The midterm elections and the growing cultural and political divide among Americans are likely to pepper news headlines in 2026. Here are three topics to keep an eye on for the coming year.
Will the Trump mass deportation operation aggressively target illegal aliens who have not been convicted of crimes other than unlawfully living in the country, and go after the people who employ them?
It’s what his grassroots base wants. Yet the Trump administration, by the constant stressing of its efforts to round up so-called “criminal” illegal aliens, is seemingly bowing before a partisan establishment narrative that deportations of illegals not convicted of other crimes while unlawfully residing in the United States is a deeply controversial action.
“Seventy percent of those arrested by [US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in 2025] are criminal illegal aliens who have been charged or convicted of a crime in the US,” the Department of Homeland Security wrote December 19 in a year-end news release.
That’s all well and good, but it almost strikes an apologetic tone. Perhaps the single most significant accomplishment of the Trump White House in 2025 was the pursuit of its mass deportation operation, with it becoming crystal clear that the American people wholeheartedly support the endeavor. That consensus emerging should strengthen Trump this year in a way he did not enjoy during the early years of his initial tenure as president.
Trump has also confused his loyal backers by delivering assurances to the hotel and big agriculture industries – two of the most notorious employers of illegal aliens – that they will be protected from ICE raids.
The American people put Donald Trump back in the White House not just to deal with the most egregious aspects of the illegal immigration crisis, but to implement systemic changes to a corrosive status quo that gravely harms American citizens socially, culturally, and economically. These changes will probably not occur solely by arresting “criminal” illegal aliens.
Who Will Recharge National Democrat Fortunes?
Will Democrats see a crop of fresh figures emerge as the potential face of the party for 2028?
The rise of Barack Obama in 2007 breathed new life into a wheezing Democrat Party that had unsuccessfully run soggy Swamp veterans Al Gore and John Kerry against underwhelming Republican presidential nominee George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004. On the heels of Hillary Clinton in 2016, Joe Biden in 2020, and Kamala Harris in 2024, Democrats again desperately need a new star to emerge in 2026.
But where is he or she to be found? Given the abiding unpopularity of Washington, DC, among the nation at large and the aged leadership dominating the blue ranks on Capitol Hill, the ideal Democrat face of the future will be a state governor or some similar outside-the-Beltway figure.
Unfortunately for Democrats, the governors sucking all the oxygen out of the room on the eve of 2026 are deeply polarizing figures with multiple Achilles heels. California Gov. Gavin Newsom carries the burden of a financial crisis in the Golden State, along with a litany of progressive legislation he has affixed his signature to in the blue-controlled state.
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a deep-pocketed progressive finishing out his second term in office who is poised to seek a third, has all the ambition to match Newsom. Alas, he also has many of the same liabilities. Financial woes and runaway crime plague the state’s biggest city, Chicago. And Pritzker’s staunch support of “sanctuary state” policies for illegal aliens in Illinois is also likely to dent his appeal to moderate Americans.
The possible second tier looks every bit as bleak. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s two terms in office featured perhaps the most harshly punitive progressive state attorney general in the nation, Dana Nessel. That hasn’t stopped Whitmer from portraying herself as a centrist over the past year. Her attempts to play to the middle are bound to instantly unravel on the national stage upon the first touch.
In Pennsylvania, Gov. Josh Shapiro is also gearing up for a 2028 run. He’s the author of a new political memoir, a sure signal of his intentions. Yet Shapiro shares the same knack found with these other Democrat governors of getting himself entangled in hot-button controversies that will diminish his appeal to uncommitted voters.
If these are the “outsiders” Democrats have to offer for 2028, their stretch in the political wilderness may last longer than they think.
2026 Should Be Barren Ground for Cultural Radicals
Will progressives continue to see their hold on popular culture erode?
Hollywood is dead. Big media has forfeited its trust in the eyes of the average American. Political correctness and DEI feel as antiquated as compact discs. And dropping the “R” word – racism – as the ultimate nuclear weapon to silence opposition voices doesn’t crush logic anymore.
In short, it’s been a rough couple of years for a cultural left that was riding high as recently as 2020. In hindsight, the leaden orchestration of the coronavirus social regimen may have inflicted more damage on the progressive cultural playbook than the sharpest conservative criticism. Everyday Americans were force-fed a hefty dose of “you’ll do it because we tell you to” from credentialed elites during the pandemic. The inevitable backlash to this overreach appears to have spilled over into the social engineering realm.
So much of the progressive cultural agenda mirrors the worst of the coronavirus excesses in its bullying nature. Defining “whiteness” as an inherent evil, declaring the traditional family unit to be an oppressive entity, and allowing grown men in dresses into women’s restrooms – all this was foisted upon the general public very much without its consent. As the support troops in media, academic, entertainment, and clerical circles for this strong-arm campaign inevitably saw their credibility erode, a societal corrective action centered on common sense rather than deliberately distorted “expertism” has arisen in organic fashion.
It is that natural growth, so lacking in the contrived rise of wokeness over the past 20+ years, that gives it a durability absent in cultural radicalism. Last year was a tough time to demand that your neighbor accept that there are 72 genders. There is every reason to believe Americans will move even further away from this stale orbit in the coming 12 months. And it is the would-be cultural ostracizers of the past two decades who may find themselves cast out from the realm of responsible public discourse in 2026.
