Washington (United States) (AFP) – Two days before the mid-term elections, Donald Trump is busy Sunday trying to thwart the polls putting his party in a bad position in this election, the outcome of which will determine the end of his mandate and could thwart his frantic quest for power.

Published on: 02/11/2026 - 07:20

The 80-year-old president, who has traveled across the United States in recent weeks to defend candidates, once again visited Iowa, which he had won by a large margin in 2024.

“We will win,” he repeated to the crowd in a speech interrupted several times by demonstrators.

Accusing these spoilsport of being paid, the billionaire urged his supporters to mobilize to “prevent communists and jihadists who hate America from taking control of the United States by seizing the American Congress”.

“What we have done is unprecedented, and they are going to demolish everything,” insisted the Republican, who has continued to expand executive power since his return to the White House, helped by a docile Republican Party.

Despite his displayed optimism, this new visit to Iowa, then that planned later in the day in Kansas, another state traditionally anchored to the right, betrays the feverishness of the conservative camp.

In these conservative lands, polls indeed show the Democrats neck and neck due to dissatisfaction with the explosion in the cost of living and the war in Iran, initiated despite Donald Trump's promise to stop military campaigns abroad.

- "Optimistic" -

Enough to fuel the opposition's hopes of a victory in the House of Representatives, where all the seats are at stake, or even in the Senate, where a third of the positions are renewed and where a change of majority was until recently almost unthinkable.

“I am nervous but optimistic,” Raphael Warnock, Democratic senator from Georgia, told CNN on Sunday, calling for “impose limits on this president who is literally pillaging our country and selling its pieces.”

An encouraging sign for the left: more than 50 million Americans, a record, have already voted early, including a majority of voters registered as Democrats, according to initial figures analyzed by the University of Florida.

However, caution remains in order, with polls having repeatedly underestimated the mobilization of Donald Trump's Maga base in the past.

The Democratic camp suffered a setback on Sunday in Michigan, one of the key states, with elected Democrat Haley Stevens announcing she would support Republican Mike Rogers and not Democrat Abdul El-Sayed due to differences over Israel.

Possible dispute

Traditionally, the president's party in power loses mid-term elections, and the historic unpopularity of Donald Trump, who now reaches 60% according to a poll published Sunday by NBC News, also goes in this direction.

A switch to the Democratic side of one or the other chamber of the American federal Parliament would allow the opposition to dictate the legislative program and influence the federal budget, but also to demand accountability from Donald Trump, who has been imposing his will on America for two years and shaking up the world without encountering any real resistance.

In the meantime, these elections have already siphoned off at least $11 billion in advertising campaigns.

And a sign of nervousness, the Republican president has promised on several occasions to pay $5,000 to each citizen in the event of a Republican victory, despite questions about the legality of such a measure and its financing.

He who still does not recognize his defeat against Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election has also already mentioned a possible challenge to the results.

His administration notably introduced a preventive appeal to prevent the certification of a possible Democratic victory in Alaska in the Senate, which was rejected on Sunday by an American judge. The Trump administration has announced its intention to appeal.

© 2026 AFP

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