Can Scandals Influence Midterm Elections?

Going into the fall midterm season, political scandals are in the air in U.S. politics. Over the past few months, the public has been confronted with a series of high-profile scandals that have become challenges for both parties. Democrats were forced to scramble in July after a sexual assault allegation brought down Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner, who was replaced by the working-class Troy Jackson. Although Platner denied the accusation and had already survived multiple controversies, including the discovery of an apparent Nazi tattoo and reports that he had sent sexually explicit messages to women other than his wife, the last round of allegations proved more than Democrats could tolerate. In April, California Rep. Eric Swalwell was accused of sexual assault and misconduct by several women. While denying the allegations, Swalwell resigned. Going into the fall midterm season, political scandals are in the air in U.S. politics. Over the past few months, the public has been confronted with a series of high-profile scandals that have become challenges for both parties. Democrats were forced to scramble in July after a sexual assault allegation brought down Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner, who was replaced by the working-class Troy Jackson. Although Platner denied the accusation and had already survived multiple controversies, including the discovery of an apparent Nazi tattoo and reports that he had sent sexually explicit messages to women other than his wife, the last round of allegations proved more than Democrats could tolerate. In April, California Rep. Eric Swalwell was accused of sexual assault and misconduct by several women. While denying the allegations, Swalwell resigned. Republicans have also faced numerous political scandals. The most prominent example is Texas Senate candidate Ken Paxton, the current state attorney general, who was impeached in 2023 by the Republican-controlled state House of Representatives (and later acquitted by the state Senate) and was the subject of a federal corruption investigation involving allegations connected to bribery and abusing power. Paxton has also for years faced rumors of an extramarital affair—a contrast to his self-promotion as a champion of “traditional” social values. Paxton, whom President Donald Trump endorsed in the primary, is not alone. Florida Rep. Cory Mills, who lost his primary on Aug. 18, has been accused by women of assault and making threats. Ohio Rep. Max Miller’s ex-wife has said that he abused her. North Carolina Rep. Chuck Edwards ended his reelection campaign earlier this month after the House Ethics Committee found that he had engaged in inappropriate conduct toward female staffers and recommended that he be censured. Texas Rep. Tony Gonzales also stepped down in April amid allegations of sexual misconduct and other controversies. The midterms are awash in scandal. And none of this even touches on the multiple controversies that have engulfed the head of the Republican Party—the president—as well as several key members of his cabinet. But will any of this matter? Can scandals influence midterm elections? Can these issues rise to the level of economic concerns or assessments of presidential leadership in shaping decisions at the ballot box? In 2006, the answer was yes. Many issues were on the minds of voters that election cycle. President George W. Bush’s war in Iraq was deeply unpopular and had no end in sight. Republicans had pursued a policy agenda that slashed taxes for upper-income Americans while doing little to strengthen the social safety net on which many working Americans depended, fueling discontent with the GOP’s priorities. The fallout from the disastrous response to Hurricane Katrina symbolized what many saw as Republican indifference to vulnerable communities. Stagnant wages, rising income inequality, and inadequate access to healthcare were all major concerns, as were fears that the Bush administration’s deregulatory zeal was harming the environment. But amid this long list of complaints, political corruption and personal scandal also emerged as key issues. The first earthquake to rock the GOP involved one of the party’s most influential figures, House Majority Leader Tom “The Hammer” DeLay. Elected to the House in 1984, DeLay was indicted by a grand jury in September 2005 for being part of a conspiracy to violate campaign finance laws. After denouncing the charges as a “sham” driven by “political retribution,” he resigned from his leadership position. The next Republican scandal to unfold centered on California Rep. Duke Cunningham, who pleaded guilty in November 2005 to accepting more than $2 million from defense contractors in exchange for supporting lucrative government contracts. (For example, one businessperson docked a yacht at the Washington waterfront, where the congressman lived rent-free during sessions.) Cunningham resigned from the House. In January 2006, one of the most powerful lobbyists in Washington, Jack Abramoff, pleaded guilty to a series of major charges, including mail fraud, tax evasion, and participating in a conspiracy to bribe public officials. Abramoff had created very close connections to DeLay and the Republican leadership, aided by a revolving door of congressional staffers and lobbying organizations on K Street. The FBI had been investigating his business for a while, and the public learned about all sorts of sordid tales about Abramoff, including him tricking Native American tribes into paying his group almost $80 million. “Words can never express my sorrow and profound regret,” he said in court after pleading guilty. “Nor can they express my sadness and regret for my