Transcript Generated by AI 00:05 Mark Parkinson back with Park Place and I'm here today to talk about the 2026 00:10 elections. 00:11 You know, I have people come up and ask me all the 00:13 time is 2026 is there going to be a blue wave? 00:16 And I will say it tell you that it what I think here today is that there isn't 00:20 going to be a blue wave. 00:21 There is going to be a blue tsunami. 00:24 It's going to be beyond what most of you have experienced. 00:28 One of the few advantages of being old is that you've lived through and seen a lot 00:34 of things, and 2026 reminds me a lot of 1994. 00:37 In 1992, Bill Clinton was elected president. 00:40 He wasn't very popular, and in his midterms elections in 1994, 00:45 Republicans won a shocking number of races. 00:49 We really haven't had a wave or tsunami like that since then. 00:54 But 2026 is set up to be the same thing in reverse. 00:58 Obviously. 00:59 President Trump was elected in 2024. 01:02 His numbers are not good. 01:03 Inflation is high, the war is unpopular. 01:07 People are just generally not feeling good about things. 01:11 And I think there's going to be a massive Democratic win when the election results 01:15 are tallied. 01:15 So why do I think that? 01:16 Let's first of all talk about the US House. 01:19 When I last reported to you my thoughts, I told you what I think most pundits 01:23 thought, which was that the Democrats would 01:26 probably win the House in 2026. 01:28 I think it's now a virtual certainty. 01:31 Democrats only need to pick up four seats. 01:33 The average number of seats that are lost in a midterm is 35. 01:38 This president is quite unpopular. 01:40 So I think there will be way, way more than four seats lost. 01:44 And the overwhelming probability is that Democrats will control the House and that 01:48 Hakeem Jeffries will be the speaker of the House. 01:51 The big question is the Senate. 01:54 A year or so ago, pundits were almost universally saying 01:57 that there's no way Republicans would lose control of the Senate. 02:02 Why were they saying that? 02:03 Republicans currently have a 53 to 47 margin, 02:07 but in addition to having that margin, they also have the vice president that 02:12 breaks ties. 02:14 What that means is that the Democrats don't just need the three seats to get to 02:18 even with Republicans, Democrats have to pick up four seats. 02:22 When you look at the map in 2026, a year ago, you would say, well, 02:25 that's just not going to happen. 02:27 Why? 02:28 Well, first of all, Democrats have to defend 2 seats that are 02:32 very hard for Democrats to defend. 02:33 They need to not go backwards. 02:35 And those are Georgia and Michigan. 02:37 But if you look at the polling as we sit here today, 02:40 it looks like the two Democratic seats in Georgia and Michigan will hold. 02:45 So then you have to ask yourself the question, 02:47 where do Democrats pick up four seats? 02:50 And a year ago it seemed almost impossible and now it looks pretty likely. 02:55 3 states the Democrats are pulling far ahead. 02:59 Those are Maine, North Carolina, and believe it or not, Alaska. 03:04 If they win those three, that gets it to 50/50. 03:06 And so then you say, well, where do they pick up the 4th seat? 03:11 Well, believe it or not, there are multiple possibilities. 03:13 Texas is in play. 03:15 Iowa, believe it or not, is in play. 03:17 Ohio, not surprisingly, is in play. 03:19 And believe it or not, my home state of Kansas may elect a 03:23 Democratic Senator for the first time in 90 years. 03:27 The betting markets currently say that the Democrats have a 65% chance to take 03:32 the Senate. 03:33 I actually think the probability is much higher than that. 03:36 What does this mean for the sector if Democrats just win the House but don't 03:41 win the Senate? 03:42 I don't think it means very much. 03:44 There will be a ton of oversight of the president and his administration during 03:48 those two years in the House, but I don't think they'll be much 03:52 oversight on us. 03:53 However, if Democrats win both the House and the 03:56 Senate, we're definitely going to be looked at. 03:59 There are a handful of Democrats in the Senate that are very determined to get a 04:04 minimum staffing bill into statute. 04:07 And I have no doubts that there will be multiple hearings and discussions on the 04:11 topic. 04:12 At the end of the day, I don't think it'll happen. 04:14 It won't happen because President Trump has the veto power, 04:17 but we will be under the microscope. 04:20 And what that will really mean is that a large part of our future will be 04:24 determined by the 2028 elections. 04:26 If we have a scenario where we have a Democratic president, a Democratic House, 04:32 and a Democratic Senate, the minimum staffing bill that our our 04:36 idea that was that we were successfully defeated will definitely resurrect itself. 04:41 And I wouldn't be surprised if it could make it all the way through this process 04:46 in 2029. 04:46 So the elections upcoming in 2026 are incredibly important. 04:50 Look for what I think will be an historic result for the Democrats and any election 04:55 results creates opportunities and challenges for us. 04:58 None of this is worth worrying too much about. 05:00 We will figure it out, but I think change is definitely coming. 05:04 Thanks again for watching this video and thanks for your support at Park Place.
