With Trump’s focus abroad, Republicans push for midterms pivot to economy

By Sarah Ferris, Manu Raju, CNN

(CNN) — Some of President Donald Trump’s closest allies in Congress are warning that the party needs to sharpen its affordability message to voters heading into the 2026 elections — or risk big losses that would shackle him for the rest of his second term.

“I would love him to get back to driving around in the garbage truck, going to McDonald’s. Go to a supermarket, go to a farm. That’s when he’s at his best,” Rep. Jeff Van Drew told CNN, recalling a message he conveyed to the president in a lengthy phone call earlier this week. “Next year, we got to concentrate — the American people first.”

Van Drew, a New Jersey Republican in a purple seat, said he’s not worried about his own reelection but is concerned for the political survival of “many of my friends, some people who won by one or two or three points.” And he’s worried about the House GOP’s fragile majority next November.

Many Republicans in Washington were already privately anxious that their party lacked a clear domestic agenda in Congress, as Trump himself devoted much of the fall to overseas crises. Those fears escalated this week, after their GOP candidate in a special election for a ruby-red Tennessee congressional district won on Tuesday by just nine points, after Trump himself won the seat by 22 points a year earlier.

Inside the party, GOP lawmakers and top strategists acknowledge that the Republican Party – including Trump – need to remind voters they are focused on making life more affordable for everyday Americans, with less emphasis on conflicts like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine or strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean. In the House, that means an ​economy-focused policy agenda in 2026, rather than party infighting on issues like the release of the Jeffrey Epstein case files or lawmaker censure votes dominating floor time.

It’s not clear yet exactly how or when party leaders will make the pivot, with Trump himself calling the affordability issue a “scam” and a “con job” by Democrats at a Tuesday Cabinet meeting.

The day after the Tennessee special election, Trump again said that affordability is a “Democrat hoax” while unveiling plans to rescind fuel-economy standards for vehicles put in place under the Biden administration — a move he said would save Americans money.

“They use the word ‘affordability’ — it’s a Democrat hoax. They’re the ones that drove the prices up,” Trump said. “They never talk about, like, the specifics.”

“I think affordability is the greatest con job. They look at you and say ‘affordability,’ they don’t say anything else,” he said.

But the pressure to do more on the economy is mounting, and it’s not just battleground Republicans who are sounding the alarm. Ultraconservative GOP Rep. Tim Burchett called Tuesday’s special election in his home state a “wake up” call, warning that “complacency within our party is a problem.”

“The best friend the Democrats have right now is the Republicans messaging, because we do a terrible job of messaging,” Burchett said, lamenting the lack of enthusiasm within the party’s own base, particularly with economic concerns creeping up. “We got a real problem, and we better wake up.”

Across the Capitol, Senate Majority Leader John Thune said he, too, was eying the results in Tennessee as a sign that the party needed to better focus its message, even as he downplayed the results from an off-year race that comes with its own unique circumstances.

“I think, obviously, we need to take to heart the fact that we have to sharpen our message, make sure that we’re giving people a reason to vote for us in the midterms next year,” Thune said.

He added that Republicans needed strong candidates, good messaging, and healthy financial resources next year: “Those are the ingredients to a successful election, and we got some work and some challenges ahead of us this next year.”

(His counterpart, Speaker Mike Johnson, brushed off any signals from the race, telling reporters: “I’m not concerned at all.”)

Some of Trump’s GOP critics in Congress have gone after him directly for his recent focus on military campaigns abroad. That includes Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, who has attacked him nearly every day on social media for ignoring issues at home.

Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky was also blunt in his criticism: “I think that people voted for Donald Trump because they wanted less foreign war.”

“Venezuela is still foreign war. Just because it’s in our hemisphere doesn’t make it a lot different. and so I think there’s a large portion of his supporters that will be very upset with a war in Venezuela,” Paul said on the escalating conflict against alleged drug trafficking in South America.

For many Republicans, the most immediate concern is health care. The party is facing a glaring affordability crisis on December 31, when enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies are set to expire, threatening to spike health care premiums for tens of millions of people.

No one in GOP leadership or in the White House has yet indicated how they plan to address the expiring subsidies that help lower the cost of Obamacare, even as dozens of their own members push the party to strike a deal with Democrats to avert the cliff.

One of those Republicans is Sen. Josh Hawley, a close Trump ally who has repeatedly urged his party to embrace the growing number of working class voters in their base — and to put affordability at the center of their agenda.

Hawley has pushed hard for GOP leaders to strike a deal to avert steep price hikes for those Obamacare plans, in addition to pushing his own bill to allow individual taxpayers to deduct up to $25,000 in medical expenses.

“We have got to help people be able to afford the necessities of life and just get by day to day. And there’s no better place to start than health care. Nothing costs more than health care,” the Missouri Republican told CNN.

Asked if the party gets the message, Hawley said: “Well, we’ll find out. The president gets it. … He realizes Congress needs to act, and we do. We need to act.”

GOP Rep. Kevin Kiley, who represents a battleground seat, said he expects party leaders to make a “conscious effort” to focus on affordability in 2026, adding: “And I hope it’s done in a way that’s actually going to help, as opposed to just trying.”

Kiley has been publicly and privately critical of his party leadership for failing to do more on the issue, frustrated that the House stayed out of session for nearly two months during the fall government shutdown.

“We could have been working on these issues every single day for the last several months. Bringing bills that would move the needle. Working on bipartisan deals. To address the cost of housing, the cost of energy, the cost of health care and everything else. Unfortunately the House wasted a lot of time,” Kiley said.

But he believes it’s not too late. “I think everyone agrees that affordability needs to be at the center of any agenda. Americans are really frustrated right now,” he said.

This story has been updated with additional details.

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From CNN’s Ted Barrett, Veronica Stracqualursi, Alison Main and Annie Grayer contributed to this report.