Here are the messages that could decide the midterm elections as campaigns make their final pitches

Congressional campaigns have less than a week to convince voters to keep the House and Senate in Republican hands or to turn control over to Democrats.President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance are relentlessly hitting the campaign trail to boost turnout among GOP voters in key battleground states. Democrats are relying on former President Barack Obama, former Vice President Kamala Harris, and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to help shore up support on their side.Outside super PACs and allies like tech billionaire Elon Musk are also pouring millions into ads to help Republicans, while Democratic groups are investing in traditionally red states in hopes of pulling off election night upsets. Here are the key themes campaigns are focusing on in the waning days of the midterm cycle.Affordability and the Iran war Affordability has been the top issue, as the Iran war has raised gas prices and Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs have increased the cost of goods.Democrats have repeatedly hammered their opponents on the issue and tied them to the president, who is facing record-low approval numbers.“This is the rot at the core of our broken system. It’s why so many Texans can’t get ahead no matter how hard they work,” Texas Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico said at a Sunday rally. “It’s why we can’t afford the basics in this economy — gas, groceries, utilities, healthcare — because the system has been rigged by crooked politicians just like Ken Paxton.”Former Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper has struck a similar tone against Republican Michael Whatley in the North Carolina Senate race.“I’m running to make stuff cost less, and that starts by addressing the cost of food and groceries, health care, utilities, housing and child care,” he recently wrote in an op-ed for the Charlotte Observer. “I’ll work with anyone I can to deliver relief for families getting crushed by high prices.”House Majority PAC, a super PAC affiliated with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), launched ads on Tuesday slamming Reps. Jeff Hurd (R-CO) and Rob Wittman (R-VA) for supporting Trump’s tariffs and the war. Trump has tried to help Republicans by announcing federal projects to bring jobs to battleground states.“With America First allies, we can further reduce your taxes,” Vance said while campaigning in Montana Monday. “We can further tear down the bureaucracy of DEI and racial hatred that has infected our classrooms and too many of our companies. We can build more. We can build more houses. We can build more factories. We can build more of the good jobs that support our families and sustain our nation.”Republicans have also tried to flip the affordability issue on Democrats by highlighting several candidates’ opposition to Trump’s signature tax cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. The Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC affiliated with Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), released a new ad this week slamming Ohio Democratic Senate nominee Sherrod Brown on that very topic. Republicans hit Democrats over transgender issues While Republicans are taking hits for affordability, transgender issues continue to haunt Democrats this cycle.The Senate Leadership Fund is out with an ad hitting Iowa Democratic Senate nominee Josh Turek for voting to “allow boys to use girls’ locker rooms and bathrooms in schools.”“Josh Turek chose cocktail hour with his liberal donors over representing Iowans in Des Moines,” said Chris Gustafson, the GOP super PAC’s communications director. “Turek skipped over half his votes in the state House and only showed up to advance the Far-Left’s radical agenda, like allowing men in girls’ bathrooms. Turek is far too liberal for Iowa.” During last week’s Notre Dame-BYU football game, Choose Freedom PAC debuted an ad claiming Democrats care more about their pronouns than paychecks.According to Inside Elections, Republicans have spent more than $200 million on ads attacking Democrats over transgender issues during this midterm cycle. In contrast, Democrats have spent roughly $12 million in response.Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), a possible 2028 contender, implored Democrats to reaffirm their support for transgender individuals.“I support the rights of trans women because I’m a girl’s girl,” she said during a campaign town hall in Portland, Maine, last week to support Maine Democratic Senate nominee Troy Jackson.But it’s unclear if members of her party are listening. In Texas, Talarico has walked back his previous claim that there are “six sexes.”Corruption and stock trading This cycle, both Democrats and Republicans are making an issue of congressional stock trading. The main super PAC affiliated with House Democrats is running ads attacking incumbent GOP lawmakers over their stock trades while serving in office.“Take Victoria Spartz,” says one Democrat ad targeting the Indiana Republican. “Her family traded up to $5 million in stocks in just the last five years, and got caught failing to disclose her trades on time. All while voting to make our lives more expensive, Spartz is keeping the game rigged for herself, leaving us behind.” Republicans are using the same tactic in several contests, most notably against Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY) in a seat Trump carried in 2024.