Democrats can’t ever seem to win federal races in North Carolina, but former Governor Roy Cooper is the strongest U.S. Senate candidate that the party has run there in a long time. The party also has also convinced former Senator Sherrod Brown to run for his old job in Ohio. And this week, Mary Peltola, who in August 2022 won a statewide special election for Alaska’s only U.S. House seat and was reelected that November, officially entered the U.S. Senate race there.
Such a strong crop of Senate candidates is very positive news. With these candidates running and the increased unpopularity of Maine Republican Susan Collins, Democrats have a small chance of winning the U.S. Senate this year, which would block President Trump from judicial confirmations and many other powers in his final two years in office. Even if they can’t pull that off, flipping one or two seats in 2026 hands the party a very strong chance to get to 50 in 2028, giving it a majority if a Democrat wins the presidency and a Democratic vice president can cast tie-breaking votes. Democrats have also strong prospects of flipping the House this year. So even though we are enduring a dark, scary time in American democracy, a Democratic trifecta in January 2029 and a chance to reverse much of what Trump has done is now a very real possibility.
These successful Senate recruitments also tell another story: Perhaps Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and the party’s leadership isn’t totally useless. Schumer has deserved the intense criticism that he has received for his inept handling of a government funding fight early last year (he was better during last fall’s shutdown), and his refusal to endorse Zohran Mamdani after the future New York mayor won the Democratic primary (or even say who he voted for in the general election). But the Majority Leader has been very involved in encouraging these candidates to run, and his recruits could flip the Senate and help save democracy.
I am not prematurely declaring victories for Democrats in 2026 or 2028. Nothing is guaranteed. But these early developments in the 2026 Senate contests really matter. The way that American politics is currently polarized, with Democrats dominating in urban areas and the coasts but very weak in small, rural states in the Great Plains and Mountain West, essentially everything must go right for the party to win the Senate.
And a lot is going right for Democrats right now. Trump’s poll numbers have plunged, making him unpopular even in red and purple states that he won in 2024. The president’s net approval is -9 in Ohio and -13 in North Carolina, according to The Economist. Independents are deeply frustrated with the president. Democratic voters are super-engaged and turning out in large numbers. The party did extremely well in last fall’s elections, and special elections over the last year.
And in many key states, Democrats have found Senate candidates who are familiar to voters and have been skilled enough to win in these places before. Cooper was elected attorney general of North Carolina in 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012 and then governor in 2016 and 2020. The Democratic presidential candidate at the top of the ticket lost in all those years but 2008. Peltola was the first Democrat since 2008 elected statewide in Alaska when she first won her at-large House seat three years ago. Brown lost his reelection contest in 2024, but received 47 percent of the vote in Ohio, compared to 44 percent for Kamala Harris. The Democrats also have a good plan to make Nebraska competitive. The party is standing down there while populist Dan Osborne makes a second run as an independent. He won 47 percent of the vote in 2024, well ahead of Harris’s 39 percent in the state.
Okay, let’s not get overly optimistic here. Democrats would need to flip four seats to win control of the Senate, and they may not win any of these. Cooper is a great candidate, but Democrats almost always come close but narrowly lose presidential and U.S. Senate races in North Carolina. Alaska’s Peltola lost in 2024, and her two wins in 2022 may have been largely because the top Republican candidate was the very polarizing Sarah Palin. In Maine, even though Collins looks beatable, Governor Janet Mills has been very uninspiring on the campaign trail. Her Democratic primary opponent Graham Platner is untested and yes, used to have a tattoo of a symbol associated with the Nazis on his chest. And there is a good chance that the party’s left and center-left wings turn that race into a very divisive fight, making it harder for Maine Democrats to come together and defeat Collins in a general election.
Alaska, Nebraska, Ohio, and even North Carolina may just be too pro-Republican to buck the party in a high-stakes Senate race. And Democrats have to hold onto seats in Georgia, where Democrat Jon Ossoff is strong but where the state leans red, and Michigan, where the retirement of Gary Peters has resulted in a very intense three-candidate primary that may turn ugly.
But if you think about 2026 and 2028, there’s more reason for enthusiasm. There’s another seat in North Carolina in ’28 and also one in Wisconsin that Democrats could flip. Put the two cycles together, and it’s not hard to see Democrats flipping at least three Senate seats in 2026 and 2028 and winning the presidential election in 2028, giving them a majority again.
My enthusiasm (and Schumer’s strategy) assume that the normal laws of politics still apply. The Democrats have recruited experienced candidates with records of past electoral success who are more establishment than outsiders. That’s a risk, considering there is growing evidence that Americans hate both parties and career politicians. Having people like Brown and Cooper, who have been in elective office for the entire lives of some voters in their states, may be a mistake in a time where Americans may be yearning for fresh faces. The party leadership pushing the 78-year-old Mills over Platner could in particular be a misreading of where voters are.
Things are changing. There is something of a liberal Tea Party happening, as my colleague Alex Shephard has argued. But I agree with Schumer’s bet that Brown, Cooper, and Peltola in particular are the best possible candidates in their states. And if he’s right, I hope in January 2029 Schumer is taking credit for a Senate majority while, after having graciously decided to retire at age 78 and attending the swearing-in of his replacement, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
