Size of voter turnout will decide House: analysts

With no crystal ball at hand, pundits, pollsters and political soothsayers are having a hard time forecasting the outcomes of the US midterm elections on Tuesday.

Until Monday, a flurry of polls and analyses suggested the Democrats could regain a majority in the House, but with a caveat: only if their voters turn out sufficiently.

That, coupled with the prospect that US President Donald Trump's Republican Party would continue to dominate the Senate, means a divided Congress is most probable, with the GOP's legislative agenda likely to stall, followed by an increase in investigations to be pursued by subpoena-powered Democratic committee leaders.

On the eve of the midterm elections, Democrats continued to hold a double-digit lead, 55 percent vs 42 percent, over Republicans in a generic congressional ballot among likely voters, according to a CNN Poll released on Monday.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll released a day before showed that half of registered voters prefer Democratic House candidates, compared with 43 percent for Republicans. Democrats need to gain 23 seats to win control of the House.

But The Associated Press, in a report last Wednesday, cautioned, "depending on voter turnout, it's also possible that the Republicans could maintain their hold on both the House and the Senate". Other reports said the Republicans may even expand their majority in the Senate, which now has 51 Republicans and 49 Democrats.

In the days leading up to the midterm elections, Trump has tried to convince voters that Republicans produce jobs, while Democrats produce "mobs", warning that if Democrats regain political power, the US economy would suffer badly.

Some analysts, however, said a Democratic House majority couldn't do much to reverse the trend in the economy.

"It's probably not that much of a change," Beth Ann Bovino, chief US economist at S&P Global, was quoted by the AP as saying. "While you might see further gridlock if the Democrats take the House, that doesn't mean it would tip the boat and slow growth."

A Democrat-controlled House would be "a line of defense" against further tax cuts, reduced entitlement spending and efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, said Oxford Economics' senior economist Nancy Vanden Houten, according to the AP report.

A divided Congress would present a "profound challenge" to Trump's presidency for the last two years of his term, making the prospect of major legislation even more distant and opening a period of partisan warfare led by Democratic committee leaders intent on investigating everything from his taxes to Russia's involvement in the 2016 election, The New York Times reported on Monday.

"If Democrats win control of the House, they will gain control of powerful committees that could put a check on Mr. Trump's agenda," the newspaper said in an article on Oct 29. "They will assume control of two of the most powerful tools in Washington: gavels and subpoenas."

Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi also said last week that investigating the president's tax records is one of the "first things we'd do".

"If Democrats win the House, Trump's foreign policy may be in trouble," claimed Vox Media in one of its website reports.

With the Senate likely to remain in Republican hands, House Democrats would be limited in what they can do, but that won't stop them from trying to push back on Trump, vox.com reported on Nov 1.

"There will definitely be a re-evaluation of America's engagement in the world," it cited US Democratic Representative Joaquin Castro of Texas, a member of the House Foreign Affairs and Intelligence committees, as saying.

Another Democrat, Representative Adam Smith of Washington state, said the next Congress should, among many things, focus on pushing back on Trump's plan to increase and modernize the US' nuclear arsenal and tackling large issues ignored by the Trump administration — like the threat of climate change.

In the scenario that Republicans maintain control of both chambers in Congress, it would render not only a victory for the party, but also an endorsement of Trump's style of politics and facilitate his re-election bidding.

Contact the writer at huanxinzhao@chinadailyusa.com