Midterm Election 2018 Recap And What We Can Expect For The Future: Today, we are talking about this most recent 2018 midterm election. We were covering the election live for most of the night and we are excited to share with you the recap and our thoughts on what you can expect the next few years to look like. Tune in now to learn more!

Air Date: 11/09/2018

On-air Personalities: David Barton, Rick Green, and Tim Barton

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Transcription note:  As a courtesy for our listeners’ enjoyment, we are providing a transcription of this podcast. Transcription will be released shortly. However, as this is transcribed from a live talk show, words and sentence structure were not altered to fit grammatical, written norms in order to preserve the integrity of the actual dialogue between the speakers. Additionally, names may be misspelled or we might use an asterisk to indicate a missing word because of the difficulty in understanding the speaker at times. We apologize in advance.

Faith And The Culture

Rick:

Welcome to the intersection of faith and culture. This is WallBuilders Live where we’re talking about today’s hottest topics on policy, faith and the culture.

And as you know this is a listener supported program which means we’re able to bring you this great information: the Constitutional knowledge, the great guests that we have on the program and all the other biblical application to the culture. We’re able to bring you that because of the listeners like you supporting the program from all over the nation, and we’re asking you to come alongside us and not only support us with your prayers and sharing the word but yes with your fortunes. Lives, fortunes, sacred honor so we encourage you to go to WallBuilders.com today.

Make a contribution and come alongside us and be a part of the program. Help us to spread the word out there across the country.

We’re here with David and Tim Barton. David Barton is America’s premier historian. Tim Barton national speaker and pastor. Guys, we’ve got a post-election program today.

We’re going to recap some of what happened on Tuesday. Even now, some races not called and haven”€™t been completed. Some local races across the country razor-thin and even some of the national races.

House Races too close to call

David:

Yeah, on some of the races, Rick, like you mentioned, we’re not going to know the results literally for days and maybe for weeks in some cases. There are some razor thin margins which is one of the things we predicted. We did the election night coverage. We had six hours of live coverage. There were 12 different networks that came together. Myself and Michele Bachmann did coverage on those networks.

And one of the things we predicted early on was there’s going to be a whole lot of House races that are going to be too close to call, it’s going to be really late night. And now, a few days later they’re still not being called yet. So, by the time you count the absentee ballots and military ballots, etc. it’s going to be a while before we know.

And the Senate race in Mississippi, they have to go to a runoff with that because that was an open seat, the candidates were all in there. You have to have a clear 50 plus one winner and a pure majority so that Senate seat, U.S. Senate seat, and Mississippi.

And by the way, there were two Senate seats up in Mississippi. Roger Wicker, incumbent Republican was returned on the second seat. It was an open seat. And that one is going to have to go to a runoff. So we still don’t have the results of that, so there’s going to be results coming in yet for a while.

But what we do know at this point is that the Republicans picked up several seats in the Senate and the Democrats were able to flip the House by a much smaller margin than what was anticipated and predicted. And that’s going to create some interesting opportunities for Republicans in the Senate and interesting problems for Democrats in the House.

Democrats barely took the House

So, there’s a lot of things we can discuss that we never heard any kind of analysis on. And in the last three days since the election nobody’s really talking about them so we’re going to have a lot of fun looking is some things that may be kind of unique for people to hear but things you can look forward to two years from now and what’s going to happen in the next two years between now and the next election.

Rick:

Let’s do a quick summary before we go to break. Like you said, the Democrats took the House barely. I mean this was a razor-thin margin much smaller than it typically is the turn in a midterm election especially the first midterm for a president. I mean, this was twice as bad for Obama in 2010, twice as bad for Clinton in “€˜94, it was even worse for, if you go all the way back, Ford and Johnson and Eisenhower. They always lost a whole lot more.

We should’ve lost 50 seats based on history and didn”€™t. It’s going to be closer to 30 and then to gain in the Senate. I mean that’s almost unheard of. Not unheard of. I mean, it happened to Bush, but that was after 9/11 right after 9/11. So there was kind of some unity in the country.

