Author: Patryk Litwiński

The midterm elections on November 3 are taking place in an atmosphere of tension that could easily be mistaken for a crisis of the electoral process itself. Figures in the president’s circle who dispute the results of previous elections are urging him to declare a state of emergency and take federal control of the vote under the pretext of foreign interference, while the leading Democrats on the intelligence committees of both chambers have warned the CIA director that, should the president publicly invoke agency intelligence on such interference, they will demand that he confirm whether the president is telling the truth [1]. Disputes over elections are, however, a permanent fixture of American politics, and the decentralized electoral system, while it prolongs the resolution of close races, makes it difficult for any president to seize control of the process nationwide. Moreover, voters are electing Congress, not the president, whose announcements and executive orders do not expand the powers vested in him [2]. What sets this year’s elections apart is their stakes for foreign policy.

Europeans and Americans are, in fact, following different elections. Europe’s attention is focused on Donald Trump, NATO and Ukraine, while voters are deciding individual seats in states and districts, guided primarily by the prices of food, housing and energy [2]. Forecasts point to the Democrats taking the House of Representatives, and their chances of regaining a majority in the Senate have grown markedly [3]. Such an outcome would strengthen congressional oversight and give Europe more partners in Washington, but it would not bring a reset of American policy: pressure on Europeans to shoulder the burden of their own defense and trade disputes will remain, and the elections will change above all Europe’s interlocutors, and policy to a far lesser extent [2].

The first decisions relevant to Europe will be made even before the new Congress is sworn in. By December 11, 2026, when the current continuing resolution expires, the outgoing Congress must secure continued government funding and take up the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year 2027 [4]. In parallel, the Pentagon’s six-month review of the US military presence in Europe is under way, which Democrats regard as aimed at reducing that presence [5][6].

Against the backdrop of these procedures, the nature of the constraints on the White House is changing. In recent weeks, the brake was the approaching vote, the last electoral test before the end of the term, which held back a resumption of military operations against Iran. After November 3, voters’ sensitivity to the costs of foreign policy will begin to operate indirectly, through two constraints moving at different speeds. Energy prices react immediately to every signal of escalation, and it is they that will shape Washington’s day-to-day decisions on Iran and, indirectly, on Russia and Ukraine. Congress, whose members will face voters again in 2028, moves more slowly, but it is in budget and defense legislation that it will be decided which elements of “America First” policy are curtailed and which are entrenched. The elections will thus narrow this policy’s room for maneuver in the final two years of President Trump’s term, but they will not reverse two processes older than the current presidency: the scaling back of external commitments, which accelerates when the costs of engagement land directly on household budgets, and the erosion of the institutions that have hitherto shielded alliance commitments from the volatility of White House decisions. For Europe, and for Poland in particular, the stakes of these elections therefore lie in the extent to which the costs of the war in the Persian Gulf spill over to the eastern flank and in how much of America’s commitments can be anchored in law.

Foreign Policy Among Voters’ Motivations: Effects Rather Than Direction

Foreign policy rarely decides the outcome of American elections, but this year it is returning to the set of factors that motivate voters, not through a dispute over its direction, but through effects felt in household budgets and in assessments of the president’s credibility. While 37% of Americans cite inflation and the cost of living as the most important factor in their vote and a mere 2% cite the war with Iran, 86% believe that the war has raised the cost of living at home, and 81% say the same of the administration’s tariff policy [7]. Foreign policy is therefore not competing with the economy for voters’ attention; it has become part of it. Both conditions under which international issues seep into American electoral competition have thus been met – the direct impact of the administration’s decisions on citizens’ daily lives and the undermining of the president’s image as a competent commander-in-chief – making this year’s vote the first of its kind since 2006, when opposition to the conduct of the Iraq war sealed the defeat of George W. Bush’s Republicans [8].

