigrants. And tell family and friends to stop cashing in Hunter Biden-style. 

Barack Obama and Bill Clinton lost both houses of Congress in their midterms and got a lot done by “the pen and the phone.” They ended their presidencies more popular than ever. 

The economy is already growing, and Trump has promised boom times over the next two years, and gas prices back below $2 after the Iran war is finished. 

The jostling of his hopeful successors has already started on both sides. Gingrich expects 10 to 15 Republicans, and 15 to 20 Democrats, to throw their hats into the ring. 

If Trump sets the table for a Republican to win in 2028, his legacy will be preserved.