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The REAL reason Democrats won: MARK HALPERIN spots secret to their landslide victory buried in exit polls… and how it may ultimately backfire Mark Halperin is the editor-in-chief and host of the interactive live video platform 2WAY and the host of the video podcast 'Next Up' on the Megyn Kelly network. By MARK HALPERIN FOR DAILYMAIL.COM Published: 14:20 GMT, 5 November 2025 | Updated: 14:20 GMT, 5 November 2025 Democrats didn't just win on Tuesday. They crushed it. From Virginia to New Jersey to California, they rolled through every major contest, as a party that has rediscovered its swagger. Governor's races? Swept. Attorney general in Virginia? Won, even with a candidate whose past text messages (expressing violent thoughts about a political opponent) might, under other circumstances, have ended a career. A redistricting measure in California? Passed handily. Add victories in Pennsylvania's Supreme Court races, down ballot contests in Virginia, and a Maine ballot measure on voting rights and the scoreboard was one-sided enough to make Republican strategists wonder if they were experiencing an Yves Klein Blue Monochrome-inspired mass hallucination. This was the off-cycle election the GOP dreaded; the test they hoped wouldn't arrive; the omens realized; the chickens coming home and settling in for an uncomfortable roost. Rather than tightening up and locking down the map, Republicans watched Democrats expand it. For all the talk of Republican momentum heading into the 2026 midterms, this was a flashing red warning that the political winds might be blowing the other way. From Virginia to New Jersey to California, Democrats rolled through every major contest, as a party that has rediscovered its swagger. (Pictured: New Jersey Governor-elect Mikie Sherrill) Pictured: Virginia Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger Democrats didn't just win because they were organized. They won because the Trump coalition, shorn of Trump himself, became deflated. Minority voters who flirted with the GOP under Trump's spell seem to have vanished without him on the ballot. In Virginia and New Jersey, Republicans were wiped out among Hispanics and working-class non-white voters — the very blocs they boasted had joined their movement just a year ago. Virginia's Abigail Spanberger, a former CIA officer who first flipped a deep-red seat during the anti-Trump backlash of 2018 and has since cultivated a pragmatic, centrist image, romped to victory. New Jersey's Mikie Sherrill, a Navy veteran and former federal prosecutor representing the affluent suburbs west of New York City, turned back her GOP challenger with ease. Exit polls show Spanberger winning 84 percent of non-white voters without a college degree, Sherrill winning 71 percent and both women taking more than 70 percent of Latinas. Their Republican opponents, according to the exit polls, got only 31 percent and 34 percent of Hispanics and five percent and eight percent of black voters, respectively. In California, 70 percent of Latino voters said Trump's deportation policies went too far. If the GOP's comeback strategy is dependent on those groups, they'll likely need a new plan. Trump's attempt to soothe the faithful on Truth Social — insisting Republicans lost because his name wasn't on the ballot — is cold comfort to those Republicans already gaming out the 2026 midterms (and casting an icy chill towards 2028). The problem is precisely that Trump won't be on the ballot then either. His hovering presence motivates his voters (but also Democrats), but his absence exposes how little of his movement can stand on its own. Trump may have inspired MAGA and transformed the Republican Party, but Donald Trump is, and always has been, a one-man show. And that show has a fixed closing night. Republicans are also facing a double crisis: a fundraising problem and a woman problem, especially among young women who recoil from the culture-war politics the party keeps reinforcing. What was meant to be a crusade for parental rights and traditional values now feels, to many voters, like an attempt to police women's lives. Even the suburbs that once tilted red have retreated again, exhausted by the noise and intrusion. And while Republicans search for a message, Democrats are learning to weaponize emotion. Anger used to make party elders tense. Now it's the entry ticket for 2028. Voters, numbed by years of chaos, tired of being buffeted by Trump's hot air, eager to shake off the grip of his Teflon clout, seem to crave candidates who channel fury into — and with — authenticity. Zohran Mamdani, the New York assemblyman who has become a rising voice on the Democratic left, tapped into that energy in his own insurgent, winning campaign for mayor in the Big Apple, all the while remaining personally affable and accessible. For all his controversies — including accusations of radicalism, antisemitism, and his open embrace of socialism — Mamdani understood something basic: people want someone who will rage against a system they believe has failed them. Trump once owned that tone. Now leaders like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Gavin Newsom have learned to wield it, and they do so with a fluency and confidence that unnerves their opponents. Zohran Mamdani, the New York assemblyman who has become a rising voice on the Democratic left, tapped into that energy in his own insurgent, winning campaign for mayor in the Big Apple A redistricting measure in California? Passed handily. (Pictured: California Governor Gavin Newsom speaks on election night) Republicans, meanwhile, appear to have only one script from Tuesday. Based on early statements from Trump allies, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, their spin on Election Day 2025 is simple: the Democratic Party is now the party of antisemitic communists. It's the modern echo of Joe Biden's old joke about Rudy Giuliani, who, Biden said, based an entire campaign on 'a noun, a verb, and 9/11.' In 2025, the GOP's version is the face of the Democratic Party is an antisemitic communist socialist, applied liberally (pun intended) and their retort for every Democrat success. Mamdani assisted by literally quoting Eugene V Debs — the early 20th-century labor leader and five-time Socialist Party presidential candidate who famously ran from prison in 1920 — in his at times heated victory speech on Tuesday night. Republicans seized on the moment instantly, waving the red flag (embossed with hammer, sickle and gold star) as proof of this one-note notion. Yet even as they tried to brand Democrats as radicals, Republicans seemed adrift. The loss in Virginia wasn't only about weak Republican candidates. It was a backlash against the Trump administration's assault on the economic privilege and stability that Northern Virginia voters have long taken for granted. Republicans are now likely to write off the state entirely in 2026 and 2028, an astonishing reversal from just a few years ago when they were boasting about its reddish-purple hue. Democrats, however, shouldn't overinterpret the results. They had strong candidates and structural advantages in states predisposed to favor them. The economy remains sluggish, and the cost of living remains the issue voters most want solved, with an affordability throughline sparking the polls in New Jersey, Virginia and New York City. Now Democrats, in part, are the ones who have to perform on the economy. Still, the night shattered the narrative that the Democratic Party is imploding. The fears that Democrats can't raise money, recruit talent or excite voters suddenly look overblown. The party's mood, once funereal, has turned buoyant. Tuesday's big turnout by voters doesn't lie — that right there is enthusiasm, optimism and mojo. The results won't change White House policy, of course. The Trump administration's focus remains fixed on dismantling liberal power centers — the courts, the bureaucracy, the media — not on recalibration after a rough election night. For the MAGA movement, rage is still the strategy, even if the electorate has grown tired of being shouted at. So, what does Tuesday's result really mean? Not that a blue wave is inevitable in 2026, but that a red force strong enough to hold the Republicans' House majority might never come. For all its dominance, Trumpism remains brittle and iffy, dependent on its creator's personal magnetism. MAGA needs better candidates, a better economy and a better story about how its revolution is improving the real lives of real people. Without that, it's all noise and nostalgia hinged on a single star. Democrats, meanwhile, are learning how to fight with discipline and emotion at once — a potent combination. They've found their footing not by pretending to be calm, but by letting their frustration show. Politics, like Bay area weather, can change quickly. But for one night at least, the forecast was clear: Democrats own the victory. Republicans own the hangover. And America's mood, volatile as ever, is still searching for an affordable, permanent and peaceful home. Share or comment on this article: The REAL reason Democrats won: MARK HALPERIN spots secret to their landslide victory buried in exit polls… and how it may ultimately backfire Add comment
