MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
We woke up to major changes in both the U.S. Senate and the House, with Democrats flipping enough seats in both chambers to control Congress next year. Voters rejected Republicans across the country in places President Trump won two years ago by double digits, with many voters saying they are frustrated about the cost of living. So how will Democrats use their legislative power to address voters' economic concerns? NPR congressional correspondent Barbara Strunt (ph) is with us here in-studio. We're going to ask her. Good morning.
BARBARA SPRUNT, BYLINE: Good morning.
MARTIN: So look. In the midterms, the president's party typically does lose seats, but the results last night went much further than many Democrats had even hoped. So just give us the lay of the land here.
SPRUNT: Yeah. I mean, to call this a sweeping win for Democrats doesn't even feel strong enough. A lot of Democrats woke up this morning to the news that they had won Senate races in Iowa, South Carolina, in Texas, in Kansas. I mean, the first Democrat elected to the Senate in Kansas in 94 years. In fact, a strategist texted me as the results were coming in and said, I guess it looks like Democrats are going to win Canada at this point. I mean...
MARTIN: Too soon.
SPRUNT: It was just a great night.
MARTIN: Too soon.
SPRUNT: Yeah.
MARTIN: OK. So let's talk about the role of President Trump here. He's been struggling with low approval ratings. He told voters to pretend that he was on the ballot this cycle. He thought that that was going to boost turnout, I mean, among his supporters. How do you assess his role here now?
SPRUNT: Yeah. I mean, as you said, the president does usually lose seats for the party in a midterm. So he was always swimming upstream in that sense. But a lot of this is of his own making. You know, he got behind certain candidates in key primaries. He put a thumb on the scale. And in several instances, including Texas, it likely did make a difference. You know, lots of Republicans I talked to think that Senator John Cornyn, the incumbent, would have had a much better chance of winning than Ken Paxton, who just lost. And of course, the president's policies. You know, voters across the country told me again and again and again that they directly connect their concerns about high prices to the president's policies - tariffs and the war in Iran.
MARTIN: So should this be seen as a success for the Democrats or as a failure of the Republicans?
SPRUNT: I think it's clear this election was a referendum on President Trump and his policies. But this is an opportunity for Democrats to redefine the party in red states where they've just won and their brand has been suffering.
You know, in some ways, I think of it as, you know, despite Trump still being in office, this sets Democrats up to think very hard about how to be a post-Trump party. You know, the criticism from Republicans for years and years has been that Democrats define themselves by Trump - you know, by opposing his policies, his personality, the whole shebang. So how do they think about their party once he's out of office? And, you know, you have these Democratic senators for four years after Trump leaves office in some of these states like South Carolina and Kansas. So can Democrats retake control of their messaging, their brand? Can it propel them to maintain power in these states far beyond the cycle? That's the question.
MARTIN: So looking to the near future, how - what are Democrats telling you about how they plan to approach their role legislatively? They have said they plan to investigate what they're calling corruption within the White House, what many voters are calling corruption within the White House. But how do they address issues like affordability, these bread-and-butter issues?
SPRUNT: Well, Democrats know they won in an environment where these are the issues that people care about - affordability. And they also know they don't have unified government. So I talked to a House Democrat last night. And he said, we just cannot nibble around the edges here, meaning Democrats are going to have to take some big swings on issues like affordability, even if they get vetoed. They have to show the public they hear their concerns. They're doing as much as they can. It sets them up in '28 to say, look at what we passed. Sure, they got vetoed, but imagine what we could do with a Democrat in the White House.
MARTIN: That is NPR's Barbara Sprunt. Barbara, thank you.
SPRUNT: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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