Democrats won the congressional elections on the affordability theme — but will face Trump's veto

Winning on prices, not statistics

Democrats won the midterm elections and will take control of Congress, taking at least seven Senate seats from Republicans — more than most forecasters expected, BBC News reports. Behind the result lies a telling figure: only 21% of Americans are satisfied with the direction of the country, even though the economy looks healthy on paper. Voters, the outlet notes, were not looking at statistics but at bills for groceries, electricity and gasoline.

Discontent also hit Republicans

Rising prices struck even traditionally Republican territory. In Texas, Kim Hanks, owner of the Tillies hotel, restaurant and spa near Austin, told BBC World Service that rising food and fuel costs have forced her to raise wages for 300 employees. Sid Miller, the outgoing Texas Republican agriculture commissioner, said ranchers are receiving $300–500 less per head of cattle amid record fertilizer prices: “They felt betrayed,” the BBC quotes him as saying. Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic majority leader in the House of Representatives, framed the task this way: “We ran on affordability, we won on it, and now our job is to govern on affordability.”

What Democrats promise

Under the slogan “Fighting for an Affordable America,” the party names healthcare as its first priority: restoring the extra financial assistance that made health insurance cheaper under the ACA, and reversing the Medicaid cuts signed by Trump in 2025. Next come repealing import tariffs, which Democrats claim add thousands of dollars a year to the cost of groceries, fertilizer and building materials, and ending the war with Iran, which they link to the average gasoline price of $4.18 per gallon (an increase of nearly 40%). The plans also include building four million new homes over a decade, raising taxes on billionaires and expanding tax credits for families with children.

The limits of the new power

Victory does not give Democrats a free hand: Trump retains the power to block bills with a veto, and overriding it requires two-thirds of the votes in both chambers. Investor Ken Fisher, founder of Fisher Investments, predicts in a BBC comment “two years of relative quiet” in legislation and regulation. Tariffs are a central element of Trump's agenda, and they cannot be changed without Republican support: Bernard Yaros, deputy chief economist at Oxford Economics, expects the average import tariff rate to remain around 10% until the end of the president's term. The budget argument also complicates repeal: if import duties accounted for just over 1% of federal revenue in 2024, this year the figure is more than 5%, which, in Yaros's view, will make them “difficult for a future administration to fully dismantle.”

Where deals and pressure are possible

Trump told CNBC he is ready to work with Democrats “on far more issues than people realize.” Yaros sees a possible grand bargain: Democrats agree to extend Republican tax cuts in exchange for restoring health insurance subsidies, but he does not expect a deal before the end of 2027, with economic effects in 2028. Meanwhile, Democrats can pressure business: according to Henrietta Treyz of Veda Partners, companies that passed tariff costs on to consumers will be asked whether they lowered prices after tariff payments were refunded following the Supreme Court ruling in February. Senator Ron Wyden, the future chairman of the finance committee, promises to “restore Congress's authority” over trade policy and to summon insurers, pharmaceutical companies and banks to explain themselves, framing the approach as “affordability for us, accountability for them.”

What is beyond their control and the nearest deadline

Some factors Democrats cannot control through laws: prices for gasoline, diesel, and fertilizers depend on the war with Iran, and Oxford Economics warns that after the election further escalation 'appears more likely,' since fuel prices will no longer be as politically sensitive for the president. At the same time, the BBC notes, if prices fall, Democrats will find it hard to claim credit, and if they rise, they will share the blame. Some levers remain at the state level: Democrats won the governorships in Texas, Ohio, and Georgia, where rising electricity prices for data centers are already a concern, and local authorities decide where to build new housing. The nearest test is government funding, which runs out after December 11: the likelihood of new shutdowns looks, in the outlet's assessment, uncomfortably high.