1. LEADING OFF

Good morning. Forty days out.

In a PBS News/NPR/Marist poll released Wednesday, 45 percent of registered voters said their vote for Congress this fall is mostly a vote against President Trump. Only 24 percent said it’s mostly a vote for him. The same poll found 56 percent would rather back a candidate with new ideas than one with a proven record.

Put those numbers together and you get an electorate that knows exactly what it’s against and hasn’t yet been told what it’s getting. The first number can win a House majority. The second decides whether that majority keeps anyone’s trust. In my opinion, the second one is the harder number, because a president’s unpopularity can’t answer it for you.

Below, you’ll find the first test our On the Hill columnist thinks a new majority would face, the state that could make Medicaid a 2028 Democratic presidential primary issue, and the Iowa poll Iowans don’t believe.

— Elias Isquith

2. DEMOCRATS RIDE THE ANTI-INCUMBENT TIGER

Our On the Hill columnist has been watching this Congress all year and is not grading on a curve. Today’s column argues that members have spent the fall on show votes while people outside Washington worry about gas, rent, and groceries. Our columnist expects that frustration to help Democrats take the House.

Then comes the turn. The anger that could hand House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries the Speaker’s gavel doesn’t go away once he has it. A majority won this way, our analyst argues, has to prove itself — fast. And as you’ll see if you read the piece, the most tempting things to do with a gavel aren’t the ones that prove anything. 

Columns like this usually run in December, after the promises have been made. Running it now puts the to-do list in front of the people still asking for votes.

To learn more about the four problems that would be waiting on a Speaker Jeffries’ desk, read this month’s On the Hill column at The Caucus.

3. THE FOURTH STATE

New Mexico has never been one of the first states to vote in a Democratic presidential primary. In 2028 it goes fourth, on February 15, after South Carolina, Nevada, and New Hampshire. Russell Payne asked New Mexico Democrats what that changes, and their answer is the conversation itself.

Candidates who want to win New Mexico will have to talk about water rights, about oil and gas money and who it actually benefits, and about Medicaid. Medicaid covers about a third of New Mexicans, a bigger share than in any other state. In my view, that last one is the sleeper. A primary where candidates discuss Medicaid cuts in front of the people living with them is a different primary from one decided on cable news.

To learn more about why one youth organizer thinks New Mexico will tell candidates more about young voters than any other early state, read Russell Payne’s full story at The Caucus.

4. UPS AND DOWNS

👍 A Marist poll of Iowa released Tuesday has Democrat Josh Turek ahead of Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson 50 percent to 42 percent for Senate. It also has Democrat Rob Sand ahead of Republican Zach Lahn 54 percent to 42 percent for governor.

👎 Iowans don’t believe it. In the same poll, 59 percent say Hinson will win anyway, and an Emerson poll earlier this month had Hinson up five.

👍 Democrat James Talarico had 12 times as much cash on hand as Republican Ken Paxton as of the last report in June. A lot of it came in through viral TV appearances and fundraising appeals.

👎 It isn’t enough to keep pace. Ads backing Paxton add up to more than $94 million in September reservations, against roughly $20 million backing Talarico, according to NPR’s analysis of AdImpact data. A campaign can out-raise its opponent and still get out-spent more than four to one by their allies.

5. IN THE NEWS

— The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is spending nearly $8 million on TV in 26 House districts this week. It’s the first week Democrats are advertising in more districts they’re trying to flip than districts they’re defending. (The Caucus)

— The Cook Political Report on Wednesday moved Kansas’s Senate race, between Kansas Senator Roger Marshall and Democrat Adam Hamilton, from “Likely Republican” to “Lean Republican.” It also moved South Carolina’s, between South Carolina Senator Darline Graham and Democrat Annie Andrews, from “Solid Republican” to “Likely Republican.” (The Hill)

— Democrat Sherrod Brown has run at least three TV ads hitting Ohio Senator Jon Husted over the roughly $116,000 Husted took from 2001 to 2025 from billionaire Les Wexner, who once hired Jeffrey Epstein as a financial adviser. Husted is answering with ads on Brown’s own donors named in the Epstein files. (The Associated Press)

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