Testing times for Trump

US polls give signals for November 2026 mid-terms

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Key elections across the United States (US) were largely seen as a political test for Donald Trump's second presidency ahead of critical midterm elections next year.

The results suggest that, at the very least, the Republicans will have a tough battle on their hands in November next year. Nowhere was this more evident than in the extraordinary election of 34-year-old Ugandan-born Democratic Socialist Zohran Kwame Mamdani as the first Muslim and South Asian mayor of New York City. With 50 per cent of the vote, Mr Mamdani polled almost nine percentage points more than Andrew Cuomo, a former Democrat governor of New York who ran as an independent financed by billionaires across the political spectrum, including former mayor Michael Bloomberg. Mr Cuomo also received an unsolicited endorsement from the President, who threatened to cut federal funding to New York if “Communist Candidate Mamdani’” is elected (though the Constitution allocates this power to Congress).