'Messy,' 'divided' and 'scary': swing voters rate the country ahead of Election Day

Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me! Fresh Air Wild Card with Rachel Martin It's Been a Minute Machine Gods Get NPR+ More Podcasts & Shows Search Newsletters NPR Shop Get NPR+ Tiny Desk New Music Friday All Songs Considered Music Features Live Sessions About NPR Diversity Support Careers Press Ethics Swing voters show midterm challenge for Trump, Republicans One last check in with the Swing Shift voters before Election Day. All of them voted for President Trump. Now, they're rating his presidency and deciding who to support when he's not on the ballot. 'Messy,' 'divided' and 'scary': swing voters rate the country ahead of Election Day November 3, 20265:00 AM ET Heard on Morning Edition By 

Voters Lee, Wally, Theresa, and Gerald. Tara Anand for NPR hide caption

Gerald and Wally both voted for President Trump in 2024, helping him with the state of Georgia. Their votes in 2026 illustrate the challenges the president and his party face in today's midterms.

Gerald is still all in, giving Trump an A+++. He cast his ballot on the first day of early voting in Georgia for Republicans Mike Collins for Senate and Rick Jackson for governor.

"Red all the way down the ballot," Gerald said. "There was one instance where there was nothing but a Democrat running unopposed and I preferred to write my own name in, because I refuse to give a Democrat my vote."

Swing Shift These men voted for President Trump. They have very different views of how he's doing Wally, on the other hand, represents a fraying of the Trump coalition. Every time he's been asked since March, he's given the president an F.

"I just don't think that he's an effective leader and I thought that as Americans we'd do so much better," he said.

Wally said inflation is the top issue influencing his vote, but he doesn't have a lot of hope that any one politician or any one election can fix it. He also voted early in Georgia for the Democratic Senate incumbent Jon Ossoff and gubernatorial candidate Keisha Lance Bottoms — a vote against Trump and MAGA as much as anything else.

He gives Democrats and Republicans in Congress an F as well.

"I think these people are essentially stealing money from the American public and we need wholesale change in this midterm, and we also need a big change for the next presidential election," he said.

Wally and Gerald are among a group of swing voters in swing states NPR has been checking in with regularly as part of a long-term reporting project called Swing Shift. NPR has agreed not to use their full names so they can speak freely about politics, without fear of personal or professional repercussions.

All of the Swing Shift voters have cast a ballot for President Trump over the past decade. Most of them voted for him just two years ago.

When Americans cast their votes in the midterm elections, they'll have the chance to weigh in on the state of the country, nearly two years into President Trump's second term in office.

Asked for one word or phrase to describe how they are feeling, Swing Shift voters used words like "messy," "divided," "disarray," and "scary. "

In the week before Election Day, their assessment of Trump's performance on the job roughly aligns with national polls: most were unhappy or underwhelmed, often citing the war in Iran and high energy prices as major concerns. Only two of the 11 Swing Shift voters told NPR they were happy with Trump's second term.

Theresa, a Pennsylvania voter who voted for former President Joe Biden in 2020, then President Trump in 2024, said she would give the president a C-.

"Because he said the war was only going to be a few weeks. And we knew that was not the case," she said.

Elections NPR special: 5 takeaways from a year of listening to swing voters Lee from Nevada, one of the voters happy with Trump, still voiced concerns about the war with Iran. He gave Trump's performance in office this term an A-.

"Because the war in Iran is taking kind of long," he said.

When NPR first spoke to Lee, he was out of work. Now, with a new job, his outlook on the economy has improved. He said he's gotten even more Republican since the last election and more suspicious of Democrats.

Meanwhile, Quintero, a Biden to Trump voter, also from Nevada, told NPR he is swinging back to Democrats in this year's midterms.

That's the challenge for Republicans: two years in, the Trump 2024 base isn't supplying reliable Republican votes.

Even as this election, like all midterms, has turned into a referendum on the president and his policies, he isn't on the ballot. So the question is how their feelings about Trump and his presidency will translate to votes for the House, Senate and governors.

In Pennsylvania, the Swing Shift voters are divided: three out of four voted for Trump in 2024. Now, three of them plan to vote for Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro, who is seeking re-election.

Swing Shift Pennsylvania swing voters say Trump hasn't delivered on promise to lower prices "I might get in there and change my mind again. But at this point, it is going to be with the politician that we're familiar with, which is Shapiro," Theresa said.

In the northern suburbs of Philadelphia, Stephen lives in one of the most competitive House districts in the country, Pennsylvania's 1st Congressional District. Incumbent Republican Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick has survived a Democratic wave before, and Stephen is willing to stick with him.

"I would still re-elect Brian Fitzpatrick but everything else, I would say maybe Democratic or…maybe do a write in," Stephen said.

At the top of the ticket, though, he's voting for Shapiro.

Only John from Philadelphia said he voted for the Republican in the governor's race. He said he feels like the country is "teetering" and he isn't happy with either party. He follows the news closely and sees where the political tides are headed.

"I think there will be a lot of investigations, a lot of impeachment talk and a lot of gridlock in Washington," John said of a possible Democratic win in the midterms. "And I don't know if we can afford that right now. So my word to describe the state of the country is 'anxious.'"

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