Election Day: Americans go to the polls today in an election considered a national referendum on Donald Trump’s presidency and the overall Republican political agenda. Even the President admits that’s what it is. “I’m not on the ballot, but in a certain way I’m on the ballot.”
Former President Barack Obama said, “The character of the country is on the ballot.”
The FiveThirtyEight blog gives Democrats a nearly 88 percent chance of taking control of the House and Republicans an 81 percent chance to retain the Senate.
In last-minute campaigning Trump has said, “The Democrat agenda is a socialist nightmare for our country.”
FiveThirtyEight gives Democrats an 80 percent chance of picking up 21 to 59 seats in the House. They give Democrats only a 10 percent chance of gaining two seats in the Senate, and Republicans only a 10 percent chance of gaining four.
While trying to carry his party over the goal line, Trump has a nearly 53 percent disapproval rating.
Early voting revealed a surge of interest in this election, with 18 states and Washington, DC surpassing early and absentee votes in the 2014 midterm. The top four states for advance voting are Tennessee, Nevada, Arizona and Texas.
Following the tradition that the party out of power does well in the midterms you’d think the vote will break Democratic. But the rules of normal political expectations were broken the day Donald Trump was elected.
Here’s what to watch for:
The Senate: Democrats need to pick up two seats to take control of the Senate, which doesn’t sound like much, but it’s an electoral mountain. Only 13 races are considered competitive and Democrats could lose seats they already have. The bitter fight over Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh appears to have lit a fire under Republican voters.
The Democrats will need to win most or all of West Virginia, North Dakota, Missouri, Montana, Indiana, and Florida. Then they have to take seats away from Republicans in Nevada, Arizona, or possibly even Tennessee and Texas.
—- Texas: If  Democratic contender Beto O’Rourke, a congressman, manages to beat the incumbent Republican Ted Cruz, consider it an earthquake. With an appealing personality, O’Rourke presents well against the odious Cruz, who’s hated even by members of his own party in the Senate. But Texas is a deep red state. If O’Rourke wrests the seat, it’s a huge crack in Trump’s political wall.
— In Missouri, Democratic incumbent Claire McCaskill is laboring under a 48 percent disapproval rating with just 37 percent approval. Republican Josh Hawley leads in the polls by maybe one percentage point.
The House: The Trump presidency has inspired a huge number of women to run; 238 women are candidates for the House. There are 172 military veterans running, some of them women.
One potential indicator in the race for the House is NY-19, the district in which The Rooney Report is published. Democratic challenger Antonio Delgado, a black Rhodes Scholar with an Italian name, has a slight lead in the polls over incumbent John Faso, who roused voter anger minutes after he was elected two years ago. Faso tends to spurn actual contact with his constituents and played fast and loose with his position on healthcare.
NY-19 is huge, straddling the Hudson River at Kingston and rolling west into the Catskills and farm country. It’s classic upstate Republican territory and if Delgado can win, despite having once been a lame-assed rap singer, the Republican leadership in the House could have a long night.
Statehouses: Democrats are looking to break the Republican hold on statehouses in the Midwest, but probably the most important race is in Florida, one of the biggest swing states. The President needs Ron DeSantis to win and drive Florida’s political engine for Trump’s re-election effort in 2020. Democrat Andrew Gillum has had a small lead —and Gillum may even be helping incumbent Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson in his Senate race against Rick Scott, the current governor.
On the Ballot: In Alabama, where Chief Judge Roy Moore was removed for installing the Ten Commandments at the Supreme Court, a ballot measure would amend the constitution to allow display of the commandments on public property.
— Also in Alabama, voters are deciding on a constitutional amendment that would define personhood as beginning at conception and make it clear the state recognizes no right to abortion.
— Voters in West Virginia, and Oregon will decide whether to amend their state constitutions to limit Medicaid abortion funding to cases of life endangerment, rape and incest, the minimum federal requirement. West Virginia’s referendum would also add a constitutional amendment that says a woman has no right to an abortion.
— Colorado, Michigan, and Utah have ballot measures to create independent commissions  for legislative redistricting in the hope of eliminating partisan gerrymandering.
— Voting Rights: Florida has a measure returning voting rights to 1.5 million felons, nearly 10percent of the state’s voting age population. On the other hand, bills in North Carolina and Texas would make it harder to vote … voters would need a photo ID.
It’s a Big Day: As they used to say in Chicago, “Vote early and often.”