US midterm elections: Why Democrats are backing Trump candidates

The US midterm elections have seen Democrats now counting on former president Donald Trump, and his chosen candidates.

Joe Biden and Donald Trump won’t be on the ballot when Americans vote in a month.

But the midterm elections – to determine which party controls Congress for the next two years – are all about the current and former presidents. The irony is that, for both Democrats and Republicans, many would rather the campaign had nothing to do with them at all.

Republicans want the midterms to be a referendum on Biden, one of the most unpopular presidents in US history. While his personal ratings have improved in recent weeks, inflation is still fuelling a cost of living crisis and more than two thirds of voters believe the country is heading in the wrong direction.

In turn, Democrats want to make the midterms all about Trump, the former president who retains power over much of the Republican Party as he plots another White House run in 2024.

The Democrats are counting on former US President Donald Trump being toxic among middle-of-the-road Americans, even though he is not on the ballot for the midterm elections. Picture: Jeff Kowalsky/AFP

His core voter base is as strong as ever, but top Democrats (and even some Republicans) believe Trump’s refusal to accept his 2020 defeat and the shocking Capitol riot that followed has made him toxic among middle-of-the-road Americans.

That theory prompted Democratic strategists to unleash an extraordinary political strategy that has divided their own party – and contradicted Biden himself.

In recent months, Democrats spent more than $80m on advertisements designed to influence Republican preselection races, boosting Trump-backed candidates they believed would be easier to beat in November’s general elections.

The reverse psychology-style ads hyped up the hardline views of far-right Republicans and suggested they were too conservative, aiding their profile with voters they had to win over in their primary races.

Among those to benefit were Doug Mastriano, a Pennsylvania state senator who participated in the January 6 “Stop the Steal” rally and is now the Republican nominee to lead the key battleground state.

The Democrats also targeted Michigan congressman Peter Meijer, one of only 10 Republicans to vote to impeach Trump in the wake of the January 6 riot.

Republican candidate for Pennsylvania Governor Doug Mastriano. Picture: Mark Makela/Getty Images/AFP

They spent more than $670,000 buying ads that helped his Trump-backed rival John Gibbs, even though he claimed there were “anomalies” in the 2020 results that made Biden’s win “mathematically impossible”. That was more money than Gibbs raised himself.

Meijer was furious, saying he was “sick and tired of hearing the sanctimonious bulls*** about the Democrats being the pro-democracy party”, but he was unable to win the primary battle.

From Pennsylvania to Michigan, there is every chance the controversial strategy will pay off for the Democrats. But, according to American politics expert Associate Professor David Smith, it is “at odds with the principles of what the party should be”.

“The party wants to talk about defending democracy from people who are trying to undermine it,” says Smith, from the University of Sydney’s United States Studies Centre.

“Then they go after one of the few Republicans who stood up against Trump in the aftermath of the Capitol riot – that really doesn’t sit right.”

‘Submerged’ Trump voters are wreaking havoc on US election predictions

That hypocrisy was underscored last month when Biden delivered a dramatic speech in which he declared Trump and his “Make America Great Again” allies represented “an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic”.

“MAGA Republicans do not respect the Constitution. They do not believe in the rule of law. They do not recognise the will of the people,” Biden thundered.

“They refuse to accept the results of a free election. And they’re working right now, as I speak, in state after state to give power to decide elections in America to partisans and cronies, empowering election deniers to undermine democracy itself.”

US President Joe Biden is one of the most unpopular in US history. Picture: Saul Loeb/AFP

Of course, as Smith points out, Biden’s own party spent $1.8m helping one of those people in Mastriano – and if he wins, he would be in a position to try and overturn future elections.

“They are playing with fire,” Smith warns. “In the United States today, almost no statewide race is safe … It really is a very dangerous strategy.”

While the Republican Party had hoped to take control of the House of Representatives and the Senate with a decisive swing next month, the polls have recently tightened as Biden secured a series of legislative wins – including passing his mammoth $US1.1 trillion Inflation Reduction Act – and new abortion restrictions became a central issue for voters.

This has upped the stakes for both Biden and Trump, with the political future of both presidents on the line even though neither are up for election.

A Republican red wave would put Trump in the box seat to run again and essentially make Biden a lame duck for the second half of his term in the White House.

A strong result for the Democrats – defying the history of midterm elections under new presidents – would officially turn the tide for Biden’s administration and aid Republicans wanting to move on from Trump once and for all.

Either way, Smith says it is difficult to see the midterms bringing a fractured country closer together.

“Polarisation is so bad that you almost wonder if it can get any worse, but the answer is that it can always get worse,” he says.

Originally published as US midterm elections: Why Democrats are backing Trump candidates