The war, launched on February 28, 2026, with US-Israeli strikes, spilled over almost immediately into the energy market when Tehran disrupted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz [9], and the price of diesel in the United States hit a record high [3]. Military achievements have not, however, translated into a diplomatic victory: Washington and Tehran are stuck in a stalemate, and the naval blockade of Iranian oil exports has not brought prices down [10]. Tellingly, 76% of Americans believe the war has weakened Iran’s position in the region, yet 68% judge that it was not worth the costs incurred [7]. Most also see its toll on the country’s international standing: 72% believe it has damaged relations with allies and the reputation of the United States, and 65% that it has weakened national security [7]. More than half of Americans also believe that their country inspires more fear than admiration in the world, although 75% would prefer the reverse [7].

Assessments of the president’s competence in foreign policy have also suffered. The share of Americans approving of Donald Trump’s handling of foreign affairs has fallen from 42% just after he took office to 29%, and only one in four respondents now believes he has a clear strategy toward Tehran, compared with 40% after the outbreak of the war [8]. The war also undermines the promise on which Trump campaigned in 2024: the image of a leader pledging firmness toward adversaries and the avoidance of costly conflicts is losing credibility [8]. The ruling camp is feeling this pressure. The Republican electorate remains loyal, but its support for the war is losing intensity: in August, 74% of Republicans approved of Donald Trump’s handling of the war, much as in the spring, yet the share who strongly approve has fallen since April from 49% to 34%, accompanied by criticism of the war in parts of the conservative camp [11]. Some of the party’s candidates in close races are distancing themselves from the president, while Democrats frame the conflict as a household-budget issue [9].

The administration recognizes this risk, as evidenced by two October decisions: the announcement that the United States would not attack Iran before election day [10], and the agreement with Moscow on Russian diesel exports, intended to ease fuel prices [8]. The structure of voters’ preferences regarding a possible deal with Tehran follows the same logic: a clear majority rejects Iran retaining its ballistic missile program, its stockpile of enriched uranium and control over the Strait of Hormuz, while the only concession accepted across party lines is allowing Iranian oil exports [7]. Voters thus judge foreign policy by its costs rather than its direction, and this distinction defines the scope of change that the new balance of power in Congress will bring.

Congress After the Elections: Procedures That Set Europe’s and Ukraine’s Agenda

A majority in the House of Representatives brings control over the drafting of defense and foreign aid appropriations bills, as well as the power to hold hearings and issue subpoenas, while a Senate majority brings the ability to block nominations to national security posts [5]. Democrats have announced that their top priority will be investigations into corruption in foreign policy, from the president’s acceptance of an aircraft gifted by Qatar to the approval of exports of advanced chips to the United Arab Emirates, followed by curbing the war with Iran, supporting Ukraine and defending the US presence in Europe [5]. Each of the levers available to Congress, however, has been weakened over the past two years. The Trump administration has thus given new momentum to a century-long process in which Congress’s constitutional powers in foreign policy, from declaring war to regulating trade, have gradually eroded [12].

The defense budget remains the most immediate battleground. The administration is requesting $1.5 trillion for defense in fiscal year 2027, including $1.15 trillion in regular discretionary funding and $350 billion through budget reconciliation, which is exempt from the 60-vote requirement in the Senate, whereas the budget resolutions of both chambers provide for only $60 billion through this procedure, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune considers securing the votes after the elections difficult [4]. Until January 3, 2027, when the new Congress convenes under the Twentieth Amendment to the Constitution, Republicans retain majorities in both chambers. In the Senate, however, passing regular appropriations bills requires 60 votes, which, with 53 Republican seats, gives Democrats real influence over their content and timing. In the fall of 2025, they used it to block government funding for 42 days [13]. For the remainder of the current Congress, Democrats, if they win either chamber, will therefore have an interest in extending the continuing resolution into the new year, so as to negotiate Pentagon funding in the new Congress, in conjunction with the dispute over the debt ceiling, which is expected to be reached in the first half of 2027 [4].

