As they do the first Tuesday of every November, Americans went to the polls this week to elect their leaders. The peaceful occurrence of this democratic ritual indicates that the US still has some distance to travel before it reaches full-blown authoritarianism. The results were a clear rebuke to president Donald Trump. Yet American democracy remains imperilled. Tuesday’s results set the stage for future showdowns.
It was a very good night for Democrats. They flipped the governorship of Virginia and held on to the governorship of New Jersey. Both races were won by convincing margins. Even more impressive were the legislative results in Virginia, where Democrats won at least 64 out of 100 seats in the House of Delegates. These results, in states that lean Democratic but where Republicans can win, confirmed Trump’s deep unpopularity. Recent polls have Trump’s approval ratings falling to a second-term low of 37 per cent.
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