Whether it’s a 12-hour-long protest on the Capitol steps about inflation, assaulting police officers during a protest at an ICE facility, or the threat of ousting the newly elected leadership of the DNC, it’s safe to say that since President Donald Trump retook the White House in November, Democrats have found themselves lost as a party, if not in total disarray.
The Democrats’ apparent lack of direction and constant infighting could help carry the GOP through a midterm cycle that, given historical trends, they appear destined to lose.
Over more than a dozen interviews, party officials and GOP consultants told the Daily Caller that they have a plan to bring Republicans more victory in 2026 — and they’re fully intending on using the divisions in the Democratic Party to achieve this goal.
“There’s an old rule in politics that I tell my clients, which is when your opponent is committing suicide, stay out of the way,” a national GOP operative told the Caller. “And that’s what the Democrats are doing right now.”
DEMS IN DISARRAY
In stark contrast to the Democratic Party, the GOP is fresh off a week-long celebration touting the Trump administration’s success in the first 100 days of his second term. Six months after Trump was elected for the second time, and the party took both the House and the Senate, the GOP is in prime position to enact the MAGA agenda.
Despite the celebration, the thought of the 2026 midterms still looms. The question of how to continue to capitalize on the nation’s massive shift to the right is on the minds of GOP strategists, top party officials and the White House.
“What I am going to tell my clients is let the Democrats be Democrats. If they think that transgender issues and Harry Sisson and those guys are going to deliver them great wins, God bless them. Keep going, kids,” one Midwestern conservative strategist told the Caller.
Since the 2024 election, Harris’s camp signaled that she wouldn’t make a decision about her political future until the summer. Joe Biden retreated to Delaware for a quiet life. Gavin Newsom launched a podcast. Gretchen Whitmer was spotted in the White House. And AOC and Bernie Sanders, two of the party’s furthest left candidates, stepped up to become the new faces of the Democratic Party.
“Democrats may not know who their leader is, but we do – it’s the Jasmine Crocketts, the AOCs, and the Bernie Sanders of the party. We’ll elevate their most extreme voices, like Jasmine Crockett, because they are the ones running the party right now, and they couldn’t be more out-of-touch with what most Americans care about,” Abigail Jackson, the deputy communications director for the Republican National Committee, told the Caller.
Andrew Clark, founder of Relentless Strategies, told the Caller that the media is primed right now to cover tension within the Democrat ranks and that Republicans can use this opportunity to push Democrats to be on the record talking about the division in their party. Alternatively, they can force them on the record defending unpopular policy positions – like men in women’s sports. Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff, who is running for re-election in Georgia, and Democratic Rep. Haley Stevens, who is running for an open Senate seat in Michigan, are both cosponsoring legislation that would allow men to compete in women’s sports, for example.
“Get Democrats on the record talking about it, draw attention to it,” Clark told the Caller. “If the Democrats go on the record now, that’s what gets used for ads in the fall — that lays the foundation for what these Republicans can run on and what these Democrats have to defend.”
In November, nearly every area of the country shifted to the right. American voters signaled leading up to Election Day that they were worried, first and foremost, about Democrats’ handling of the border crisis and the effect ‘Bidenomics’ had on the economy. But voters were also heavily persuaded by the candidates’ views on transgender issues. According to an analysis by Future Forward, a Democratic super PAC, Trump’s most effective ad was one telling voters that Harris was for “they/them” but that he was for “you.” That ad shifted viewers 2.7 percentage points in favor of the now president.
One strategist told the Caller that getting Democrats to take the unpopular stance on 70-30 and 80-20 issues – like wanting men in women’s sports – can prove to be lucrative for Republicans.
“It provides really kind of stark differences between our candidates and theirs that manifest themselves on the earned media front,” a GOP strategist told the Caller.
The Democrats’ collapse hasn’t just been on Capitol Hill, as one strategist pointed out. Across the country, Americans have protested the administration, especially Elon Musk’s role, by lighting Tesla chargers on fire, keying the cars and throwing Molotov cocktails at Tesla dealerships.
“What am I doing about this? I’m just collecting footage, some of this unhinged protest footage, like … domestic terrorism and like people keying cars and looking completely out of their minds,” one national strategist focused on full service creative services told the Caller.