Last time it happened in a normal type election was Reagan in “€˜82, and he only picked up one. So I mean this is very very unique it’s it’s much different than what everybody expected. Don”€™t you think?

David:

It is different from what they expected because the margin is so thin in the House. One thing to remember is after the last House was elected, there were 11 seats that became open after the election. The Democrats were looking only at a handful of seats making them a majority. If you were to have 11 seats that became open and you had special elections, Democrats could easily lose the House in the middle of the next cycle. Now, I’m not saying they will, but that is clearly within the realm of possibilities.

41 Republicans announced their retirement

And one of the other things that really kind of set this up is you had 41 Republicans announced their retirement this session. Now that’s unprecedented to have 41 incumbents Republicans saying “€œI’m leaving.”€ A lot of them did it shortly after Trump, and they thought he was going to be an embarrassment. Now they’re really kind of embarrassed at how well he’s done and how wrong they were on their predictions of what he would be.

Those 41 retirements was a substantial opening that would have made the results last Tuesday night, perhaps much different or at least much closer even over that. But having said that you still have to win 435. You have 435 races you have to win, 218 regardless of whether you’re retired or not.

So with that, there are some things that happened, that Rick in addition what you’re saying, this is unprecedentedly low bloodshed for a midterm after the presidents first elected. And we even did some things to complicate our own re-election in many cases. So this is, this is not the mandate.

There certainly was no blue wave or blue tsunami, blue ripple, I think is a better way of saying it. And we’ll look after the break is some things that really are more optimistic than what many people may be are seeing.

Rick:

Let”€™s take a quick break. We’ll be right back. More election results. You’re listening to WallBuilders Live.

 

Moment From American History

Tim:

This is Tim Barton from WallBuilders with another moment from American history. Alexis De Tocqueville, a political official from France, traveled to the United States in 1831 and penned his observations in the now famous book, “€œDemocracy In America.”€

Being from France, what he found in America was completely unexpected to him. He reported, “€œUpon my arrival in the United States, the religious aspect of the country was the first thing that struck my attention. And the longer I stayed there, the more I perceived the great political consequences resulting from this. In France, I had almost always seen the spirit of religion and the spirit of freedom marching in opposite directions. But in America, I found that they were intimately united and that they reigned in common over the same country.”€

Did Tocqueville recognized that it was Biblical Christianity and the morals it produced that made America great? For more information about Alexis Tocqueville and the positive influence of Christianity in early America go to WallBuilders.com.

 

Rick:

We’re back. Thanks for staying with us here on WallBuilders Live. We”€™re doing a little election recap on what happened Tuesday night across the nation.

 

House Losing The House Versus Keeping The Senate

And as we were going to the break, we were talking about you know the House, the Senate in general and how it turned out. Tim, that the House losing the House versus keeping the Senate. I mean, which one would you say was more important in the current environment?

Tim:

Well, I think there’s no doubt the Senate is the most important one based on the way we operate politically in America today, but you know even just let me back up to this idea.

Dad, you know that as you mentioned there was a blue ripple so to speak. I don’t know if you can even really consider it a ripple, as we commented in the first section. Based on how much things shifted in previous presidential administrations with that first midterm, whether it was under President Obama, there was such a huge what is that 60 something? It was a 60 pickup for the Republicans in the House under President Obama. Maybe it was relatively the same with President Clinton when I guess back in 1994 and Newt Gingrich became Speaker of the House.

Rick:

Yes, 63 House seats Obama lost, and six Senate seats and then Clinton lost 52 in the House and lost eight Senate seats. So both of those twice as bad as what we experienced Tuesday night.

Tim:

Right. And so especially when you have someone from a presidential perspective, who is very polarizing. It is very normal for the other side to swing so far off the pendulum and the fact that pendulum didn’t move hardly at all I think is just very telling.

