The Republican Wave of 2014: The Continuity of the 2012 and 2014 Elections

Abstract

AbstractThis article examines the influences on the 2014 midterm congressional elections. The election was a decisive victory for the Republican Party. Republicans picked up nine Senate seats and with them control of the Senate. They also gained thirteen House seats, extending their House majority to its largest size in over 80 years. Although Republican seat gains can be explained at one level by the normal processes of surge and decline plus the midterm as a referendum on the performance of the presidential party, this does not explain why the midterm referendum was so lopsidedly against the Democrats that it created a Republican wave in the election. This analysis traces the reasons for the Democrats’ “shellacking” to the 2012 presidential election. The reason for President Obama’s reelection in 2012 has been misinterpreted as an ideological triumph or as a positive referendum on the president’s job performance. Neither was the case. As a first party-term incumbent, President Obama was given additional time to revive the weak economy that he inherited from President Bush. The 2012 referendum on the president’s performance was a suspended referendum, not a vote of confidence. The analysis shows that the economy was weak by historical standards in 2012 and remained so in 2014 and that voters realized that the economy was weak in 2012 and continued to believe so in 2014. The crucial political difference was that voters blamed former President Bush in 2012, but held the Democrats responsible in 2014.