US President Donald Trump and Republican US Senate candidate Ken Paxton attend a campaign rally at Freeman Coliseum in San Antonio, Texas, US, October 7, 2026.
Republicans are making it exceedingly obvious that they can see their own doom coming, and according to a new piece from MS NOW, all one has to do is "follow the money" instead of the polls to see the truth.
Writing for the outlet on Monday morning, MS NOW reporter and editor James Downie explained that, despite the abundance of strong polls indicating that a massive blue wave is approaching in the midterms, Democrats remain too scarred by President Donald Trump's wins in 2016 and 2024 to trust them. They might ease their "stress," he suggested, by using a simple rule: "Don’t follow the polls. Follow the money."
"More specifically, follow where the money is being spent," Downie explained. "Most people who track the latest polls and other data do so to stay informed. But political operatives are using a much larger amount of data, including private polling, to allocate hundreds of millions of dollars in spending on ads and other expenditures."
Often, he explained further, campaigns can see trends and possibilities in the available polling data that the public does not — the much-fabled "internal polling" — and these findings can influence their actions in very revealing ways. Downie noted the example from 2016, when Trump closed his campaign with stops in swing states expected to go blue, because internal data showed that he was gaining considerable ground there.
"There’s no such aggression coming from the GOP this year," Downie added. "First came the Senate cuts, with GOP groups pulling out of the races in North Carolina and Georgia. And rather than shift the money to target Democratic-held seats, Republicans have moved that money to states where Democrats haven’t won a Senate race in 18 years (Iowa), 38 years (Texas) and 94 years (Kansas)."
He added: "Then came the House cuts. Last week the House Majority PAC and the Congressional Leadership Fund pulled advertising in Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District, where Rep. Don Bacon is retiring. This week, they retreated from two more districts, this time with GOP incumbents: New Jersey’s 7th District and Iowa’s 1st District. In the 2024 elections, voters gave Republicans a three-seat majority. With two weeks to go, the House GOP has already given up on that many seats. At the same time, Republican groups also pulled back from efforts to oust a half-dozen Democratic representatives in swing districts, including Reps. Kristen McDonald Rivet, Greg Landsmann,Tom Suozzi, and Henry Cuellar."
These sort of cuts, historically, suggest a bad Election Day across the entire GOP, not just the impacted candidates.
Based on all of these movements, Downie argued that while the public might be anxious about trusting polls, "the Republicans who are paid to know this stuff are behaving as if they believe the polls.
"For many Democratic partisans, however, no data can calm the fears of midterm disappointment," Downie concluded. "But endlessly fretting about that possibility is no way for any of us to spend the Halloween season. So, the next time you’re worried about the polls, just remember: Republicans are, too."