Will millennials have the cutting edge these mid-term polls?
Dr. Shirin Abbas & Adam Rizvi: Midterm elections are just a couple of days ago and tension is escalating as Republicans and Democrats get set to pit the strengths against each other.
According to poll pundits, however, it is the young millennials that may have the upper edge as they vow to vote for their priorities.
Donald Trump is drastically ramping up his final push to campaign for the Republicans. Up for grabs are one-third of the Senate and every seat in the House of Representatives, the two chambers making up Congress.
Polls pundits foretell that Democrats are likely to have a good chance of taking the House, but Senate looks likely to remain in Republican control and in a final push to keep the House with the GOP, President Donald Trump hit the campaign trail with a vengeance.
In Washington President Donald Trump hammered his closing message on immigration during a pair of campaign rallies on Saturday, repeatedly urging voters to consider “security” when they turn out for next week’s pivotal midterm elections. In what was expected to be his final visit to Florida before voters go for polls on Tuesday, Trump blasted Democratic opposition to his proposed border wall and criticized the liberal Democrat notion to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
In concluding his campaign pitch Trump has revived a theme that worked well for him in the 2016 election and tapped into a frustration felt by millions of Americans over illegal immigration.
Meanwhile, the number of Hispanic voters casting their ballot in Tuesday’s midterm elections could be up by a third on the 2014 midterms, with their turnout higher than the overall surge in voting across all US adults, a national tracking poll out today shows.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll, taken between September 1 and October 29, found 36 percent of Hispanic voters said they were “certain” to vote, up from 27 percent in 2014 according to The Sunday Express, UK.
The increase is nearly double the five percent rise among all US voters over the same period, according to the data. And those same voters are twice as likely to back the Democrat party.
Latino enthusiasm is thought to be rising as President Trump’s Republican Party increases its hardline anti-immigrant talk.
Racism and Immigration issues have been dominant players in the run-up to the midterms. Both campaigns for the candidates running for the governor of Georgia have condemned a racist and anti-Semitic recording sent to residents in the state days before the election. The campaign for Democratic nominee Stacey Abrams, who is hoping to become the first US black governor, denounced the calls as evidence of the “increasing desperation” of the Republican campaign.
Abrams’ rival, Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, called them “absolutely disgusting”.
The calls impersonated Oprah Winfrey, who has thrown her weight behind the campaign in Abrams, as well as anti-Semitic language.
Similar racist calls were sent out in Florida in August to undermine Democrat candidate Andrew Gillum, who is black.
President Trump hardened his stance on immigration at his rally in Montana, accusing the Democrats of encouraging endless numbers of migrants to the US. He was in Montana to boost the campaign of Republican candidate Matt Rosendale who is challenging Democrat Jon Tester in the Senate. Once again Trump raised the Immigrant bogey saying, “The Democrats want to invite caravan after caravan to flood your communities, depleting our resources and flooding our nation. We don’t want that.” He also claimed “America is booming” while talking about the economy while standing in an airfield in front of Air Force One. Mr. Trump said: “America is booming. Republicans passed a massive tax cut for working families and we will soon follow it up with another 10 percent tax cut for the middle class.”
Panic in the Presidential ranks?
According to ghostwriter Tony Schwartz who wrote Trump’s famous book “The Art of the Deal”, Trump is panicking as the midterms get closer to elections day. Mr. Schwartz says that Trump will “throw anything against the wall in a feeling of desperation” to make sure that the Republicans do not lose the elections.
He added that what Trump “realizes is this could turn very, very dark for him” and he could potentially lose both the House and the Senate despite polling saying that Republicans will hold the Senate.
Pentagon snubs Trump
On the other hand Pentagon statement that they will not approve Trump’s request to send at least 5,000 active-duty troops to the US border has been a major setback for the President’s poll-vault.
Pentagon said that it should be handled by local or state law enforcement and did not approve the use of live-fire weapons. This when Trump has repeatedly said that he will send anywhere from 5,000 to 15,000 troops to the border.
He has also labeled the 3,000 migrants heading to the border as an “invasion”.
In a message sent out to voters, former President Obama has said:
“This is the most important election.” But this one really is that important. The stakes really are that high. The consequences of you not voting — or not doing everything in your power to ensure your friends, family, and neighbors vote — could be monumental.
America is at a crossroads, and control of Congress may be decided by a handful of razor-thin House and Senate races. Dozens of governorships and thousands of state legislative seats are up for grabs, with major implications on whether we can draw fairer maps for the next decade.
Make no mistake: The direction of the country will come down to who turns out and who stays home. And the greatest threat to our democracy is indifference. Indifference is exactly what cynical politicians want from you. They’re counting on it. Their success depends on convincing you that your vote doesn’t matter. They know their agenda is unpopular, so the only way to keep power is by shrinking the electorate. Don’t let them.
Beseeching voters on issues like tax cuts to billionaires, slashing of Medicare and Social Security, Climate change issues and politicians refusing to pass common-sense gun laws as also failing to adequately stand up for the rights of immigrants, or women, or LGBTQ Americans – the email from Barack Obama urges voters to go out and vote.
Whether the voters will heed that call, remains to be seen on the 6th—a day for which America and the world is waiting with bated breath.
Edited By Dr. Shirin Abbas