The Senate So Much More Important

But Rick, to the question you asked coming out of the break, “€œIs the House or the Senate more important the atmosphere and environment?”€ I think the Senate so much more important.

You know one of the things that we actually have mentioned on previous Good News Fridays is some of the judges that were being confirmed through the Senate that President Trump has nominated.

So many good judges and even with Judge Kavanaugh there was such a fight in the Senate. If we would have lost the Senate at that point, you’re not going to really get any of these pro-life judges confirmed. And because the way the current political climate works judges are the ones, it seems, to be making more legislation than even the legislators do. And so where we are and culture today, the Senate seems to be much much more important than although if you look at the House and probably Nancy Pelosi will become the speaker.

And so with Nancy Pelosi leading the House, they’re going to try to do a lot of things. They’ve said that they want to open the borders and abolish ICE and they’re in favor of socialism, and there’s a lot of things they want to do. But that also has to go through the Senate and the Senate probably hopefully right Mitch McConnell come on.

The Senate’s hopefully not going to let that happen. But when it comes to the way that we operate in America and how significant judges have become in this current political climate and system there’s no doubt the Senate was much much more important for getting the right kind of judges in place so they can be the ones to protect religious liberty or the right to freedom of speech or you can go down the list of second amendment things that are under attack. You need the right kind of judges there to protect that, and the Senate”€™s the one that helps get those judges approved so we can fill those seats.

Judges and The Budgeting Process

David:

Here’s where I think you’ll say the most difference. I think you’ll see the most difference with the budgeting process because Tim’s right, judges will change America more than any election will right now.

Unfortunately, that’s the case, it should not be the case. Judges should not have the policy-making power. And I think the current crop of judges we’re getting right now are going to give more power back to the legislatures both State and Federal.

Rick:

And what this result means is that we get that same type of current crop of judges for another two years

David:

That’s right. That’s right.

Rick:  

That’s one of the major take-home lessons or results from Tuesday night is: two more years of President Trump appointing constitutional Conservatives to the bench and being approved by a Republican Senate. With this expanded majority

Government Shutdown and an Omnibus Bill

David:

Now, what happened this time, is the House and this past two years was able to get 3 of the 13 reparation bills through the process to the President to sign.

First time, in 10 years that the Congress has followed Federal law and turning out appropriations bills. I don’t think that’ll happen now with Democrats in control of the House. They are not going to turn out 13 appropriation bills.

What they will do is wait for a government shutdown and then do an omnibus bill. And that way to veto Planned Parenthood money you also have to veto military funding. And so, by having an omnibus bill rather than 13 appropriation bills for each Cabinet-level department etc. what you’re going to be faced with is we’re putting all the money in one basket and so while we’re at it we’re going to add every favorite social program we have, every radical agenda we can do to this, and we’re going to dare the Senate, the Republican Senate, to veto the military because they don’t like our social programs. So that I think will be the biggest thing.

Look for some government shutdown. Look for more omnibus bills which are abominable bills, but that’s what happens when you can’t get a body to go along with what the Federal law says. So look for those kind of changes.

Signs of Concern for the Democrats

Now outside of that, if I’m a Democrat strategist looking at what happened on Tuesday night, I mean what Tim was just saying talking about how both of you talking about how we retain the Senate. If I’m a Democrat strategist, I’m really concerned with the elections because while Democrats won the House, they won it through gerrymandered House districts. They did not win states they won individual locations within states.

Several states they took were seats where Hillary won that congressional district in the last election, it retained a Republican, but Hillary won that district. So these are seats that were already voting blue, and they were not pleased to have Republicans there, and they turned blue this election.

So if I’m looking at this as a Democrat, I’m saying, “€œoh my gosh, we just lost Florida.”€ We have a Republican governor, two Republican senators out of Florida and that is a key presidential state in 2020.

