In yet another sign the electorate is rejecting MAGA’s culture-war politics, Democrats swept school board elections in Texas, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.
“From Texas to Pennsylvania to Ohio, Democrat-backed candidates ran successful campaigns in some of the nation’s largest school systems and in political battlegrounds,” reported Politico. “They emphasized test scores and bus safety over debates about which bathrooms transgender students use and banning books from school libraries. The result was a set of election results at the local level that accentuated the punishment meted out against Republicans by swing voters earlier this month.”
Turns out, anti-trans hysteria isn’t exactly top-of-mind when voters are worried about the cost of living or the quality of a child’s education.
“Republicans thought it was an effective strategy, because it represented the values of their party, like ‘We’re looking out for you, and Democrats are looking out for this niche group,’” Chris Cormier Maggiano, a board member of pro-LGBTQ+ PAC Fight for Our Rights, told Politico. “And I think that narrative has now flipped.”
We always talk about political pendulums swinging, and we’re seeing that now. Republicans are in a world of hurt, and it’s only fixing to get worse next year, with more resignations expected.
Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia announced last week that she would resign from Congress in January 2026.
Ultimately, Republicans won’t lose the 2026 midterm elections because of their culture-war stances but because of their fixation on them. Democrats got electorally punished for the manufactured perception that they cared more about trans rights than the cost of living. Republicans are now getting hammered for their very real obsession with trans people at the expense of cost-of-living issues.
And that’s where Democrats need to be careful. The pendulum may be swinging their way now, but pendulums swing back if you let the fundamentals slip. Voters want their lives to get better in material, tangible ways. They want to feel like the people in charge understand what it means to juggle rent, child care, groceries, health care, student debt, aging parents, and unpredictable wages. When a party delivers on that basic expectation, voters reward them for it. When a party gets distracted or starts signaling that something else matters more, they don’t.
For Democrats, the path forward isn’t complicated. The party has to keep showing up for the everyday economic concerns that shape people’s lives while still fighting for the rights and dignity of the communities that form its core coalition. Those two things aren’t in tension unless Democrats allow them to be. The broader electorate isn’t rejecting inclusion or equality, as we were reminded this past election. It is rejecting political actors who seem more invested in symbolic fights than in solving real problems.
The GOP can’t escape its culture-war spiral. That’s the only thing its base cares about anymore. And Democrats have the advantage of a coalition that actually wants governance. If they treat that as an opportunity instead of a constraint, they can meet the electorate where it is now and keep it there. The pendulum may be swinging in their favor, but it won’t stay there on its own.