conduct.” Two former DeLay aides, Tony Rudy and Michael Scanlon, were also implicated. As the year unfolded, new details continued to emerge, creating an unfavorable portrait of a Republican Party deeply enmeshed in the money-and-lobbying culture. For a country that had remained distrustful of government since Vietnam and Watergate, the high profile scandal reinforced a public perception that a culture of corruption, rather than the legacy of Ronald Reagan, had become a defining feature of Republican Party politics. In February 2006, 36 percent of independent voters told Pew they did not want their incumbents to be reelected—slightly more than the 34 percent that said the same before the watershed election of 1994 (when Republicans took control of Congress for the first time in 40 years). In June 2006, DeLay announced that, because of the prolonged investigation into his actions, he would resign from Congress and not seek reelection. In a blistering farewell speech on the House floor, he declared, “The common lament over the recent rise in political partisanship is often nothing more than a veiled complaint instead about the recent rise of political conservatism. You show me a nation without partisanship, and I’ll show you a tyranny.” There was also a Democratic scandal that captured public attention, though its impact was far less significant than the cumulative impact of the problems facing the GOP. In July 2005, the FBI taped Louisiana Rep. William Jefferson accepting $100,000 in a leather briefcase from an investor who was wearing a wire and recorded Jefferson talking about bribing a Nigerian official. On Aug. 3, 2005, federal agents searched his home and found $90,000 stored in a freezer, along with $10,000 hidden in food containers. In May 2006, the scandal intensified when the FBI raided Jefferson’s office in the Rayburn House Office Building, producing complaints even from some top Republicans that the executive branch had overstepped constitutional boundaries. But Republican scandals continued to dominate the headlines. In September 2006, with just weeks to go to the midterm elections, Ohio Rep. Bob Ney, a prominent lawmaker with ties to Abramoff, pled guilty to corruption-related charges. Meanwhile, Pennsylvania Rep. Curt Weldon was under investigation for assisting foreign-owned companies that had awarded contracts to his daughter. After months of hearing about money, politics, and corruption, a sex scandal capped off the year. On Sept. 29, Florida Republican Mark Foley rocked the party that had championed conservative cultural values when he resigned after reports that he had sent sexually explicit messages to teenage congressional pages. The story, which was also being investigated by the FBI, continued to unfold through the election. Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, who would be indicted in 2015 for structuring cash withdrawals in order to conceal sexual misconduct against teenage boys, insisted that he knew nothing about the allegations against Foley. The cumulative impact of these scandals was substantial. A Republican Party already severely weakened by the failed war in Iraq and burdened with a highly controversial domestic agenda now found itself increasingly associated with a culture of corruption that deepened public distrust of government. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi effectively incorporated this theme into the Democratic Party’s national campaign, but always as part of a broader argument about why Republicans could not be trusted and why conditions had deteriorated for so many Americans. According to Democrats, the scandals were not the only reason voters should reject the GOP, nor even the primary issue. Rather, they served as an X-ray of a political party that fundamentally did not have the interests of ordinary Americans at heart. Republicans, Democrats argued, were more interested in enriching themselves and indulging in sexual predilections than in ensuring Americans had food on the table, money in the bank, and a secure future. “Republicans are resisting true reform,” Pelosi argued, “because they all benefit from enabling the culture of corruption to continue. Republicans have allowed this poison tree of corruption to bear the fruit of bad policy for the American people.” Exit polls showed that corruption and scandal played a significant role in shaping the vote, with the state of the economy ranking as the only issue of higher importance. “Indictments, investigations and allegations of wrongdoing,” noted the Washington Post shortly before the election, “have helped put at least 15 Republican House seats in jeopardy, enough to swing control to the Democrats … even before the larger issues of war, economic unease and President Bush are invoked.” After a long period in the political wilderness, Democrats regained control of Congress, winning a 233-202 majority in the House and securing a 51-49 majority in the Senate, with a pickup of five seats. It’s unclear whether scandals going into this year’s midterms will have the same effect they did in 2006, especially since Democrats have also been touched by some high-profile controversies. The contemporary media ecosystem makes it increasingly difficult for any scandal to gain traction for more than a few days—at best. Plus, Trump has, for many Americans, blurred the boundaries of what constitutes a notable scandal. But scandals have the potential to matter a great deal, especially with Trump as the face of the party. Democrats have an opportunity similar to the one they seized in 2006 to use these scandals to illuminate the character of a party that has let presidential power run amok, permitted a war of choice in Iran, and stood by as prices continue to rise.