by Ten Bottemiller

Officials in the White House and Democrats all over the country are worried Democrats may lose control of both the Senate and White House in the upcoming midterm elections on November 8, where all seats in the House of Representatives and 35 seats in the Senate will be up for election. The elections will dictate the last two years of Joe Biden’s first term of presidency including lynchpin issues like abortion, government spending, immigration, and policing.

In May, Biden anticipated Democrats will keep the majority in the House and Senate, but recently he addressed the tensions between the parties and the aim of Republicans to take both houses. “It’s been back and forth with them ahead, us ahead, them ahead,” Biden said at a Democratic National Convention fundraiser. 

In the Siena Poll conducted by The New York Times and Siena College, 71% of 792 registered voters agreed that American democracy is currently under threat. 28% of voters think Republicans are a major threat to democracy, 33% think Democrats are a major threat to democracy, 45% think Donald Trump is a major threat to democracy, and 38% think Joe Biden is a major threat to democracy. 39% of the voters aligned more with the Republican party, in contrast to the 38% that aligns with the Democratic party.

On Wednesday, President Joe Biden delivered a message to Americans condemning violence occurring with the upcoming elections, mostly in response to the attack last week on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband by an intruder who consumed extreme right-wing conspiracies on social media. “I believe the voices excusing or calling for violence and intimidation are a distinct minority in America,” Biden said. “But they’re loud and they are determined.”

“This intimidation, this violence against Democrats, Republicans and non-partisan officials just doing their jobs, is the consequence of lies told for power and profit, lies of conspiracy and malice, lies repeated over and over to generate a cycle of anger, hate, vitriol and even violence,” Biden said. “In this moment, we have to confront those lies with the truth, the very future of our nation depends on it.” He directly references former president Donald Trump: “You know, American democracy is under attack because the defeated former president of the United States refused to accept the results of the 2020 election. If he refuses to accept the will of the people, if he refuses to accept the fact that he lost, he’s abused his power and put loyalty to himself before loyalty to the Constitution.”