Donald Trump built a historic coalition that delivered a landslide victory in 2024.
That coalition just gave a message for inside-the-beltway, Swamp elites.
And Donald Trump's coalition just delivered one brutal wake-up call.
Trump's voters didn't show up for down-ballot Republicans
Democrats crushed Republicans across the board on Tuesday night in what was supposed to be competitive off-year elections.
But the real story wasn't Democrat strength.
It was large swaths of the Trump coalition sitting on the sidelines unmotivated by the establishment elites who they see being allowed to steamroll so many MAGA promises.
That needs to serve as a crowing rooster to wake up the party elites in the GOP.
Former Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger demolished Republican Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears by 15 percentage points in Virginia's gubernatorial race, becoming the state's first female governor.¹
In New Jersey, Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill destroyed Republican businessman Jack Ciattarelli by 13 points to become governor, making history as the first politician in 50 years to win a third consecutive gubernatorial term for either party in the Garden State.²
And in New York City, democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani won the mayor's race, defeating independent Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa in a three-way contest.³
The numbers tell the brutal truth about what happened.
Spanberger pulled in about 1.96 million votes compared to Earle-Sears' 1.44 million.⁴
Trump received 2.01 million votes in Virginia just one year ago.⁵
More than 500,000 Trump voters didn't show up for Earle-Sears.
The turnout collapse was even worse in New Jersey
Ciattarelli managed to get only 1.36 million votes compared to Trump's nearly 2 million votes in 2024.⁶
That's a staggering 635,000 fewer voters.⁷
In Passaic County, where Trump won by nearly 6,000 votes last year, Ciattarelli was losing by more than 20,000 votes.⁸
Trump transformed the Republican coalition by bringing in working-class voters, Hispanics, and low-propensity voters who don't normally participate in off-year elections.
These voters came out for Trump because he promised to drain the swamp, secure the border, and fight for forgotten Americans.
They stayed home on Tuesday because many of them weren’t given a reason to show up.
Republicans invested heavily in get-out-the-vote operations, with Trump's team pumping $2 million into microtargeting efforts.⁹
It didn't work but that’s not surprising considering Spanberger’s campaign alone spent nearly $60 million.
And, you simply can't manufacture enthusiasm when the party hasn’t inspired it.
Much of Trump's coalition isn't a party loyalty coalition – they’re a Trump loyalty coalition and a results coalition.
And that should terrify every Republican heading into 2026 midterms.
Virginia voters elected an assassination fantasizer while Republicans watched
The most disturbing result of the night proved Democrats will turn out no matter what.
Democrat Jay Jones defeated Republican incumbent Attorney General Jason Miyares despite text messages surfacing just weeks before the election showing Jones fantasizing about murdering a Republican lawmaker.¹⁰
In 2022 messages, Jones wrote about putting "two bullets to the head" of then-House Speaker Todd Gilbert.¹¹
When asked in a hypothetical scenario who he'd shoot if given two bullets and a choice between Gilbert, Adolf Hitler, and Cambodian dictator Pol Pot, Jones said Gilbert "gets two bullets to the head" and "receives both bullets every time."¹²
Jones also wrote about wanting to "piss on graves" of GOP opponents.¹³
Trump called Jones a "Radical Left Lunatic" who made "SICK and DEMENTED jokes" and demanded he withdraw from the race immediately.¹⁴
Virginia Democrats didn't care.
They elected him attorney general anyway.
NBC News exit polls showed 45% of Virginia voters said the text messages disqualified Jones for the job.¹⁵
But among the 49% who strongly disapproved of Trump, a staggering 91% voted for Jones anyway.¹⁶
That's the difference.
Democrats are motivated by pure hatred of Trump and will vote for anyone – even someone who fantasizes about political assassination – as long as that person promises to fight Trump.
Meanwhile, much of Trump's 2024 coalition was left to sit at home because the GOP party infrastructure failed to show them why they’d done much worth showing up for.
The party also completely failed on early voting and ballot harvesting.
Democrats dominated early voting in both Virginia and New Jersey, building up massive leads before Election Day even arrived.¹⁷
In New Jersey, registered Democrats led registered Republicans in mail ballot returns by over 41 points.¹⁸
You can't win elections when the other side banks that many votes before your voters even show up.
Trump figured out how to turn out low-propensity voters by giving them something worth fighting for.
But that 2024 magic was never going to automatically transfer to 2025 or 2026.
Trump and GOP party leadership have less than a year to correct things or they're going to hand the keys to Congress back to a Democrat Party that is now for all intents and purposes controlled by radicals like Mamdani, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Jay Jones.
¹ "2025 election results and full coverage," Yahoo News, November 5, 2025.
² Ibid.
³ "Maps show election results for NYC mayor," CBS News, November 5, 2025.
⁴ "Virginia Governor Election 2025 Live Results," NBC News, November 5, 2025.
⁵ Ibid.
⁶ "New Jersey governor election results 2025 live updates," The Washington Post, November 5, 2025.
⁷ "Dems' Election Day Sweep Is Not A Harbinger, It's A Wake-Up Call For The Grand Old Party," Conservative Brief, November 5, 2025.
⁸ Ibid.
⁹ Ibid.
¹⁰ "Democrat Jay Jones wins Virginia attorney general race," NBC News, November 4, 2025.
¹¹ Ibid.
¹² Ibid.
¹³ "Virginia AG candidate faces bipartisan backlash over violent, inflammatory text messages," CBS News, October 2025.
¹⁴ Ibid.
¹⁵ "Democrat Jay Jones wins Virginia attorney general race," NBC News, November 4, 2025.
¹⁶ Ibid.
¹⁷ "What early voting data says about NYC, Virginia and New Jersey elections," CNN Politics, November 1, 2025.
¹⁸ Ibid.