If I look at it I’m saying, “€œMan, look at Georgia we didn’t get Georgia. We didn’t make grounds there. We lost Tennessee that went statewide. We lost our Democrat in Indiana. That’s now gone Republican. Look at what happened in Missouri. Look at what happened in North Dakota.”€

So if I’m a Democrat strategist, I’m saying a lot of States rejected a Democrat statewide candidate. Now they chose individual Democrats within the House districts, and that’s how they got the House.

But overall, when you look at a presidential election in two years, this is not good news for Democrats overall although it’s going to complicate the process for the next two years and again budgeting is where I think you’ll see most of it.

Embarrassing House Hearings

I think you may see some really crazy hearings you know whether they have impeachment hearings. I think they will use the House hearing process to try to embarrass the administration as much as they can. They’ll call everybody under the sun “€œHow come Trump is the guy to cause global climate change to expand a new level.”€

They’ll do everything they can to give the media something to talk about, and we’ll see whether the people respond to that. I think there’s going to be enough stupidity coming out of the House that people are going to kind of say, “€œYou know this is not what I thought I was putting in the House when I put it there. I was not asking for impeachments, I was not asking for ICE to be abolished.”€

I think the Democrats will really have an internal debate because I think a lot of them are recognizing that a lot of the party’s gone too far in the opposite direction. You know Joe Manchin, West Virginia senator, re-elected he had to act like a Republican to vote for Kavanaugh, etc. His race was still very close.

So all of that being said there, are some interesting dynamics out there from what happened Tuesday night. There’s a lot of positive things to look at despite having lost the House.

Rick:

Right, when we come back, we’ll dive into some of these specific races. We’ll also talk about who the biggest losers were. Hollywood, the races they went all in on, they lost. Some great things to look at where we’ll be right back. You’re listening to WallBuilders Live.

This Precarious Moment Book

David:

This is David Barton. I want to let about a brand new book we have called, “€œThis Precarious Moment, Six Urgent Steps That Will Save You, Your family, and Our Country.”€ Jim Garlow and I have co-authored this book, and we take six issues that are hot in the culture right now.

Issues that we’re dealing with, issues such as immigration, race relations, our relationship with Israel, the rising generation Millennials, and the absence of the church in the culture wars, and where American heritage is our godly heritage. We look at all six of those issues right now that are under attack, and we give you both Biblical and historical perspective on those issues that provide solutions on what each of us can do right now to make a difference.

These are all problems that are solvable if we’ll get involved. So you can grab the book This Precarious Moment and find out what you can do to make a difference. This Precarious Moment is available at WallBuilders.com.

 

Rick:

Welcome back to WallBuilders Live! We”€™re doing some election recap for you today. We’re going to jump back into that in just a moment. But just to say a word about how this is even possible to bring you this great election analysis from David Barton, to be able to bring you the great guests we bring on the program, and our Good News Fridays. We get so much positive feedback about the uplifting Friday programs.

The Foundations of Freedom Thursday programs where we dive into our foundational principles. There”€™s so much information that comes through this program. We know it’s a blessing to you because we hear from you all the time about that. This program is only able to be on the air because of your help because of the donations from supporters across the nation.

So we’re asking you to dig in to be willing to give of your life your fortune and your sacred honor. Meaning with your fortune donating to the program and to help us grow and expand and keep us on the air and be able to bring those great guests on the program as well.

So go to WallBuilders.com today come alongside us we would certainly appreciate your help so that we can continue to bring you this great news.

David, Tim you know part of what makes this program possible is the fact that we do have so many donors from across the country and sometimes we’re you know we’re only talking about “€œHey a coffee cup, one coffee a month.”€ Five bucks a month would make a big difference for our program.

David:

We tried to make this really easy so the folks can come along and help us. They can give through the website that we have or whether you give off your mobile device or anything else, your smart device. We try to make it really easy. It’s a way to come alongside, and this information we know is unique. We hear that from all over the country from stations everywhere, and we enjoy being able to bring it to you. We have enjoyed having partners come alongside to help us bring this to you.

Rick:

Well, let’s let’s get to some of that good news that we love bringing to folks and that their contributions make possible.

