#midterms 2026

Let me preface this by saying.....

For example, if there are 2 democrats running for senator for a state, there is probably going to be one that you prefer over the other. The current political parties have different 'groups' within them, and just because someone is a democrat, does not automatically mean they will do a good job in office. The primaries allows citizens of every state to have a say in who represents the party in the final election on November 3rd, 2026.

The primary election dates vary by state, with some starting in March, and some running as late as September. Primaries typically have low voter turnouts, which is why it is so important that everyone who is able to votes in them.

There are a few types of primaries, which I will list below:

Closed primary - You can only vote in the primary if you are registered Democrat or Republican, and must vote with the party you are registered with (Ex. Registered Democrat votes in the Democratic primary to select the Democrat candidate)

Partially Closed - same rules as above, BUT unaffiliated/independent voters can choose one parties primary to participate in as long as the political party allows it (Ex. Registered Independent votes in the Republican primary to select the Republican candidate)

Partially Open - Voters choose a party when registering, but they can switch their party at the time of voting (Ex. Registered Republican decides to vote in the Democratic primary, and they will now be registered as Democrat after voting)

Open Primary - Any voter can choose which party's primary they want to participate in

Open to unaffiliated voter primaries - unaffiliated/independent voters can choose one parties primary to participate in, but those registered to a political party must vote only in the primary for the party they are registered for

Multi-Party Primary - Everyone votes in the same primary, and the top 2 or 4 candidates are chosen to run on the ballot

Knowing this info can help you choose which party to register for when you register to vote.

Please note, registering as a certain party and voting and that parties primary does not mean you have to vote with them on November 3rd, 2026. Someone can register republican, vote in the republican primary, but still vote for a democrat in the actual Midterm.

The type of primary varies by state, so please check here for your states info.

List of Primary Election dates and voter registration deadlines for every states primary election in 2026!

primary elections are coming up in kansas (august 4th 2026) and on the ballot is a choice to vote for or against an amendment to the constitution regarding the process of supreme court justice nomination. a “yes” vote to accept the amendment would overhaul the existing merit-based system, meaning that justices would no longer have to prove impartiality, and would be replaced by a “partisan election system” that would allow significant monetary contributions (read: from billionaires) to campaigns, influencing their decisions in favor of said donors, effectively buying their decisions.

the current merit-based system still has its flaws and limitations, and i’m not naive enough to believe that there is no bias in the existing nomination and selection process or that judges always have people’s best interests at heart, but it is the reason that kansans were able to protect abortion rights when roe v. wade was overturned in 2022 by a 60% majority. so if you’re from kansas, please make sure you’re registered to vote (registration deadline is july 14th) and vote “no” on this.

i don’t like asking this but please if you can, spread this around so it can reach more kansans!

November 2026. Vote Democrat. We can take the House and Senate back. Talk to your friends, family, and like-minded folks. I feel hopeful. You should, too. We need to take that hope and do something with it.

you have voting rights. the current administration would not be gerrymandering, would not be using ice as enforcement at voting centers, would not be spreading propaganda about voter id and fraudulent elections if they didn’t know that. they do. it is our responsibility to utilize those rights and fight for the change that is both being stripped from us and the change we have never had.

inform yourself. research about your representatives and those running. find out about what they support, what they fight for, and—also importantly—who supports them. who funds them, who sponsors them. make sure that you are not an uninformed voter.

From Joohn Choe:

So the President's pick for acting Director of National Intelligence is William J. Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), grandson of the billionaire who founded the homebuilding giant PulteGroup, and a man who does not, from any verifiable reporting, even appear to hold a security clearance.

What does this mean?

It means increased risk of abuse of the office of the DNI, as suggested by his weaponization of mortgage-fraud prosecution, and at the same time decreased risk of successful abuse, because Pulte has never served in the intelligence community, the armed forces or the diplomatic corps (Congress, in creating the DNI position in 2004, actually stipulated that any nominee "shall have extensive national security expertise," which is one of several reasons the reaction on the Hill has been bipartisan).

