For reasons that will puzzle historians, frustrate campaign consultants, and one day inspire a very long Netflix documentary, Republicans have decided to sit politely on their hands while Democrats tell the biggest economic fairy tale since “inflation is transitory.”
And it’s working.
Somewhere in America right now, a voter is standing in the cereal aisle staring at an $8 box of cornflakes, thinking, “I thought Trump was going to make things more affordable, not worse. He really messed things up with these tariffs.” Not because that voter is stupid, but because silence is persuasive. When one side yells nonstop and the other side mutters into its loafers, people assume the yelling side knows something.
Democrats have discovered a magical word—affordability—and they’re using it the way toddlers use markers: everywhere, with no regard for damage. Everything costs too much? Trump. Rent’s insane? Trump. Groceries, gas, daycare, car insurance, dental cleanings, paper towels? Also Trump. The man’s been back in office for five minutes, but apparently he personally raised the price of eggs by staring at a chicken too aggressively.
And Republicans, watching this unfold, have responded with the political equivalent of a shrug and a throat-clearing cough.
This is how you lose midterms.
Historically, midterms punish sitting presidents. That’s not a theory—it’s gravity. Voters get cranky, the opposition gets energized, and the party in power suddenly discovers that enthusiasm does not, in fact, refill itself. The base assumes the job is done. The other side assumes the house is on fire. Guess which one shows up in November?
Now layer on the modern left’s true superpower: message discipline. They find a phrase, bleach it of meaning, repeat it until it sounds like common sense, and accuse anyone who pushes back of being cruel. “Affordability” is perfect. It’s vague. It’s emotional. It’s unfalsifiable. You can’t argue with it without sounding like a villain in a Dickens novel.
The real trick, though, is time travel.
Democrats are attempting to retroactively assign Joe Biden’s inflationary dumpster fire to Donald Trump, and Republicans are letting them do it. Biden lit the match, threw it into a barrel of gasoline labeled “$6 trillion spending spree,” and then wandered off muttering about electric buses. Trump returns, grabs a fire extinguisher, and Democrats shout, “Why’s everything still smoky?!”
Here’s the uncomfortable truth Republicans seem allergic to stating out loud: inflation doesn’t disappear because you glare at it. You don’t fix four years of monetary malpractice with a press release and a vibe shift. It takes time. It takes restraint. It takes undoing layers of bad policy without snapping the economy in half.
Voters understand that—if someone explains it to them.
Instead, Republicans are doing something far more dangerous: pretending voters’ pain isn’t real. Calling affordability concerns a “hoax” is political malpractice. People know what their mortgage costs. They know what their grocery bill was three years ago. You can’t gaslight someone who has a receipt.
This isn’t the first time this movie has played.
Jimmy Carter handed Reagan an economy that felt like an economic escape room. Reagan didn’t pretend the damage wasn’t real. He explained why it happened and why fixing it would take time. Clinton inherited Bush 41’s slowdown and sold patience with optimism. Obama rode the Bush 43 crash while promising recovery would be “shovel-ready” (spoiler: it wasn’t).
Trump has something none of them had: a media environment where lies travel at broadband speed and get reinforced by TikTok influencers who think economics is astrology with spreadsheets.
And yet—Republicans are still acting like this is 1986, as if silence projects seriousness.
It doesn’t.
Silence tells voters you’re either guilty or asleep.
Meanwhile, Democrats are already warming up the sequel. If they retake Congress, impeachment becomes background noise. Investigations become hobby projects. Legislation becomes impossible. Then comes 2028, complete with a new candidate promising to “finally fix affordability” by doing the exact same things that broke it.
Higher taxes. More spending. Softer borders. Harder lives.
The irony is that Republicans actually have material to work with. Real wins. Real relief. Tax cuts. Deregulation. Energy abundance. Border enforcement. Wages inching upward as inflation finally loosens its grip. That’s a story—if someone tells it.
Politics is not about being right. It’s about being heard.
Republicans don’t just need a message. They need repetition. They need discipline. They need to say, over and over, until it’s boring: This pain started before Trump. Fixing it takes time. And we’re doing the work.
They also need to remind voters what happens if Democrats get power again—not with hysteria, but with memory. People remember the prices. They remember the chaos. They remember the lectures. They just need permission to connect the dots.
Midterms aren’t decided by think pieces. They’re decided by turnout. And turnout follows emotion. If Republicans don’t give their voters something to fight for, Democrats will happily give theirs something to fight against.
The clock is ticking. Inflation doesn’t care about decorum. Voters don’t care about excuses. And elections don’t reward silence.
If Republicans keep letting Democrats lie about affordability, they won’t just lose Congress.
They’ll lose the story.
And in politics, once you lose the story, the ending writes itself.