Hollywood and Mega Donors Lose Races

We’ve been talking about the election results on Tuesday night which some may have seen just by losing the House. It was all bad news but effective some great news. My favorite probably of the evening was it was Hollywood losing the races that they really went all in on.

They lost the Beto O’Rourke race. They lost the Georgia and Florida governor races where Oprah and others were all in. I mean, the Florida guy was you know a total Socialist. There was a lot of effort that went into those candidates, and they lost those races.

That’s a that’s a good sign, David. You’re pointing out Florida now – governor and both senate race both senators Republicans first time in a while that’s happened, and that does not bode well for the Democrats in the presidential race in two years.

David:

No, it doesn’t. And some other big losers on Tuesday night that I was glad to see as big losers not that I wished bad to them but I wish bad to their agenda. That was folks like George Soros.

Soros put at least 15 million in candidates and countless millions more into so many PACS. PACS don’t have to report their donors. We know that Soros put at least 15 million direct in, we know that he gave to so many other PACs way beyond that.

Tom Steyer put 42 million in. Michael Bloomberg put 20 million in and so you look at the amount that was put in and you track the races they put the most money into, and they did not have a good night because they put so much into the Senate races.

They wanted to take the Senate and turn the Senate. As an indication of how much money was in this election cycle, on a normal senatorial race between the candidates you have usually about 12 million spent between the two candidates, right?

Texas, you had Beto O’Rourke with 80 million spent. You had Ted Cruz with 42 million spent. That’s a 122 million and one Senate race. That’s like 10 normal U.S. Senate races.

Tim:

By the way, that”€™s a little bigger than what my checking account happens to be.

David:

I will point out that they spent 122 million to get a job that pays $174,000 a year.

Rick:

Don’t forget O’Rourke’s campaign, that’s the largest US Senate candidate has ever, raised twice as much as Cruz, and they still lost.

David:

Ad they still lost! By the way why would you put this much money into a race? Because you’re talking about policy. The difference between the type policy you get from O”€™Rorke versus Ted Cruz is why people are willing to give millions. And that’s why folks like the big donors, the Tom Steyers, and the Michael Bloombergs and the George Soroses put so much money and because they want to see policy. They know that every vote counts. So that’s why you put so much into a race that only pays $174,000 a year.

So you had big losers there on that side. And you know from the viewpoint of “€œI want conservative constitutional principles,”€ I’m glad they lost.

I don’t wish ill to them individually, but to their agenda, I do. So that was another big takeaway, Rick, you’re right, not only Hollywood but the big mega-donors. And by the way, Democrats have talked about how that there is so much Wall Street money.

Democrats Outspent Republicans

And let me just throw out the numbers in this cycle – Democrats in the House spent $923 million for the House. Republicans spent $612 million. So they were outspent by 50%.

In the Senate, Democrats spent $539 million to the $395 million of the Republicans, so Democrats far outspent the Republicans. They had so much more money, so much more donors and they did not get what they paid for.

Rick:

One more break guys. We’ll be right back. Stay with us. Getting election results right here on WallBuilders Live. Stay with us. We’ll be right back after the break.

Veterans Day TV Special on TBN

Tim:

We want to let you guys know about a TV special coming up on Veterans Day actually for TBN we’ve been filming throughout the year a series of holiday specials and the holiday coming up right now is Veterans Day.

David:

And we were able to sit down with three amazing veterans and hear their stories. And actually, two of them were Congressman. Congressman Barry Loudermilk, who is in the Air Force was one of the guys that was shot at at the baseball shooting, the Congressional baseball shooting.  Had more bullets fired at him than any other Congressman and than congressman Steve Russell who helped capture Saddam Hussein. An amazing story. And then Chad Robichaux who went through eight deployments in Afghanistan. I mean, it’s amazing what he does as a Special Forces guy, and they get to share those stories with us. And we’ve known them for years, and the details they share are things we’ve not even heard before.

