Bad night for Biden: Key takeaways from Virginia, New Jersey elections

Democrats' worst fears are that they're on course for a 2010-like drubbing in next year's midterm elections.

The off-year elections for governor in Virginia and New Jersey tend to receive outsize attention, and the results are mined for deeper meaning about what they portend for the midterm elections the following year that determine which party controls U.S. Congress.

Here are some key takeaways from Tuesday’s elections:

Democrats’ worst fears are that they’re on course for a 2010-like drubbing in next year’s midterm elections and that they can’t use the specter of former U.S. President Donald Trump to stop it.

Those fears got a lot stronger after Republican Glenn Youngkin won the governor’s race in Virginia.

U.S. President Joe Biden won Virginia by 10 percentage points just a year ago, and if Democrats cannot generate more enthusiasm than their gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe did, they’ll likely be swept out of power in Congress.

In Virginia, governors are limited to a single term and elections are held in odd-numbered years, making it the go-to gauge of voter sentiment before midterms. It usually is a warning for the party in power in Washington and this year was no different.

McAuliffe, elected Virginia governor in 2013, was unable to excite voters amid significant headwinds facing Democrats, including Biden’s drooping poll numbers, the congressional stalemate over the president’s economic agenda and the persistence of the pandemic.

Democrats have only a five-vote margin in the House and a single-vote margin in the Senate. Historically, the party in power almost always loses seats in Congress. But if 2022 nationally is anything like Virginia 2021, Democrats will lose a lot more than normal.