Overconfident? Dem optimism surges as midterms approach

WASHINGTON – The fight for the House majority is over.

At least that’s the sense from a growing number of Democrats who are increasingly confident in their quest to seize control of at least one chamber of Congress six weeks before Election Day.

Democrats’ surging optimism, usually shared in private, has begun to spill out into the open as President Donald Trump’s approval ratings sink and the GOP struggles under the weight of the president’s self-imposed political crises and erratic behaviour.

With the shock of Trump’s 2016 victory still fresh, however, Democrats are aware that significant factors could derail their presumptive success. But in need of flipping just two dozen House seats out of 236 currently held by Republicans, the chairman of the House Democrats’ campaign arm is shrugging off the risks.