As Republicans face down slipping approval ratings and growing voter discontent, President Donald Trump is musing about cancelling — or refusing to accept the outcome of — the 2026 midterms.
“It’s some deep psychological thing, but when you win the presidency, you don’t win the midterms,” Trump told Reuters in an interview published on Thursday. “When you think of it, we shouldn’t even have an election.”
The comments came on the heels of an interview the president gave to The New York Times, in which he repeatedly danced around a commitment to respecting the results of the midterms, claiming that he “always [respects] the results of elections, but the elections in our country are rigged.”
Earlier this month, in a speech to Republicans at a congressional retreat at the Kennedy Center, Trump complained of having to “even run against these people,” referring to Democrats.
“Now, I won’t say ‘cancel the election, they should cancel the election,’ because the fake news will say he wants the elections canceled,” the president added. “‘He’s a dictator.’ They always call me a dictator.”
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked on Thursday about Trump suggesting multiple times that the midterms should be canceled. She claimed Trump was just “speaking facetiously,” and “simply joking.”
“Are you saying that the president finds the idea of canceling elections funny?” reporter Andrew Feinberg asked in a follow up.
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“Were you in the room?” Leavitt snapped. “I was in the room […] and only someone like you would take that so seriously and pose it as a question in that way.”
While the White House is attempting to dismiss the comments as an extended comedy routine, the president himself has continued to threaten authoritarian action.
On Thursday, Trump threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act against ongoing protests in Minnesota in response to unrest following the killing of 37-year-old American citizen Renee Good by ICE agents.
“If the corrupt politicians of Minnesota don’t obey the law and stop the professional agitators and insurrectionists from attacking the Patriots of I.C.E., who are only trying to do their job, I will institute the INSURRECTION ACT,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, “and quickly put an end to the travesty that is taking place in that once great State.”
The Insurrection Act would allow Trump to federalise members of the state’s National Guard in order to suppress the protests, which have remained generally peaceful despite increasingly violent displays from federal agents deployed to Minnesota.
A series of polls published in January have recorded a sharp spike in disapproval of ICE, and the types of enforcement tactics being employed over the course of the administration’s deportation surge. A CNN poll found that “Americans say, 51% to 31%, that ICE enforcement actions are making cities less safe rather than safer; another 18% say there’s been little effect either way.” A separate YouGov poll found that 52 percent of respondents disapproved “of how Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is handling its job,” versus 39 percent approval.
As Trump’s administration struggles to claw back public support amid a volatile economy, international turmoil, and increased revulsion over the administration’s use of force in American cities, it’s no wonder Trump would rather skip this year’s elections.
From Rolling Stone US