Congress’s power of the purse, its strongest instrument in foreign policy, has also been undermined by the practice of so-called pocket rescissions – requests to cancel appropriated funds submitted so late that the funds expire at the end of the fiscal year before lawmakers can act on them. The administration used this mechanism in August 2025 for $4.9 billion in foreign aid, which the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Republican Susan Collins, deemed a violation of the law [14]. The Supreme Court, acting on its emergency docket, nevertheless allowed more than $4 billion to be withheld [15]. In September 2026, the administration once again resorted to this instrument, requesting the cancellation of $810 million [12], even though the Government Accountability Office concluded that the request did not authorize the president to withhold the funds beyond the end of the fiscal year [16]. Funds that Congress writes into law for Ukraine or development aid thus remain dependent on the will of the White House, and litigation usually lasts longer than the fiscal year at the end of which the funds expire [12]. Even purchases financed with these funds must go through production, approval and delivery before they translate into military capabilities.

Congress’s power over foreign trade has been similarly curtailed. In February 2026, the Supreme Court ruled that the president may not impose tariffs under emergency powers, but much of the lost latitude was restored to him by the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, signed in September 2026 [12][17]. It provides for tariffs of up to 100% on goods from the five countries that are the largest importers of Russian crude oil and natural gas, leaving it to the president to decide which of them to target and at what rate [17].

Oversight, the third lever, in turn faces a barrier in the form of an expanded interpretation of executive privilege: in August 2026, the Department of Justice concluded that it also covers the president’s conversations with advisers outside the administration, provided they concern official matters [12]. This is particularly significant in a foreign policy conducted largely by people outside state structures, such as Jared Kushner, who takes part in negotiations on Gaza and Ukraine while running an investment fund financed with Gulf capital [12]. The role of private envoys is growing as the State Department weakens: in July 2025, the department laid off more than 1,300 employees, including 246 members of the Foreign Service [18]; in the same year, around thirty career ambassadors were recalled, and more than 90% of ambassadorial appointments in Donald Trump’s second term have gone to people from outside the career diplomatic service [19]. Stronger oversight, while constraining the administration in some areas, reinforces its tendency to rely on executive powers in others [2].

The effectiveness of Congress therefore hinges on the number of Republicans willing to vote against the president, since overriding a veto requires two-thirds of the votes in both chambers. The first signs of such willingness emerged after the announcement of the Russian diesel deal: Republican Senators Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Thom Tillis and John Curtis, together with Democrats, called on the administration to reverse it immediately, recalling that Congress had banned imports of Russian energy in 2022 [20], and Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick announced a bill to block purchases of Russian oil [21]. Some Republican lawmakers also warn that the White House’s policy on the war in Ukraine will provoke resistance in their ranks to the administration’s post-election agenda, including a budget bill with additional defense funding [4]. Congress also retains real influence where it can set legal thresholds. The FY2026 NDAA made any reduction of the US contingent in Europe below 76,000 troops conditional on consultations with NATO allies and on submitting to Congress independent assessments of its impact on security and deterrence [22]. Congress will not take the helm of foreign policy, but it retains the ability to raise the costs of the administration’s decisions, establish statutory thresholds and generate information that allies can also use [12].

From the Electoral Brake to the Market Brake

The most far-reaching consequences of the forecast change in the congressional majority concern Iran, and the closest point of reference remains the 2006 elections. Republicans then lost their majorities in both chambers of Congress, and exit polls pointed to opposition to the Iraq war and a negative assessment of the president as the main reasons for the defeat [8][23][24]. In December 2006, the bipartisan Iraq Study Group recommended gradually handing the combat mission over to Iraqi forces so that, by the first quarter of 2008, all combat brigades not needed for force protection could be withdrawn, as well as opening talks with Iran and Syria [25]. George W. Bush chose the opposite course: on January 10, 2007, a few days after the new Congress was sworn in, he announced the deployment of more than 20,000 additional troops to Iraq [26]. As commander-in-chief, he did not need congressional approval to do so, yet some Republican senators also came out against the surge [27]. The Democratic majority then made war funding conditional on a timetable for troop withdrawal; on May 1, 2007, the president vetoed the bill, and the House failed to override the veto [28]. Three weeks later, Congress approved funding without a timetable [29], but it imposed eighteen benchmarks of progress in Iraq and a requirement that they be independently assessed by the Government Accountability Office, which found in September 2007 that the Iraqi government had met only three of them [30].