In detail: Tulsi Gabbard's letter resigning as DNI effective June 30 set in motion a series of legal clocks I've discussed, namely a deadline to name a replacement before the resignation became effective, as well as a Federal Vacancies Reform Act (FVRA) governed deadline before the Principal Deputy DNI, in this case Aaron Lukas, became Acting DNI. The announcement of Pulte resets all of that and starts a new set of clocks and deadlines, the ones that matter for election security against a presumed adversarial Executive Branch.

There are bipartisan questions as to whether Pulte is even qualified to do the job, which makes any eventual confirmation a real question. Trump's open breaches with Senators Cornyn, Tillis and Cassidy effectively create a 48-47 Senate majority, 49-46 if you count Fetterman as a Republican.

Thus, let us briefly explain who Pulte is:

-- "Nepobaby" origins: the characterization is admittedly crude but informative. Born in 1988, Bill Pulte is the grandson of William J. Pulte, the billionaire founder of PulteGroup, and the heir to a major construction empire (a company he himself never ran).

-- Education and private equity work: graduated from Northwestern University in 2010 with a degree in broadcast journalism, then founded the private equity firm Pulte Capital Partners in 2011, which focuses on building and housing products.

-- "Twitter philanthropy": Pulte gained visibility in 2019 and 2020 by giving away hundreds of thousands of dollars to individuals on social media.

-- Political prosecutions as FHFA head: this is probably what concerns people the most, and the clearest signal for what Pulte at ODNI could mean. He used his position at the Federal Housing Finance Agency to issue criminal referrals to the DOJ alleging mortgage and occupancy fraud against:

1. New York AG Letitia James, referred in April 2025 and indicted that October on bank fraud and false-statements charges; a federal judge dismissed the case in November 2025 after ruling that the interim U.S. attorney who secured the indictment, Lindsey Halligan, was invalidly appointed (the dismissal was without prejudice, so DOJ can try again).

2. Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, accused of mortgage fraud, which is the basis on which Trump tried to fire her; Cook sued, and her case is pending before the Supreme Court, where the justices appeared inclined in January to let her keep her job.

3. Sen. Adam Schiff, Rep. Eric Swalwell, and Fulton County DA Fani Willis, all referred by Pulte for mortgage-fraud investigations, none of which has produced a conviction.

Substantial as they are, these concerns can be held aside from consideration of Pulte's impact, because as insane as it is to have an acting DNI who isn't even cleared to see the intelligence his office governs, the law on Cabinet replacements sets out relatively clear authorities and timelines. The bad news, from the perspective of the intelligence community (and this is limited bad news, given the questionably useful role of the DNI to begin with), is that they are pretty much stuck with him. As Tom Bevan of RealClearPolitics put it:

"Bill Pulte could never be confirmed. But according to the FVRA he can be on the job for 210 days. If Trump submits a nomination for DNI, Pulte can remain in the job the entire time the nomination is pending. If the nomination fails, Pulte's 210-day clock starts over."

Run the calendar and Pulte can serve as acting DNI without Senate confirmation until January 26, 2027, and as Roll Call notes, a rejected or withdrawn nominee simply restarts the clock. At time of writing, June 2 2026, there is no formal DNI nomination before the Senate.

The news from the perspective of election security against an adversarial administration is decidedly more mixed. Dispensing with the obvious: the 2026 midterms are scheduled for Tuesday, November 3, 2026 (federal law fixes the date as the Tuesday after the first Monday in November of even years). The American Presidency Project puts the average midterm loss for the President's party across 1934 to 2018 at 28 House seats and four Senate seats, and with Trump's approval sitting at or below 40 percent, nearly every model favors Democratic gains in both chambers (no president underwater in approval the month before a midterm has escaped House losses since Truman).

The President's calls to "nationalize" elections and the unprecedentedly close micromanagement evident in DNI Gabbard's presence at a January ballot raid in Fulton County, Georgia make it likely enough to be worth assessing, and tracking carefully, that the Executive Branch may try to disrupt or discredit the midterms using Pulte as DNI.