AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
We're entering the second month of the federal shutdown, and there have yet to be any meaningful moves to end it. They may come, though, after Tuesday. NPR senior political editor and correspondent Domenico Montanaro joins us now to explain. Good morning, Domenico.
DOMENICO MONTANARO, BYLINE: Hey, Ayesha.
RASCOE: So Tuesday is Election Day, and there are off-year races in a number of states. What would those results have to look like to change the dynamic as it relates to the shutdown?
MONTANARO: Well, I mean, these elections are really the first major chance for people to side with one party or the other at the ballot box this year. And if we see significant or definitive results in one or the other direction, I mean, that could shake up leaders in Washington to want to make some kind of move or feel some pressure to negotiate because so far, all we've seen is a stalemate. That's largely because, I mean, polling has not pointed the finger for blame in either direction, really definitively. That's unlike five years ago, when we had the longest shutdown in history. This one looks like it's careening well past that. Back then, Trump got a more significant majority of the blame. Though I will say the amount of people blaming Republicans has gone up slightly since this shutdown began, so Democrats feel good that they have a solid issue that they're talking about in health care, and these subsidies that expire at the end of the year that could mean tens of millions of people see their health care prices go way up.
RASCOE: President Trump isn't on the ballot, but he kind of is. Is he a boost for Republican candidates or a drag?
MONTANARO: Well, I mean, off-year and midterm elections are usually not kind to the president's party, and that's even worse when the president's below 50% in their approval ratings, and that's certainly the case for Trump and Republicans. His approval rating has been somewhere 39 and 41% - really come down since he started the second term. People are unhappy with the cost of living and prices, and, you know, they think this administration has gone too far with things like mass deportations. Republicans don't think so, but certainly large majorities of independents and Democrats do. And independents, we know, are key in these important swing districts and swing states. Trump's certainly unpopular in Virginia and New Jersey, where we have these two big governors' races on Tuesday, and those states lean left. So we've seen Democrats talk a lot about Trump, put them in their ads. Republicans, on the other hand, have been trying to steer clear of him, make these elections more local, if that tells you anything.
RASCOE: The only House seat on Tuesday's ballot - on Tuesday's ballots is one in Texas being filled in a special election, so we won't see any real changes in the balance of power in that chamber, but there is Proposition 50 in California.
MONTANARO: Yeah. And this might be the most important election on Tuesday. Not often we say that about a ballot initiative, but it may be true this time because it could have real consequences for control of the House. You know, the issue here is that California mandates its redistricting by independent commission, but California Governor Gavin Newsom, who's a Democrat, is trying to counterbalance President Trump's demand to Republicans in places like Texas and other red states to squeeze out more Republican districts in rare mid-decade redistricting. This ballot initiative, Proposition 50, would temporarily overturn that requirement and give state Democrats the opportunity to try and create more Democratic districts. So this is all about this arms race we're seeing in redistricting for 2026 in next year's midterm elections and who controls the House. And every seat is important right now because there's only a three-seat majority with Republicans in control, and we're just in such a volatile time with narrower and narrower margins than we've ever really seen in our history.
RASCOE: You're watching New Jersey for signs of the GOP's relationship with Latino voters. Has it changed since the election? That's what you're going to be trying to see?
MONTANARO: I mean, really interesting here, because Trump lost New Jersey in the 2024 presidential election, but it was a lot closer than four years earlier. And a big reason for that was how much Latinos swung towards Trump. That's particularly evident in a lot of counties in North Jersey that have significant Latino populations. Take a place like Passaic County, where Paterson is, where I used to teach, by the way. The county is almost half Latino, according to the census, and Trump was the first Republican to win that county since 1992. And by the way, he got blown out there in 2016 when he first ran and lost it in 2020 also.
So this may be a first good test of Trump's support with Latinos and whether they're continuing to back him and the Republican Party because polling has shown Trump and the party nosediving with Hispanics, not just because of mass deportations, where the administration has gone after way more than just hardened criminals, as they said they would, but also because of prices. That's the big reason why so many people crossed over and voted for Trump in the first place because he promised to bring them down, and we've seen anything but a real focus on that from Trump.
RASCOE: And what about Democrats? What are you seeing and hearing as we go into Tuesday?
MONTANARO: Yeah. I mean, we have a real difference in style for the kinds of Democrats who are running in some of these races. Take a place like New York, where there's this big mayor's race, and you have someone like Zohran Mamdani who's really captured progressives' imagination with his focus on affordability and housing. His message has really broken through with younger voters, but Republicans have also turned him into a lightning rod, calling him extremist and radical for views on Israel and past comments on defunding the police, something he's disavowed, says safety is a top priority. But contrast that with how someone like Abigail Spanberger's running for governor of Virginia, and, you know, in much more reserved style. And I think whether - not just whether Mamdani wins, but how he governs if he does win, is going to really determine just how far Democrats run with his message next year, or if they move more toward someone like Spanberger.
RASCOE: That's NPR's Domenico Montanaro. Domenico, thanks so much.
MONTANARO: Hey, you got it. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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