A Democratic takeover of even the House alone would bring the balance of power closer to that of 2006–2007, all the more so as the signals coming out of Washington today point to the administration’s readiness to escalate: Donald Trump has declared that the United States will win the war “right after the election,” the Pentagon has directed Central Command to complete preparations for resuming large-scale operations and has begun concentrating three of the eleven US aircraft carrier groups in the region, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has stated that President Trump assured him of his readiness to “finish the job” [10]. Washington’s calculations are complicated by Tehran’s stance: it shows no willingness to reach an agreement on terms acceptable to the United States and uses every pause in the fighting to rebuild its military capabilities [10]. The difference lies in the timing. Bush announced the surge after the new Congress had been sworn in, whereas the window Trump has indicated for deciding the war opens during the transition period, when Republicans still hold majorities in both chambers and the forces needed to resume operations are already concentrated in the region. A Democratic majority would therefore respond to any escalation only ex post, in budget negotiations in early 2027.

The role of a Democratic majority will thus be, first and foremost, not to stop escalation but to raise its political costs and enforce accountability. The experience of 2007 suggests that the real effect of such pressure is conditions and reporting requirements written into appropriations bills rather than a cutoff of funding, and that their reach depends on Republicans willing to vote with Democrats. Congress will therefore not set the limit of American escalation in the Persian Gulf, but it can expose its costs and make them politically tangible ahead of the 2028 presidential election.

The analogy also has a limit of a different kind. Resuming operations against Iran immediately affects energy prices, the very variable that dominated the campaign. Each of the available options – escalation, negotiations under the threat of force or maintaining the current stalemate – carries high costs and doubtful effectiveness [10]. A renewed air campaign would have to answer the question of why it would achieve what the first did not, and whether the United States could protect the energy infrastructure of the Gulf states from Iranian retaliation, the destruction of which threatens a sharp spike in prices and a global recession while the Iranian regime survives [10]. The alternative path of economic pressure, namely sanctions on Chinese entities sustaining the Iranian economy, faces a constraint of the same kind: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has warned that targeting Chinese companies risks destabilizing the global financial system, and Beijing has the ability to cut the United States off from supplies of critical minerals [10]. After November 3, Washington’s decisions on Iran will therefore be weighed both against fuel prices, which dominated the campaign and react immediately, and against Congress, whose instruments – control over the defense budget, statutory thresholds and oversight – work more slowly but more durably.

Iran, Oil and the Eastern Flank

The same mechanism transmits the effects of the war in the Persian Gulf to NATO’s eastern flank. Ukraine faded into the background during the campaign [31], yet it remains present in its consequences: the same logic of fuel prices that dominated the vote is now shaping Washington’s policy toward Kyiv and Moscow. The rise in diesel prices stems primarily from restrictions on shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, yet Trump blames Ukrainian strikes on Russian refineries, which, according to International Energy Agency estimates, occurred on average every three days in the first eight months of the year [1]. During peace talks in Miami on October 9, 2026, attended by representatives of Kyiv and European capitals, the president announced that Vladimir Putin had agreed to sell Russian diesel on world markets. Moscow made no commitments toward a peace agreement in return, and some of the president’s advisers had urged against this step before a concrete peace proposal was on the table [1]. Easing prices at the cost of a concession to the Kremlin, rather than, for example, limiting US diesel exports, also exposed the administration’s inability to end the war in Ukraine [8].