The strategist also pointed out that Democrats have rushed to back federal workers: “These overpaid suburban D.C., career bureaucrats… if that’s their rallying cry, I think that they’re in trouble in the swing states.”
“I think any little bit of stuff that we have showing the Democrats spending a lot of time on those folks is going to be beneficial for us to hold, to have in the quiver to use,” the source added.
THE VIEW FROM THE WHITE HOUSE
Echoing what the strategists pointed out, one top White House official told the Caller that the “big, beautiful” reconciliation bill will give them an opportunity to further bury Democrats on policy.
“Like the big tax package and all this that’s come forward [in the reconciliation bill], we think there will be really popular things in there that 100% of Democrats will vote against, and then we will hang it around their neck like an anchor,” the official told the Caller.
While nailing Democrats to unpopular policy positions and highlighting the ongoing disarray in the party is important, the White House believes that the president’s ability to deliver on his campaign promises will be the best advertising the party has going into 2026, the official told the Caller.
“The big picture, the thing we’ve been most focused on so far, is just delivering the agenda that the president ran on, which is critical issue number one. We have to give the voters what they paid for to try to cement the coalition that brought him into office, which is, of course, the coalition that we need — at least some version — to turn up in the midterms in order to be successful where we want to be successful,” the senior White House official told the Caller.
That means delivering for voters on securing the southern border – which the administration has made leaps and bounds on. Illegal crossings were down roughly 95% in March from the monthly average during the Biden administration.
It also means putting more money into Americans’ pockets and addressing their concerns on the economy, something the administration is still trying to navigate as the stock market reacts to Trump’s tariff policies. The economy is something every strategist and consultant that the Caller spoke to agreed could tank the election for Republicans in 2026. And it’s an element the White House knows they have to address.
“The question is, what does [the economy] look like, sort of Q2 of next year? And if we can get the economy really moving in the right direction … by the data it already is … But get people feeling that, then I think we’ll be really successful,” the official told the Caller of the White House’s plans to address the economy.
WHERE TO FOCUS
Fixing the economy isn’t the only thing the party will be looking at the White House to do to help ensure the 2026 midterms are a building year for the GOP. Across the country, strategists, PACs and party officials will follow the White House’s direction on which states and races they should focus their time and resources.
The House of Representatives will be a big target focus, the White House official told the Caller, adding that “all of the swing districts, whether on the offensive or defensive side” will be a priority.
“The Senate is probably in a little bit safer territory, but we think we’ve got a great offensive opportunity in Georgia, good offensive opportunity in Michigan, and potentially good offensive opportunity in New Hampshire,” the official said of the top targets for the party moving into 2026.
The NRCC plans to build on down-ballot gains with different demographic groups, including Hispanic, African-American, and young voters, one party official told the Caller.
“I think for the Senate map, one of the things to lean into is the fact that Democrats don’t even want to be here,” one NRSC official told the Caller, mentioning all of the recent Senate Democrat retirees that have been announced. Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois, Tina Smith of Minnesota and Gary Peters of Michigan have indicated that they will not be running for reelection in 2026.
And don’t count out New Jersey, a typically blue state that Trump narrowly lost in 2024.
At the time the White House official spoke to the Caller, Trump had yet to endorse in the New Jersey governor’s race. The official noted that they would continue to monitor the race and would get involved if they felt Republicans were in “striking distance.”
That would “bode well for ’26 and in the future,” the official added.
On Monday, Trump announced an endorsement of Republican Jack Ciattarelli, who is the frontrunner in the primary.
Part of the puzzle to defeating the Democrats in 2026 and securing further victory for the GOP is capitalizing on what the party has only recently embraced: early voting and get-out-the-vote (GOTV) efforts.
American Majority Action’s Ned Ryun told the Caller that it comes down to the fundamentals: voter registration, more absentee voting, and embracing early voting where it benefits the party. Ryun also stressed the importance of the GOP – both on a national and local level – pressuring county clerks to clear their voter rolls of ineligible voters. In March, the Republican National Committee (RNC) requested all states provide the party information on how it maintains and cleans up its voter rolls, the Daily Caller previously reported.
After working on the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, Ryun and his group are now shifting their focus to Virginia, where they plan to practice the “fundamentals.”
