#midterms 2022

What are midterms?

Help get out the vote:

- Sign up to call or text to remind people to vote

- Drive someone to the polls

- Support the Every Last Vote fund to help overcome voter suppression efforts

- Share a positive, progressive message on social media (it may seem small, but it helps to stop hate & disinformation from spreading!)

- Thank a poll worker!

Some last-minute reminders:

- If they say you are not registered to vote at the polls, do not leave! Ask for a provisional or affidavit ballot.

- Call the Election Protection Hotline 866-OUR-VOTE or 866-VE-Y-VOTA with any questions or concerns. See other numbers above.

- And of course… if you are in line to vote, stay in line! They must allow you to vote as long as you were in line before polls closed.

- Finally, it may take days or even weeks to calculate the election results. Be patient and remind others that this is normal and expected.

Resources:

- Am I registered to vote?

- Can I register on Election Day?

- Where is my polling place?

- What’s on my ballot?

Because the Republican Party is so terrible, I want Democrats to win any seat they can. That said, I am often leery of the tactics of some Democratic candidates, particularly from the party’s more centrist bloc. Many of those tactics failed this week — which should ensure that they don’t spread within the party.

Rep. Tim Ryan, running for a Senate seat in Ohio, sharply criticized Biden’s student loan cancellation and implied (inaccurately in my view) that the Democratic Party is writing off states that don’t have lots of college graduates.

If Ryan had won in this red state, his approach would have been hailed as what Democrats must do to win, even though it’s really just pandering to moderate and conservative-leaning White men. But Ryan lost to Republican J.D. Vance by about 7 percentage points.

In Florida’s U.S. Senate race, the Democratic candidate, Rep. Val Demings, emphasized her tenure as Orlando’s police chief and repeatedly rebuked activists who have called for defunding the police. I hope Demings’s crushing defeat (by more than 16 points) shows Democrats that whatever electoral problems they have related to crime, policing and race, those aren’t going to be solved by trying to out-cop the Republicans.

Democratic policies did even better than Democratic candidates

South Dakota voted to expand Medicaid. Kentucky rejected an antiabortion amendment to its constitution. Missouri voters legalized marijuana. Democratic candidates resoundingly lost in these states.

There were a lot of progressive ballot initiatives this year adopted on those issues and others, in both red and blue states. This continues a pattern — Democratic policies were passed by referendums throughout the 2010s even as Republicans kept winning elections.

I would trade in a heartbeat Michigan and Minnesota going blue at the state level and all of those successful progressive ballot initiatives in exchange for Democrats keeping the House and Senate. Congress is just hugely important. I’m not sure a party can consider it a good election cycle if it loses a house in Congress, as still seems very possible for Democrats.”

— The 2022 Midterms in Review (by Perry Bacon, Jr.)

-Wes Moore wins and becomes Maryland’s first Black Governor-elect.

Fetterman getting hugs from his kids when he was declared the winner.

* * * * 

If I Should Need to Name, O Western World ——— If I should need to name, O Western World! your powerfulest scene to-day, 'Twould not be you, Niagara—nor you, ye limitless prairies—nor your huge rifts of canyons, Colorado, Nor you, Yosemite, with all your spasmic geyser-loops ascending to the skies, ap- pearing and disappearing, Nor Oregon's white cones—nor Huron's belt of mighty lakes—nor Mississippi's stream: This seething hemisphere's humanity, as now, I'd name—the still small voice preparing— America's choosing day, (The heart of it not in the chosen—the act itself the main, the quadrennial choosing,) The stretch of North and South arous'd— seaboard and inland—Texas to Maine, The Prairie States—Vermont, Virginia, Cali- fornia , The final ballot-shower from East to West— the paradox and conflict, The countless snow-flakes falling—(a sword- less conflict, Yet more than all Rome's wars of old, or modern Napoleon's:) Or good or ill humanity—welcoming the darker odds, the dross, the scene's debris: —Foams and ferments the wine? It serves to purify—while the heart pants, life glows: These stormy gusts and winds waft previous ships, Swell'd Washington's, Jefferson's, Lincoln's sails.

Please vote. The wellbeing of so many people depends on these midterms. I’m actively trying not to think the worst, but given the state of this country right now, news outlets, and all forms of media, anything can happen.

If you’re feeling anything tonight, you’re not alone. I just encourage you to vote, rest, and stay off the internet tomorrow if possible.