How 2026 Is Not Like 2006 

On Sunday, The New York Times’ Carl Hulse penned a comparison of the 2026 and 2006 midterm elections, as the latter produced a Blue Wave so big that Democrats took control of the House and Senate. Hulse summed up the similarities: “The war in the Middle East is increasingly unpopular. So is the president as his numbers dip perilously — a common development in the sixth year of a presidency. Congressional Republicans are embroiled in unsavory scandals. Americans are shelling out big bucks for gas while economic anxiety runs high.” 

Hulse notes the parallels are not perfect, with 2026 shaped by social media, deepening political polarization, and aggressive redistricting. But there’s one more striking difference: the Republican Party’s choice of foil. 

In 2006, Republicans took aim at then-House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. In February of that year, at a House Republican retreat, the National Republican Congressional Committee produced a Star Wars-themed parody video featuring “Darth Nancy” leading “the evil Democratic empire.” As the midterm campaign progressed, Republicans tagged Pelosi as a “just plain scary” “San Francisco liberal” pushing a “radical plan to advance the homosexual agenda” and “tax-and-spend, soft-on-security” policies.  

The political logic was sound. Pelosi was in line to become Speaker if Democrats won a House majority. The Democratic candidates running in competitive congressional districts were largely more moderate than Pelosi. Therefore, Republicans had good reason to try to tar those candidates as beholden to Pelosi.  

Still, it didn’t work. Voters were too upset with George W. Bush, the quagmire in Iraq, the mishandling of Hurricane Katrina, the unwanted attempt to privatize Social Security, the scandals, and the gas prices. Conservatives were too discredited to gin up fears about liberalism.  

In 2026, Republicans are returning to the familiar ploy of creating a leftist boogeyman to stave off a rising Blue Wave. But instead of linking candidates to the person in line to be the next Speaker, Hakeem Jeffries, Republicans are targeting a Twitch streamer who has been involved in only a handful of congressional races: Hasan Piker. 

That may be a little oversimplified. It’s not as if Piker is featured in every single ad produced by GOP campaign arms. (Although Fox News, arguably an unofficial GOP campaign arm, has aired 224 broadcasts about Piker in August, compared to 44 about the war with Iran.) It would be more accurate to describe the GOP’s main foil as “socialism” with incendiary clips of Piker used to sharpen the caricature. 

Take this ad with the tagline “Stop Socialism, Stop Democrats,” released by the National Republican Congressional Committee after the Michigan primary. The video features a collection of clips from Democratic candidates associated with the Democratic Socialists of America alongside a clip of Piker saying, “Murder those motherf***ers in the streets, let the streets soak in their f***ing red capitalist blood.” (Another clip is shown of a lesser-known leader of the DSA declaring, “Our goal is communism.”)  

Preceding those clips is one of a mild-mannered Jeffries rhetorically asking, “What do you think we are going to be able to do when we’re in the majority?” Republicans have no clips of Jeffries saying anything incendiary or aligning himself with the DSA. In fact, earlier this month Jeffries said, “I don’t support the DSA agenda.”  

The GOP can’t dust off its Pelosi playbook and apply it to Jeffries. Freaking out about a “New York liberal” isn’t going to rile voters up when there are bona fide socialists attracting attention. It also doesn’t help Republicans stoke fear about a Speaker Jeffries when Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner met with Jeffries to discuss potential areas of legislative compromise and propose a bipartisan meeting with the White House Chief of Staff. (Some Democrats are livid at Jeffries about having a chummy meeting with a corrupt Trump family member. But Republicans are the ones who should be upset that, 10 weeks before Election Day, Trump’s inner circle is tacitly acknowledging Democrats are on the cusp of winning the House.) 

And remember, the Pelosi playbook didn’t even work 20 years ago. When the party in power is deeply unpopular, stoking fears about opposition leaders is very difficult. Stoking fears about potential backbenchers and their online boosters is an even bigger stretch.  

The outsized focus on Piker overlooks that the vast majority of the Democratic candidates have had nothing to do with him. He has campaigned alongside or hosted on his Twitch stream a few House primary winners—Adam Hamawy (New Jersey-12), Melat Kiros (Colorado-01), Donavan McKinney (Michigan-13), and Chris Rabb (Pennsylvania-03)—as well as Senate primary winner Abdul El-Sayed of Michigan and Ashia Wahab, who just won a special election to represent California’s 14th congressional district. (Will Lawrence, who won the House primary in Michigan’s 7th district, flattered Piker on video and asked to be a Twitch guest.) But several of his preferred candidates lost primary races this year, including Francesca Hong (Wisconsin Governor), Tom Steyer (California Governor), Julie Gonzales (Colorado-U.S. Senate), Saikat Chakrabarti (California-11), Cori Bush (Missouri-01), and Oliver Larkin (Florida-25). 

Because the incorrigible Piker streams for several hours every day, he continues to make controversial statements and create opportunities for Republicans. Over the weekend, Piker posted a picture of the pro-Israel Democratic nominee for Michigan’s 11th congressional district, Jeremy Moss, and said, “if Jews in America keep putting this idea out there that they are singularly invested in Israel, eventually someone’s going to … take action—not against the state of Israel, mind you, but against American Jews.”  

As some interpreted the comment as blaming pro-Israel Jews for any future antisemitic violence, El-Sayed saw the need to release a statement saying “nobody speaks for this campaign besides me and my campaign spokespeople” and suggesting others should not “make this race about a Twitch streamer.” His Republican opponent Mike Rogers, arguing the statement didn’t go far enough, charged El-Sayed with not having “the guts to disavow his running mate.” 

Jeffries took the opportunity to push back on Piker with a statement on X that didn’t mention the streamer’s name but did address the substance of the controversial remarks: “The malicious claim that American Jews are inviting violence against themselves is dangerous and antisemitic. There is zero justification for threats against the safety of our Jewish brothers and sisters at a moment of rising hate. We will fight the cancer of antisemitism with the fierce urgency of now.” 

El-Sayed is in the trickiest position of any Democrat. Most others who sought and received Piker’s support are running in deep blue districts, and Piker can’t say much that would risk their chances in November. El-Sayed, however, needs to fully reunify the Democratic Party after a bruising primary as well as woo swing voters to win his closely divided state. In turn, he is now trying to downplay his association with Piker without making a complete break.  

Still, being in a tricky position is not necessarily a fatal position. We don’t know yet if the Blue Wave is big enough to render El-Sayed’s past campaigning with Piker immaterial to the final outcome.  

The rest of the Democratic Party, if the 2006 midterm campaign teaches us anything, has little to fear about the Republican Party’s attempt to spotlight Piker’s antics. When one party is in power, a midterm election is a referendum on that party’s record. With voters palpably disgusted with the Republican record, all the available scare tactics aren’t enough to change the subject.  

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