Political expert reveals why 'even bigger blue wave than 2018' is coming

President Donald Trump and the Republican Party are widely understood to be facing a harsh political environment in this midterm cycle, but according to the political experts at Pod Save America, things are even worse than they seem, and they point to an "even bigger blue wave than 2018."

In the latest episode of the Pod Save America podcast, hosts and former Obama administration officials Jon Favreau and Dan Pfeiffer broke down the latest polling information and the grim picture it paints for the GOP in the midterms. As Favreau laid out, a new poll from the New York Times and Siena College, widely regarded as one of the most reputable in the industry, gave Democrats a 9-point generic ballot lead over Republicans among likely voters.

Those findings also arrived amid an "avalanche" of other bad numbers for Republicans, with Favreau citing pollster Nate Silver's 7.5-point polling average lead for Dems — the highest of the 2026 cycle so far — and a new Cook Political Report release that gave the party a 2-point lead in the 37 most competitive House districts.

Pfeiffer, a former senior communications director for Barack Obama and polling specialist, said that, in light of these encouraging reports for Democrats, many in the political world might still be underselling how good the environment has become for the opposition party as it looks to retake majorities in Congress.

"Sometimes the larger political world is understating how good this political environment is," Pfeiffer said. "Like, it is true that you look at the polling and you look at Silver's average, that the generic ballot nationally is about where it was in 2018, [when] we picked up 40 seats. But if you look at the other fundamentals... measurements that dictate elections, they show that this could end up being an even bigger wave blue wave than 2018. So, first, if you compare polling in 2018 to 2026, Democratic enthusiasm is up a few points this time, because it's worth remembering that even in 2018, when we won all the seats, Republican turnout was quite high. Republicans were fired up. We just turned out at a higher rate. Now, Republicans are disenchanted."

He continued: Another way in which you see that is that Trump's strong approval among Republicans is down 20 points from where it was on Election Day 2018. And his strong approval among all voters is cut in half from where it was in 2018, and his strong disapproval is up by seven to 10 points. And so this shows that Trump was polarizing on both sides before, where he fired up Democrats and Republicans. Now he fires up Democrats more. And then I think even more important than those other measures is that in 2018 Trump's approval rating among independents was in the mid to low 40s. Today, in that New York Times poll you referenced, it's at 27.... So, look at what you have going on here. You have really fired up Democrats, disenchanted Republicans and independents furious at the incumbent party. That is a recipe that, if we can deliver... sets up very, very well for Democrats."