Price pressure also translates into pressure on Kyiv. Trump has threatened to suspend intelligence support if Ukraine does not stop attacking Russian refineries, even though it is precisely US data that enable its strikes deep into Russian territory and US early-warning satellites that signal incoming missiles and drones [1]. Kyiv got a foretaste of the consequences of such a decision in mid-October, when the Russian bombardment of the capital was accompanied by disruptions to the Starlink network and US early-warning systems. Intelligence support, moreover, remains in the hands of the executive branch, and Congress, which can speed up the delivery of military aid, has only indirect influence over it. The most important US contribution to Ukraine’s defense today thus lies beyond Congress’s reach, which points to the area in which European investment in satellite reconnaissance and early warning offers the highest strategic return.

The war with Iran, meanwhile, is consuming resources that are lacking elsewhere. US commands in Europe and the Indo-Pacific are signaling that directing all military resources to a single operation is unsustainable [10]. The scale of this burden is reflected in the administration’s June request for nearly $70 billion in supplemental funding to cover the costs of the war, including $21 billion to accelerate munitions procurement and expand production lines – capabilities on which deliveries to Ukraine and European allies also depend [4]. At the same time, Russia is intensifying its hybrid operations against Europe, including preparations to sabotage cargo aircraft, communications jamming and probing NATO air defenses with drones.

Juxtaposing the October Russian diesel deal with the Graham Act reveals the true nature of this instrument. Three weeks after it was signed, Washington made it easier for Russia to sell fuel, and a week later the president suspended the application of all the tariffs it provides for until he or the Secretary of State deems further action appropriate [32]. The act thus serves more as a tool of pressure than as part of a consistent sanctions policy, leaving the president to choose whom to subject to tariffs and whom to exempt; he could, for instance, accept a contract with an American supplier as proof of supply diversification [12]. EU member states that still import Russian energy also fall within the scope of the act [12], which leaves the Union vulnerable to differentiated treatment of individual capitals: Hungary and Slovakia, still heavily dependent on Russian supplies, remain the most exposed [33]. The EU timetable, which provides for a ban on imports of Russian LNG from January 2027 and of pipeline gas from September 2027 [33], thus gains additional justification.

What the Elections Will Not Change

The mechanism that turned the midterms into a vote on foreign policy favors the scaling back of external commitments rather than a renewal of American internationalism. It fits into a trend visible for more than a decade, from the pivot to Asia under President Barack Obama to the National Defense Strategy adopted in January 2026, which calls on European NATO members to assume primary responsibility for their own conventional defense with limited American support [34]. The lesson voters are drawing from the war with Iran concerns the costs of engagement abroad as such. Half of Democratic voters favor cuts to defense spending, the highest share since 1990, when the end of the Cold War raised expectations of a peace dividend, and among moderate and conservative Democrats only 49% support an active US role in the world [7]. Delegations of Democratic experts and former officials who visited Brussels, London and Paris in October told their interlocutors that the post-war order will not return and that some of the tenets of “America First,” with its rhetoric of putting American interests first and its emphasis on manufacturing, will survive regardless of the outcome of future elections [35].

That said, American public opinion does not reject alliances: 63% of Americans believe that alliances in Europe benefit the United States or both sides, and 65% favor shared leadership with other countries [7]. This support is, however, distributed between the parties in a way that makes neither of them a reliable partner for Europe across all dimensions. Democrats combine attachment to alliances and shared leadership with support for free trade, now stronger than among Republicans, but also with support for defense cuts; Republicans favor maintaining or increasing defense spending, but almost as often favor US dominance as shared leadership [7].

