President Trump says “whole world is watching” Tennessee special election

President Trump pushed voters to cast a ballot for the Republican House candidate in a Nashville-area special election that has become uncomfortably tight for the GOP in recent weeks.

This comes amid increasing concern from GOP lawmakers over signs that the 2026 midterm elections could be a wipeout for Republicans that could cost them control of the House and shave down their Senate majority by two or three seats.

Republican senators say the off-year elections in New Jersey, Virginia and other parts of the country on Nov. 4 served as a wake-up call and warn that President Trump and Republican leaders in Congress need to address voters’ concerns about the slowing economy and persistently high prices.

Republicans acknowledge that rising health insurance premiums, the issue Democrats want to put front-and-center in the election year, along with health care costs, more generally, are a major problem for their party.

When President Trump won the presidential election in 2024, he swept Tennessee’s 7th congressional district by 22 points. Now, voters are casting ballots on Tuesday in a special election to fill the seat vacated by Republican Rep. Mark Green. Green beat Democrat Megan Barry in the congressional race last year by more than 21 points.

But a new poll out of the district shows the race neck-and-neck between Republican Matt Van Epps and Democratic state Rep. Aftyn Behn. Van Epps is leading Behn by just two points, 48 percent to 46 percent, according to a new poll of likely voters and those who already cast ballots.

The expectation among strategists is not that Behn will win, but it has raised questions about what an over-performance by a Democrat in a deep red state means for next year’s battle for the House.

If a district that went to President Trump by 22 points can become competitive, then the nation as a whole seems to be shifting to the left. It should be noted that the modern Trump GOP coalition is lower turnout, and just does not show up in off year elections the way they do in Presidential elections.

We saw this play out in the 2018 midterms against President Trump in his first term, and in the 2022 midterms when then President Joe Biden was extremely unpopular, and what was predicted to be a red wave turned into a Republican loss of a Senate seat and the GOP barely taking control of the House of Representatives.

But even with that context, the shift toward Democrats is startling. And beyond that, there is still a not insignificant chance that Democrat Aftyn Behn could win, which would further shrink the GOP House majority.

President Trump is hoping that his intervention in the race can put the Republican Matt Van Epps over the top, and shore up the GOP’s majority. But whatever happens on Tuesday, President Trump and the GOP have a lot of work to do if they want to stave off a blue wave in 2026.