Republicans made a final push on Sunday to avoid a predicted thumping in the United States midterm elections, where Democrats are gunning to win Congress and impose the first political check on President Donald Trump's unprecedented pursuit of power.
Polls show Democrats are all but certain to take the majority from Republicans in the House of Representatives and—against all previous expectations—have a shot at winning the Senate.
Tens of millions of Americans will vote for their representatives to the 120th US Congress on 3 November.
But after a decade of Trump defying political gravity and two years of a second presidency in which he has ridden roughshod over every norm, Democrats remain nervous.
"Nauseously optimistic," Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock told CNN, describing the mood.
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Trump headlined the Republicans' last-ditch charge, holding rallies for candidates in Iowa and Kansas – states where, ordinarily, his party should be confident of victory and not require presidential boosts.
Along with making lurid claims that Democrats will turn the country communist, Trump is dangling the promise of $5,000 payments to everyone in the country if his party wins.
"I feel good," Trump told reporters at his luxury golf club in Florida late Saturday.
"The country has never done better."
Polls, however, show the Republican is the most unpopular US president in decades. While his efforts may galvanise a hardcore base of right-wing supporters, a growing majority has turned on him.
An NBC News poll released Sunday showed 60 per cent of Americans disapproved of Trump's performance, particularly over high prices exacerbated by his now eight-month, sputtering war against Iran.
While Tuesday is election day and results will start landing that night, early voting has already seen a record 53 million people cast ballots nationwide.
A Democratic House would impose the first meaningful political constraints on Trump since he swept back into office in 2025.
The Republican's second term has seen a relentless expansion of presidential power.
He has torn down part of the White House to build a ballroom, put his image on money and official buildings, disrupted the global economy with sweeping tariffs, and threatened to invade or annex allies such as Canada and Greenland.
Winning the House would give Democrats serious power.
They'd oversee the budget and control committees set to probe allegations of mass corruption, Trump's links to infamous sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and other explosive topics.
The biggest election question mark is who will win the Senate, where Republicans have a slender majority.
Only a third of the Senate's 100 seats are being contested in these midterms, and few races were seen as favourable.
However, with surprisingly strong challenges in deeply Republican states like Texas and Kansas, pollsters now say the odds of a Democratic flip are at least even.
A Democratic Senate could block Trump's court appointments – especially to the Supreme Court.
Reflecting the high stakes, these midterms have seen about $11 billion spent on advertising, with large shares coming from individual mega-donors.
Elon Musk, a close ally of Trump who led the so-called DOGE in dismantling entire government departments, has given nearly half a billion dollars to help elect Republican candidates.
The campaigns have also been marked by blistering language and insults, including Trump's repeated false claims that Michigan's Democratic Senate candidate, Abdul El-Sayed, is a "jihadi".
Hanging over everything is concern that Republicans will refuse to accept a loss, leading to a constitutional crisis like Trump's attempt to overturn his 2020 presidential election defeat.
The White House continued to undermine Americans' confidence in their elections over the weekend, slapping down a post that explained it is "normal" for the counting process in complex districts to show a candidate ahead at first, but for them to lose once all ballots are in.
"No it isn't," the official presidential X account said.
