(Credit for the voiceover for this article goes to the great Samuel Lipson)
Those of you who have followed me for any amount of time know one thing if absolutely nothing else: that I am an extreme skeptic about Donald Trump and his MAGA movement. In the four years that I have spent writing for this newsletter and all the time before that, I have only very rarely given either credit for anything on their own merits. Instead, I have viewed and described them in the exact way that they came across to all of us at first: as a laughably inept and out-of-touch band of corrupt morons structurally incapable of understanding or doing what it takes to succeed in politics. It’s a perspective that has served me well over the years, and now, its moment has fully arrived.
Since January 2025, we have watched every single non-intrinsic advantage once enjoyed by the MAGA movement dissipate until leaving entirely. The positive economic perceptions that had been their calling card for nearly a decade have completely inverted to become some of the lowest ratings on material issues in American history. The horrific Democratic candidate selection processes exemplified by the ascensions of the likes of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have given way to an all-world recruitment class, while Republican candidates have remained just as terrible as ever. Their anti-war reputation has been obliterated by the Iran War. Their anti-establishment reputation has been obliterated by their marriage with big tech. Even their advantage on the question of immigration has been massively reduced by their extreme excesses.
There is nothing left, and it is because of this that the stakes of this election are very simple. The question is not if Democrats can win power nationally and stop Trump’s agenda, as they’ve already done that before. It’s if they can finally pull off that long-awaited realignment that sweeps away the System of 2016 and finally inaugurates something new. The conditions are as good as they could ever be; all the cards are on the table. If Democrats cannot win a certain state now, after everything, they are never, ever going to be able to win it in their current iteration, if at all. Tomorrow, they will find their ceiling, and the height of it will determine if MAGAism will continue or if it will be dealt a lethal blow.
So, where do things stand? What is the state of the race? Are Democrats really in a position to finally achieve the full-scale electoral breakthrough that both parties have been desperately chasing for the past ten years? If they are, where does the wave look like it will crest? Are there any glimpses of hope for Republicans in their fight to retain control of the Senate, and how are they managing in their effort to mitigate their losses as the map has expanded to places once unimaginable over the past few weeks?
In short: are we finally about to take the first steps out of our political Hell?
Final Official Ettingermentum 2026 Senate Map. No tossups.