Trump’s Alaska meltdown says it all
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If you want to understand just how big the Blue Tsunami will end up being, look no further than Donald Trump’s latest delusional rant.
In a social media post this morning, he demanded that all of the votes in the Alaska Senate race that did not go to Democrat Mary Peltola be allocated to the Republican incumbent, Dan Sullivan. Trump declared, “There is no other fair solution!”
Alaska uses ranked-choice voting. Yet, Trump wants to skip that process and simply hand Sullivan every vote that didn’t go to Peltola.
There is a certain irony in Trump, who weaponized his entire government to try to undermine the election nationwide, now seeking a “fair solution” in another Senate race his party is set to lose.
A president who thought he was winning would not be demanding that votes be reassigned. His fixation on Alaska is an admission that the wave has already swamped his party nearly everywhere else. The Last Frontier is his last hope — and it’s looking bleak for the GOP.
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Based on the results so far, Democrats are set to have at least 54 senators when the new Congress is sworn in on Jan. 3, 2027.
Elias Law Group represents Scott Colom, and we are currently helping him secure his victory in the Mississippi Senate race. Given Colom’s lead and the ballots left to be counted, I am confident he will prevail.
Judging by his social media post, Donald Trump agrees with me, which is why he is focused on Alaska as his last chance to keep the Democratic Senate sweep — and his humiliating defeat — from growing any larger.
Peltola holds a narrow lead, with more ballots still to be counted. What Trump continues to ignore is that those ballots will be counted and the results certified pursuant to state law. There is no legal path to reassigning votes.
In the run-up to the election, Trump directed his Department of Justice to accomplish in court what he is still demanding on social media today. DOJ lost — badly. It filed an appeal to the Ninth Circuit but has taken no steps to seek immediate review or relief.
The lawyers at DOJ no doubt understand what Trump does not: His effort to rig the Alaska Senate election failed. His assault on free and fair elections is over.
Indeed, Trump and his cronies are now likely to face a Congress eager to conduct oversight of their abuses of power, and that oversight is certain to include their attacks on democracy.
Nowhere will the administration face greater scrutiny than in the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives. While the Senate margins have garnered much of the attention, House Democrats romped from coast to coast.
Before the election, Democrats were expected to take control of the House, but with somewhere between 225 and 235 seats. Democrats have already been declared the winners in more than 250 races, and that number continues to climb.
No party has won more than 257 House seats in over three decades, a total Democrats reached in 2008. That came in a presidential election year, a historic one at that; meeting or exceeding that number in a midterm would be astounding.
All of these victories are even more impressive given the obstacles Donald Trump put in the way of voters, election officials and Democratic candidates.
He pressured big law firms to provide him with free legal services and intimidated them out of protecting voting rights. His Department of Justice launched more than 30 cases to undermine free and fair elections. He weaponized the criminal justice system against his political opponents.
Yet despite all of that, Trump and his party not only lost but were thoroughly repudiated.
There will be many theories about why Trump failed. Some will say it was the economy and affordability. Others will point to foreign wars or health care.
Yes, those issues — plus corruption and democracy — helped motivate voters and shaped their choice of candidates. But none of it would have mattered if the machinery of elections had failed.
As we celebrate the landslide repudiation of the GOP, we must remember how close we came to losing voters’ ability to elect the candidates of their choice.
In the days ahead, I believe we will celebrate Democrats gaining Senate seats in Mississippi and Alaska. I expect House Democrats to surpass 257 seats.
Once those results are certified and the celebrations have ended, it will be time for us to get to work. Never again should we have to fight the federal government to protect our elections. Never again should a president be empowered by his party to destroy democracy.
This is the defining fight of our generation. As soon as my legal work in the remaining elections is done, I am ready to take it on right here at Democracy Docket. I hope you will join me.