Tim:

And there are aspects of their story that we thought we knew some of their stories that as they”€™re sharing and we’re going “€œOkay, we had no idea that that happened in your life.”€

It really was something, so fun to help capture these stories and obviously, we want to honor veterans on Veterans Day. Watch the program, learn about these stories and appreciate our veterans.

 

Rick:

Welcome back to Wall Builders Live. Thanks for staying with us. Election results, talking about a little bit of a recap of what happened Tuesday. One quick shout out on the good news, Josh Hawley winning in Missouri is you know, people often say no difference in Republican or Democrat. These judicial nominees Trump has gotten through have been our kind of folks, religious liberty battling guys. Hawley was an attorney for the Becket Fund for ADF. I mean we’re getting some good folks not just winning some races. We’re getting good folks in there as well.

High Voter Turnout

David:

Yeah, we have good folks in there, and that does mean a lot. And one of the healthy things from Tuesday night was how high the voter turnout was. Both sides did an excellent job of turning out citizens. I think America can only be healthier when more people are involved and participate. And what you look at is in an off year nonpresidential election like we had this time, your voter turnout is usually depressed, but we had a voter turnout that was akin to what you have in a presidential turnout. So this is a big deal.

Early voting, not every state has early voting but in states like Utah, just their early voting for this year was a 121% of their entire vote from four years ago. Nevada was 114%. Early voting was 114% of what the entire vote was four years ago. Arizona was a 104%. You had Texas at 103%. You had Tennessee at 96%. So people were engaged. People did turnout, and that’s really good.

Surprising Low Turnout of Millennials and Hispanics

Now the turnout that was surprising was all the pollsters who were predicting that Millennials were going to show up and that’s going to be part of that Democrat Blue Wave and Millennials showed up at a very low rate. They were predicting 40 percent would vote. About 30 percent 29 to 30 percent voted and one out of three Millennials voted Republican which was not supposed to be what happened.

The other thing that was amazing to me was Hispanic voter turnout was extremely low. And they thought emigration would bring it out, how mean Trump is to bring it out. Well, it didn’t. And on top of that one out of three Hispanics voted for Republicans which is the normal rate. So those are two demographics that despite all the high turnout everywhere else those were groups that did not turn out and that had an impact on the election as well.

 

Other Surprise Ballot Initiatives

So there were a lot of surprises from that night, and by the way, we didn’t cover the results of ballot initiatives, and there are some key ones. For example, Alabama passed a ballot initiative that says they’re going to display the Ten Commandments in schools now and State property. Alabama also said our Constitution does not recognize the right to abortion and it protects the sanctity of unborn life. You have a number of States that actually turned down casinos and gambling, and that’s the first we’ve had in like 8 to 10 years.

A number of States passed Marsy’s Law which gives protection to victims of crime. We’ve been given protections to criminals but not near as much to victims, so that’s changing. We had in North Carolina, they actually reduced the income tax from 10% to 7%. You had a number of States pass photo IDs in North Dakota. They actually turned down marijuana that reverses the trend of the last 6 to 8 years.

A Lot of Good Things to Rejoice

So there’s a lot of good things that happened in a lot of States at the State level that is also very healthy that didn’t show up in the national election returns. There’s a lot of health that showed up in this election. So a lot of good things to rejoice from Tuesday night although we didn’t get to everything we wanted. We sure didn’t get the shellacking that they predicted was going to happen.

God”€™s Got This

Rick:

Well, David one thing you taught me years ago because I used to rise and fall with these elections in my attitude, you taught me that even keel of stepping back and looking at the context of history not being too focused on that one moment in time and remembering that God’s got this. But for us to do our duty and leave the results to God. And the results we got on Tuesday night, nothing like what everybody expected.

Folks should be encouraged, not too elated by victories, not depressed by defeats but stay on the course, stay in the fight continue to be good citizens and doing the work that it takes to preserve freedom. Thanks so much for listening today. Folks you’ve been listening to  WallBuilders Live.