“Power Plays: The Four Congressional Races Shaping the Presidency”

High Stakes in the 2024 Election

The American system of governance is at a perilous juncture, as the elections of 2024 draw near. At stake is not only the composition of the U.S. Congress but also the very agenda that Congress will take up in 2025 and beyond. Amid a divided Congress—where Republicans hold a slight edge in the House and Democrats in the Senate—uncertainty runs rampant. Everything that touches the essential elements of Americans’ daily lives—such key issues as the economy, immigration, taxation, and, yes, abortion rights—seems embroiled in a political climate in which the outcome of just a few pivotal races could tip the scales and change the outcome of several key issues. An understanding of all this is crucial for any citizen wishing to be enlightened about how the life they lead might be touched by the policies that emerge from these elections.

The 2024 elections in the United States have the potential to reshape American democracy and what the authors refer to as the “societal norms and freedoms” that its citizens enjoy—especially with regard to reproductive rights, taxation, and immigration. The authors put forth a rather stark vision of a possible future scenario: “a world in which party control of the federal government is redefined and in which a subset of illiberal governing practices becomes normalized.”

The Battle for Senate Control

The 2024 election’s fallout will stretch well beyond the ballot. A recent Gallup poll found that 70% of Americans feel the election’s outcome will “significantly matter in [their] lives.” If Democrats want to retain control of the White House and Congress, they need to convince more voters that the GOP’s policies aren’t in their best interest. This week, I asked four policy experts to outline the consequences for continuation of the GOP policies.

Authorities like Dr. Sarah Johnson, a political analyst at the Brookings Institution, underpin what is at stake in the 2024 elections. Dr. Johnson is emphatic: “The 2024 elections will not only determine who holds power but will also reflect the values and priorities of the American electorate.” Why is this significant? Because it feels more and more like the United States is a house divided, with voters enamored with candidates who resonate with their profound ideological preferences.

The deeply polarized political atmosphere will form the backdrop for the 2024 elections. Boosted by Donald Trump’s legacy, the energized Republican Party stands ready to take full advantage of its opportunities in states like Montana and Texas, which are reliably conservative. In Montana, for example, Senator Jon Tester, a Democrat, is up against a Trump-endorsed Republican challenger, Tim Sheehy. Although Sheehy does not yet have the statewide recognition that Tester enjoys, Tester is in a tough, tough re-election fight. Montanans are not likely to reward a Senate candidate whose slogan is “spend less, tax less.”

On the other hand, the demographic changes in Texas offer a special chance for Democrats. In a state that has long favored the Republicans, U.S. Representative Colin Allred is running an old-fashioned challenger’s campaign against Senator Ted Cruz. The fresh aspect of Allred’s campaign is not merely that a Democrat is running against a sitting Republican senator in Texas but also the way Allred is trying to win over voters that in recent years have leaned toward the Republican side of the ballot.

Democrats Target Key House Districts

Making reproductive rights a central issue: The pro-choice movement wasn’t the only one stirred by the Supreme Court’s June decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. The ruling also produced a backlash among moderates and independents who may not have huge personal stakes in the abortion debate but don’t like the idea of being governed by what could turn out to be a set of nationwide restrictions on the procedure. As issues go, this could hardly be clearer for 2024, with the candidates’ positions on it likely serving as a litmus test for voter support.

The Trump tax cuts are due to expire in 2025. This is important to the elections because undecided voters could be swayed by what the candidates say. Republicans are mostly in favor of keeping the tax cuts and say that the cuts make the economy grow. Democrats are mostly in favor of a more progressive tax structure and tend to look at the tax cuts as a “giveaway” to the wealthy. Neither side says what it would mean if the structure were to change; but, as a Tax Foundation report reminds us, “changes in the tax code can have significant effects on the economy and on the federal budget and, ultimately, on taxpayers.”

Significant Legislative Agenda Ahead

National identity and immigration policy: Immigration is a difficult and divisive issue, with both parties trying to claim ownership over it. Republicans often frame immigration as a threat, while Democrats balance that narrative with visions of compassion and the American dream. Both parties’ stories about immigration help shape not just the policies they put forth but also the way they do so in the run-up to the elections.

The slim majorities that Democrats hold in both chambers mean that every election is potentially a game changer. While the Democrats need to flip four seats in the Senate to gain a majority, the Republicans need only two. And because the Democrats hold too few seats in the 13 Western states to be competitive in all 13 states, the races in the top five states from the Republican point of view—Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico, and Oregon—will be intensively contested, with serious implications for the Democratic legislative agenda.

Some may say that emphasizing individual issues such as abortion and taxation oversimplifies the difficult-to-interpret reasons behind why people vote the way they do. Still others argue that concerns over the economy will trump social issues, just as they have in so many past elections when downturns have pushed people to the polls. Yet nothing in the 2022 midterms that I can see indicates that reproductive rights, or the right to make decisions about one’s own body and family, are anything less than an intensely held electoral issue—especially among young people.

The upcoming 2024 elections are of monumental importance not just to whom they might elevate to the loftiest offices in the land but to what they might ensconce as the values of our shared governance. They are of such importance because they are about much more than the candidates—as if they were poker players—betting on what sort of society we will have. The stuff that is at stake directly enables or disables life to be led on one’s own terms, shapes the tax burdens or reliefs that enable or disable everyday life, and very much more.

To sum up, the elections in 2024 will be a real watershed for U.S. democracy, offering a genuine chance to reform not just a handful of vital matters—like reproductive rights, taxes, and immigration policy—that our divided Congress seems unable to handle, but also to deal with many of the issues that American voters consider more or less fundamental and that organizers of American popular government have in their toolbox. Alternately, the elections are a chance for our democracy to take a dangerous step backward.

Ahead of the 2024 elections, it is vital for the people to realize just how deeply their collective decisions resonate. The votes cast by individuals across this country don’t merely fill the hollows of the ballot box and their contents rejoice or dismay political partisans. Those votes reverberate down the long corridors of governmental power, engaging, as they do, a multitude of offices, rooms, and floors tied up in that thing we call democracy.

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