The status quo is rarely maintained in politics these days, if there is one thing that is certain.
Furthermore, history demonstrates that the new status quo has a lifespan of less than four years when one party controls the White House, the House, and the Senate—the so-called trifecta of governing authority. Under President-elect Donald Trump, the GOP is already under pressure to utilize their majorities, while Democrats must figure out how to bounce back from their defeat. Which pressure—the pressure to rule or the pressure to lose—will be more pressing in 2025?
We can infer this from the times when the trifecta has been controlled by one party since the election of President Ronald Reagan in 1980. Jimmy Carter, who held the trifecta for four years prior to Reagan, had his party disintegrate by the third year. It’s the final time the Democrats have controlled the White House and both chambers of Congress for four years in a row. Although Reagan’s party held the Senate for six of his eight years in office, he and George H.W. Bush never achieved a trifecta. For just two years (his first two), Bill Clinton and the Democrats were granted it.
After George W. Bush was elected, he held the office for less than six months before a party move gave the Democrats a one-seat advantage in the 50-50 Senate. After the midterm elections in 2002, Bush would regain the trifecta and hang onto it until the Democratic wave in 2006—the first time the GOP had done so since 1955!
After Barack Obama was elected president in 2008, Democrats had the trifecta for two years until the GOP took control of the House in 2010. For the first two years of Trump’s first term, Republicans would win it again, but in the 2018 midterm elections, the House would shift to the Democratic Party. After 2020, Joe Biden and the Democrats regained the trifecta, but they lost it in the first midterm election, just like Obama, Trump, and Clinton did.
This leads us to the current GOP trifecta, which will begin on January 20th, the day Trump takes office. This is Trump’s second term in office with a Republican-controlled Congress, and unlike his first year in office, he won’t be at odds with his own party. Republicans are attempting to get all of their promises into law before the 2026 midterm elections, and based on their words and deeds, it is clear that they will control this trifecta for little more than two years.
They understand that until the landlord—the American electorate—decides otherwise, they are merely renting their hold on power.
The question is not whether the GOP will lose control, but rather when. Furthermore, the when appears to be predictable, if not certain. Even if there isn’t a blue wave, it appears nearly certain that the Democrats will hold the majority in the House if Trump’s name isn’t on the 2026 election ballot.
Although the when appears to be quite predictable, we don’t know how we’ll arrive to the point where the public grows weary of the trifecta, which has happened exactly as planned in previous administrations.
Is the GOP, for example, genuinely united behind Trump, lock, stock, and barrel, or is the party just united in keeping its disagreements with Trump private?
One indication of how things could go wrong for Trump is the controversial vote for Mike Johnson to be the speaker of the House. Trump’s greatest issue is that, although the party is united in its desire to make his administration a success, it is divided on how to achieve this goal.
Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, a conservative who entered national politics with the goal of reducing the size and reach of government, is still a prominent member of this party. I’m not sure if Roy’s ideas on conservative governance align with those of Trump and the more recent Republicans he appointed to government.
From this vantage point, it appears that the current GOP is split between the more libertarian form of conservatism that has dominated since the Reagan era, which maintains that government should shrink and become less involved in Americans’ daily lives, and the idea of a strong government that gets involved in everything (the nation’s culture as well as the economy, think library books or access to junk food or vices like pornography, as well as tariffs).
The question is whether Trump will eventually have trouble getting his one big, beautiful measure passed as a result of this GOP split. Trump is not as enraged about the debt as some Republicans, including Roy, are. The Congressional Budget Office’s assessment of whether or not Trump’s policy increases the deficit will not matter to him. If he disagrees with the math, he will simply declare it incorrect and challenge his party members to disagree.
Unless he somehow loses favor with the GOP before the conclusion of his first year in office, it is probably going to be a successful legislative strategy for him. However, with the GOP’s extremely slim majority in the House, a tiny number of Republicans supporting fiscal conservatism might undermine this package and could reveal the party’s internal small-government versus strong-government division.
Of course, Democrats will only gain from the GOP coalition’s fractures if they manage to remain together throughout Trump’s first two years in office.
While the party remained remarkably united in opposition to Trump during his first term, there is already ample evidence that this unity will break down as Democrats consider how to respond to his second term after arguing for eight years that his first term was an anomaly that was not representative.
How many Democrats are willing to cooperate with Republicans in Congress to advance Trump’s agenda? More than you may imagine.
There is a growing perception that the Democratic brand is a shambles, despite the fact that Democrats lost both the presidency and the House by the narrowest of margins. Additionally, many elected Democrats are attempting to establish some degree of independence from the traditional Democratic brand, especially in the areas of economic populism and culture.
Perhaps the clearest example of this mentality in the modern era is Fetterman. He is obviously attempting to convey to his constituents that he is aware that a large number of his 2022 supporters cast ballots for Trump in 2024.
How many members of the House and Senate will be Fettermans? To what extent will the Democratic leadership pressure these individuals to follow the party line against Trump? At this time, we do not know the answers to these questions. However, it’s difficult to claim that any one party leader at the moment could even try to exercise that level of control. If Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer tries to make working with Trump a pariah cause, I don’t think he would go very far with many of his own Democratic colleagues. Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic leader of the House, is no different.
Of course, politicians are constantly thinking about the upcoming elections. Will a sizable portion of the Democratic base be willing to hold Democrats accountable for their collaboration with Trump? And if so, would that assist give the party a voice or cause it to split?
It is evident that the current group of elected Democrats in Congress feels they should be more humble with voters, acknowledge that elections have consequences, and acknowledge that voters have made it apparent they are sick of Democrats ruling. But how long will Democrats continue to think that way? Which Democrat, out of the three (looking at the next 2028 presidential race), will take advantage of the party’s possible lackluster reaction to Trump to demonstrate their toughness and establish themselves as a new spokesperson for the anti-Trump movement? And would that give the party a voice or give Trump a foil that keeps his own party closer together than it would like?
What we do know is that, even during periods of calm, politics is rarely static. One may also argue that the new political and Washington status quo is change, considering how frequently the House, Senate, and White House have changed hands over the past 25 years.
Therefore, this year, place your bets on change and party infighting, which has the potential to cause both parties to split. When does it occur, how does it happen, and which party breaks first?
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