Democrats, Trump hold final rallies before midterm elections

Donald Trump and his Republican Party will make last-gasp pitches to US midterm voters Monday to hold back a predicted Democrat wave that could sweep Congress and impose tight political constraints on the president for the first time in two years.

For his closing arguments, Trump chose a speech in Washington at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool – a landmark that has become synonymous with the 80-year-old president's controversial drive to redevelop the US capital.

"We're going to win," he said on Sunday.

Democrats, meanwhile, prepared a round of final rallies – including by star Democratic Senate candidates James Talarico in Texas and Adam Hamilton in Kansas – which will cap a campaign of breathtaking tension and bitterness.

Polls are largely in their favour, showing that Democrats are poised to take the majority from Republicans in the House of Representatives and have a real shot at winning the currently Republican Senate.

Even winning just the House would mean Democrats have voting power over the federal budget and would lead powerful committees able to investigate alleged corruption under Trump, the Epstein files and other explosive issues.

The loss of total Republican dominance would push Trump into a lame-duck period, with high inflation at home, the sputtering war against Iran, and hostile Democratic investigations into his activities in Washington.

But a decade into the Trump era, Democrats are wary about predictions of victory.

"Nauseously optimistic," Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock told CNN to describe the mood.

Scorched earth

Democrats are also facing late internal divisions, with left-wing candidates clashing at times with the party's establishment.

In a startling display of infighting on Sunday, Democratic congresswoman Haley Stevens in Michigan endorsed Republican candidate Mike Rogers against left-wing progressive candidate Abdul El-Sayed in her state's key Senate race.

Stevens, who lost a bruising primary to El-Sayed in August despite being backed by the Democratic establishment, struggled to explain her decision in an interview with CNN.

Trump's Republicans have fought a political scorched-earth campaign, painting Democrats as communists and openly branding El-Sayed, who is Muslim, as a terrorist.

Addressing a crowd in Iowa on Sunday, Trump said Democrats are "extreme and dangerous radicals" who will "steal your wealth" and let in migrants to "ransack, rape and plunder."

But polls show US citizens souring on Trump's wrecking-ball act.

While the House seems highly likely to turn Democratic, the battle for the Senate is up in the air.

Only a third of the Senate's 100 seats are being contested in these midterms, and few of the races were seen as favorable to Democrats.

To win the upper chamber, Democrats must flip seats in states the president carried by double digits two years before. This has only happened five times in midterm elections since 1990.

In its last pre-election day projection, forecaster Decision Desk HQ had the Senate flipping to 52-48 in favour of the Democrats, and the party notching a comfortable 241-194 margin in the House.

And the final New York Times/Siena poll released Sunday evening showed Democratic candidates leading in all seven seats viewed as most competitive, though five remained within the margin of error.

A Democratic Senate would be able to shut down Trump's lifetime appointments to courts – including the Supreme Court.

While Tuesday is election day, early voting has already seen a record 54 million people cast ballots around the country.

The midterms have seen about US$11 billion spent on advertising, with large chunks coming from individual mega-donors.

Elon Musk, a close Trump ally who led the so-called DOGE effort in dismantling entire government departments, has given a staggering nearly half-billion dollars to help get Republicans elected.