“You have to ban congressional stock trading, my opponent voted no to that. Why?” Suozzi’s GOP challenger Mike LiPetri asked at their October debate. “It’s because he’s made millions of dollars trading stocks while in office over the past decade.”More broadly, Democrats are going hard on public corruption. In North Carolina, Cooper alluded to the issue in a recent ad in which he empathizes with families struggling while members of Congress’ net worth continues to rise.“Washington politicians get rich while you get hurt. Corporations make huge profits while your costs go up. I’m Roy Cooper, and we have to fix it,” Cooper says. “Stop the corruption of both Republicans and Democrats. Take on the insurance and utility companies that are overcharging us; work to end this war and lower gas prices.”At a Saturday San Antonio rally, Talarico linked corruption to the affordability crisis.“Texans voted to lower healthcare costs, but corrupt political deals have gutted our healthcare and sent premiums skyrocketing, all to give tax cuts to billionaires,” he said, likely alluding to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.“We have an affordability crisis because we have a corruption crisis. But we can end that,” he continued. “We can change this in this election, in this state, in this race, we are running against the embodiment of this corrupt system. We are running against the most corrupt politician in Texas. Ken Paxton represents everything going wrong with our politics. He doesn’t serve us; he serves himself. Since taking office, Ken Paxton has increased his net worth by $27 billion.”Childcare adding to affordability woes Democrats have repeatedly linked childcare to affordability, saying the issue now is vying with rent and medical care as a top priority for voters.Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul el Sayed lamented the lack of media questions about childcare after an Oct. 21 debate against Republican Mike Rogers.“You know why? Because it’s one of the biggest drags on women in the economy,” el Sayed told reporters. “You know, too often because it’s so expensive, right? One family member or another has to leave the workforce to take care of a kid, and more often than not, it’s women. And I get asked about that every day. Y’all don’t ask me about that question, but it is a fundamental issue.”Rep. Ashley Hinson (R-IA), the Iowa Republican Senate nominee, mentioned the issue during the final moments of her Oct. 7 debate with Turek.“I’m delivering and fighting for Iowans every single day because I’m a working mom,” she said. “I understand what families are facing. Been through many of those challenges. Written the daycare checks.”Last week, the issue came up again in a fireside conversation with Sen. Katie Britt (R-AL) as Hinson pushed for accessible and affordable childcare.“I think about it as you know this is supporting healthy, happy families, but also we need to be having the conversations about the workforce behind the workforce because it is an incredibly important issue that people have access to affordable childcare, no matter what your ZIP code is,” said Hinson.The debate over childcare has roiled some conservatives who opposed federal funding to subsidize stay-at-home parents, a proposal Vance reportedly supported. Sarah Rittling, executive director of the First Five Years Fund, said polling showed that “82% of voters nationally say that childcare is part of the affordability crisis.”“But when you dig a little bit deeper into that, you have, for example, half of parents paying for care in Ohio and North Carolina say that childcare costs are preventing them from saving or getting ahead financially,” Rittling continued. “One in four voters in Louisiana and North Carolina say childcare costs are causing them to delay starting or growing their families. A third of parents in Ohio, Mississippi, and North Carolina are cutting back on household essentials in order to be able to afford care.”Fixing the border and ending illegal immigration Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration at the southern border fulfilled a campaign promise but also led to some backlash over aggressive deportation tactics.Still, Trump is touting his work to prevent illegal immigrants from entering the United States. At a Monday evening rally in Mississippi to boost Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS), Trump pledged to “pass the No Invasion of Our Country Act, prohibiting any future president from ever opening our borders to illegal immigrants again.”“We will pass the death penalty for large-scale drug dealers, human traffickers, and anyone who kills a police officer,” he continued. “We will pass voter identification, proof of citizenship, and the SAVE America Act.”New York Republican gubernatorial nominee Bruce Blakeman bemoaned the media’s reporting on the tactics of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.“All you hear about is ICE, ICE, ICE,” he told CBS New York on Sunday.Blakeman also blasted Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY) for how she handled the migrants Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) sent to New York in 2022.“Kathy Hochul made this a sanctuary state,” he said. “She invited people who came here illegally to come to New York to get free food, free housing, free transportation, a free cellphone, and free healthcare. She invited them.”TRUMP’S $5,000 DIVIDEND PROMISE MET WITH SKEPTICISM AHEAD OF ELECTION DAYIn a briefing with reporters on Tuesday, pollster G. Elliott Morris claimed that Trump had lost “a little over 20 percentage points on his handling of immigration as an umbrella issue.”New polling from Morris’s firm, Wave Polling and Research, showed that “Democrats are now trusted to handle immigration for the first time in like a decade.”