NEW MEDIA APPROACH
Early voting isn’t the only new tool that the GOP harnessed for the 2024 election. Trump’s media strategy, which included appearing on podcasts and talk shows outside of legacy media programs, was a break from the traditional route politicians usually take on the campaign trail. It was also a strategy Harris and her campaign struggled to embrace, fumbling a potential interview with Joe Rogan that would’ve given the vice president a better chance at reaching independent and undecided voters.
The White House has indicated that the new media strategy is here to stay, shaking up the press briefing room to include new and independent media outlets and adding them into the daily rotation of reporters that cover the president.
The NRSC, meanwhile, is encouraging Senate Republicans to embrace this new approach — and create a novel media strategy of their own.
A national Republican working on Senate races told the Caller that the NRSC advised each Senate office in February to have an active presence on social media and to draft up a new media engagement plan as part of a list of benchmarks meant to assist incumbents up for re-election in 2026.
A month later, the NRSC encouraged incumbents to “lead the fight” for President Trump’s efforts to cut waste, fraud, and abuse from government spending through unconventional channels. Candidates were advised to “be a leader on cuts your senator is passionate about through regional and new media,” the source told the Caller.
The NRSC also appointed Senator Marsha Blackburn to be vice chair, with the expectation that she will assist Senate Republicans in breaking into the new media sphere.
One senator who took the new media strategy in stride was Senate Majority Leader John Thune.
A Senate aide explained to the Caller that they first implemented the new media strategy when Congress was voting on the “Keep Men Out Of Women’s Sports Act.”
Sen. Tuberville had already appeared on Megyn Kelly’s independent podcast to promote the bill and the pair started a pressure campaign on X in support of the legislation. That “opened up the door” for Thune to use that outlet to publicly advocate for the bill.
“She had a call with the leader [Thune] and it was him saying, ‘Look, this is a priority,’” the aide recounted to the Caller. “We gave her the exclusive so that she could be the one to announce when that vote would be taking place on her show. We gave that to her because we saw that as being the best place for it, because that’s where the conversation was focused.”
Another Senate aide told the Caller that it has been important to put members of Congress on hour-long podcasts in addition to quick TV hits because it helps show in-depth policy knowledge and allows constituents to get to know their senator on a more personal level. Some senators do podcasts that correspond with specific policy focuses, like cryptocurrency or culture war issues.
“What has kind of been the playbook forever has been five minute Fox [News] hits, and you get your message out,” the Senate aide explained. “But people don’t really know you.”
ANGRY VS. HAPPY VOTERS
“Policy is the politics,” is a message the Caller heard from nearly every consultant or party aide over the course of numerous interviews. The best message the party can campaign on, they stressed, is the president and the GOP delivering on promises made to the American people.
The fear, though, is that angry voters are typically more motivated to turn out in a midterm than happy voters.
The GOP has already learned this lesson from the special election in Florida’s 6th Congressional District. Although Republicans managed to hang on to now U.N. Ambassador Mike Waltz’s vacant seat, the March race was much closer than the party anticipated — particularly after Trump’s decisive victory just six months prior.
The party faced the hard truth that yes, voters upset with the current administration are more motivated to show up to the polls, one national GOP strategist told the Caller. However, the source noted that the tight race shouldn’t have been a total shock given how much money Democrats poured into the race.
“Our people – they got the message on time, but it took them a little bit longer. And so they basically needed to be rustled up to say, ‘Hey, this is important.’ But once the message was delivered that, ‘hey, the President’s agenda is on the line,’ it was lights out,” the source told the Caller.
The White House feels similarly, one official told the Caller, acknowledging that, at a certain point, they can’t help but make Democrats angry if they deliver on Trump’s campaign promises.
But the official added that the fight in 2026 is really about inspiring the Republican coalition to keep fighting each and every election cycle. Voters need to understand that Trump’s long-term success is in many ways predicated on having a friendly Congress to codify his agenda through legislation, the official explained.
“What it really comes down to is the Republican coalition … can we connect the need for a Republican Congress to Trump’s success in the minds of those voters that have really only turned out when Trump is on the ticket,” the official said.
AUTHOR
White House Correspondent. Follow Reagan on Twitter.
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