Equally telling is the assessment of the state of transatlantic relations: 51% of Americans believe that relations with Europe have been strained but will improve with a change of administration, while only 9% consider the damage irreversible [7]. On the American side, the current crisis is thus seen as a parenthesis that the next presidency will close. The erosion of Congress’s levers, however, is structural: the practice of pocket rescissions, the expanded executive privilege and tariff discretion will remain available to any successor of Donald Trump, making the United States a less predictable partner even after the current term ends [12]. The weakening of the foreign policy apparatus is similarly lasting: in addition to staff losses at the State Department, the reduction of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence’s workforce by more than a third, mass departures from the Central Intelligence Agency and a growing tendency among analysts to avoid assessments inconvenient to the White House [1] amount to a loss of expertise whose rebuilding extends beyond the horizon of a single term. The elections will thus change Europe’s interlocutors in Washington, but they will not rebuild the safeguards that have so far protected alliance commitments from the fluctuations of American policy.

Partners in Washington: Conclusions for Poland

Given the durability of this trend and the weakening of Congress’s levers, Europe should treat Congress as a source of information and a channel for building relationships, not as a guarantee that lawmakers’ pledges will translate into administration decisions [12]. Funds approved in Washington should be treated as a declaration of intent rather than a commitment, which applies in particular to planning support for Ukraine, long deprived of new deliveries financed by US aid [5][12]. Hearings and investigations will at the same time reveal the inner workings of the administration’s decisions, including the role of private envoys in negotiations on Ukraine, which Europe can use to push for institutional channels for peace talks.

For Poland, the most important instrument remains the NDAA, which already makes any reduction of the US presence in Europe conditional on specific requirements [22]. The 76,000-troop threshold, however, covers the continent as a whole and does not protect against the redeployment of forces within it, which is why, from a Polish perspective, provisions concerning the eastern flank are key [22]. The FY2027 bill drafted by the House Armed Services Committee adds to the conditions for withdrawing troops from Europe a requirement to demonstrate that repositioning personnel or equipment to NATO’s eastern flank was not feasible [36]. Whether this provision makes it into the final text of the act will be decided by the outgoing, Republican-controlled Congress, during the ongoing review of the US military presence in Europe and at a time when a window for possible escalation against Iran is opening [4][6][10]. Warsaw should pursue statutory guarantees now rather than waiting for the new Congress, focusing above all on the chairs of the armed services and appropriations committees of both chambers and on Republicans opposed to the administration’s Ukraine policy [4]. The Democrats’ declared opposition to reducing the US presence in Europe [5] will then make it easier to defend these guarantees in the new Congress. These efforts should be complemented by ties built beyond Washington – with governors, local authorities, industry, universities and military partners – that are more durable than relations with the White House and lay the groundwork for cooperation with the administration that will take office in January 2029 [2].

Within the EU, Poland should push for any use of the Graham Act against EU member states, whether in the form of tariffs or selective exemptions, to be met with a common EU response rather than with bilateral arrangements between individual capitals and Washington, since the security of the eastern flank rests on the unity of EU sanctions policy. Congress will not stop the president, but it can enshrine in law what is most valuable for Poland’s security. At a time when the costs of foreign engagement land directly on American household budgets and the institutions that have hitherto shielded alliance commitments from the volatility of voter sentiment and presidential decisions are weakening, it is statutory thresholds that are becoming the most durable form of American commitment.

References

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[34] Kacprzyk, Artur. “US Publishes New National Defense Strategy.” Polish Institute of International Affairs, January 27, 2026. https://pism.pl/publications/us-publishes-new-national-defense-strategy.

[35] “MAGA Foreign Policy Is a Mess. Democrats Disagree on What Comes Next.” The Economist, October 20, 2026. https://www.economist.com/international/2026/10/20/maga-foreign-policy-is-a-mess-democrats-disagree-on-what-comes-next.

[36] U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Armed Services. “Chairman’s Mark of H.R. 8800, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2027.” May 2026, sec. 1231. https://armedservices.house.gov/UploadedFiles/FY27_NDAA_CHAIRMANS_MARK_-_FINAL.pdf.