Americans vote on 3 November for all 435 members of the House of Representatives and 35 senators, with governors, state legislatures and other offices also on the ballot in several states. Republicans currently hold majorities in both chambers. Political analyst Cătălin Done told Adevărul that the vote will set the balance between the executive and the legislature for the last two years of Donald Trump’s presidential term, and that it is also a test of the president’s popularity.
Done named the main congressional leaders as Mike Johnson in the House and John Thune in the Senate for the Republicans, and Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer for the Democrats. He said a Democratic win in the House could intensify parliamentary oversight of the Trump administration, including inquiries and hearings. If Republicans also lost the Senate, confirming appointments to the administration and the judiciary could become harder. In his account, that would amount to divided government, institutional competition, difficult negotiations and a higher chance of legislative deadlock.
George Jiglău, a lecturer at the Faculty of Political, Administrative and Communication Sciences at Babeș-Bolyai University and a political analyst, said the results for senators and governors could also shape the 2028 presidential race by strengthening politicians who win re-election convincingly ahead of each party’s internal contest. He said a loss of both the House and the Senate would complicate matters greatly for Trump, who could still issue executive orders, while a Democratic Congress could obstruct him as it did after the 2018 elections through inquiries, committees, hearings and impeachment.
The article recalls that Trump faced two impeachment proceedings in his first term. The House voted to impeach him both times and the Senate acquitted him. Impeachment does not automatically remove a president; removal requires conviction by the Senate with the votes of two-thirds of the senators present.
Done described an identity-based and emotional polarisation in which party affiliation has become part of social identity for a significant share of Americans, extending beyond taxes, social policy and the role of the state to competing views of democracy, authority and national identity. He said American society is not split into two homogeneous blocs, with important differences by generation, social category, urban and rural community, and ethnic and religious group, but that the electoral system can amplify existing antagonisms. Jiglău said the polarisation is also visible in leaders’ language, including Trump’s talk about Americans who do not support him and the hostile replies that language draws. On immigration, he said that if Trump uses aggressive rhetoric toward migrants, Democratic candidates answer with friendlier messages about immigration as a foundation of American society. He added that two-party competition and frequent elections encourage each side to present the other as a threat.
Trump has repeatedly raised staying in the White House after 2028, although the Constitution limits a person to election as president twice. Done called a third presidential term constitutionally impossible. He said the 22nd Amendment, ratified in 1951 after Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected four times and broke the informal tradition set by George Washington, states that no person may be elected president more than twice. He noted legal speculation about a narrow reading that distinguishes being elected president from exercising the office by succession, including a scenario in which JD Vance ran for president with Trump as vice president and then resigned. Done said that reading faces major constitutional obstacles, including the 12th Amendment’s limits on vice-presidential eligibility for people who are constitutionally ineligible for the presidency. Amending the Constitution would require a two-thirds majority in both chambers and ratification by three-quarters of the states, a consensus he called very hard to imagine. He treated the third-term talk as a way to keep Trump’s electorate mobilised and to extend his influence over the Republican Party and the 2028 succession, and as a test of political acceptability and of institutions under pressure from personal authority.
Jiglău also judged the chances of a third term very small and said the narrative has been less prominent in recent months than immediately after the 2024 election. He said such a change would be very hard to formalise because the Constitution would have to be amended, and he argued that Trump’s popular support is lower than it has ever been, with outright hostility on the other side. He said any attempt to push a third term through popular force rather than formal constitutional mechanisms would need broader support or much less concrete hostility. Looking to 2028, he said the Republican nominee would likely be someone Trump endorses to his MAGA base as a continuation of his own presidency. He named Vice President JD Vance as a possible candidate, while saying strong Republican senators and governors on 3 November could emerge as alternatives to politicians close to Trump.
A change in the congressional majority could also affect relations with European allies, funding for Ukraine and NATO security decisions. For Romania, on the Alliance’s eastern border, the question is whether 3 November brings concrete changes in the relationship with Washington. Done said US-Europe relations are being redefined, with the Trump administration pressing Europe to raise defence contributions and with Congress able to influence budgets and external commitments. A Democratic majority could exercise stronger control without automatically restoring pre-second-term US foreign policy. He warned that Romania should treat the elections as a moment that can change the operating parameters of regional security, and said Bucharest should keep strengthening the strategic partnership with the United States while also taking part in European defence capabilities, so regional security depends less on political shifts in Washington.
Jiglău does not believe the elections will have so large a macro effect on Romania-US relations, economically, politically or on security. He said Romania has tried to keep good relations with the Trump administration without moving away from European partners or Ukraine. He described President Nicușor Dan’s positioning as sometimes appearing ambiguous, and judged that ambiguity positively because it lets Bucharest keep talking with different political camps. If something significant changes in the US administration now or in 2028, he does not think Romania is in an adversarial position toward whoever might lead or influence the top of that administration. He noted that ties also run through American institutions, diplomats and members of Congress, including in defence and security, and through the State Department, where Romania has had a fairly good relationship. He said current difficulties between Washington and European capitals are too deep to be solved merely by a new parliamentary majority, and that the 2028 US presidential election could matter more for foreign policy, while European states should not tie their economic and security strategies to a single vote.
The result could also influence US trade policy, including the tariffs the Trump administration has used with trading partners. Done said import taxes have become a tool of geopolitical bargaining whose effects go beyond bilateral trade, forcing companies that rely on international suppliers to weigh extra costs, possible route changes and the risk that rules shift during an investment. In February 2026 the US Supreme Court held that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act does not give the president authority to impose tariffs under that law. The ruling invalidated tariffs adopted on that basis without removing the administration’s ability to use other legal instruments to tax imports. Done said tariffs would not disappear automatically even if Democrats won Congress, though lawmakers could tighten oversight of trade policy and try to change the legal framework. He called predictability the central problem for the global economy and said firms unsure of tariffs months ahead may delay investment, renegotiate contracts or seek suppliers elsewhere, with effects on economies that are not directly targeted but sit in the same production and supply chains.
In Romania, Jiglău does not expect already consolidated American investment to be significantly affected by the 3 November result, while flagging energy projects where politics could matter more. He described the United States as an important partner that has anchored itself fairly well, and said he does not believe these investors would leave if the administration or political control in Washington changed, or even if Romania itself saw a significant change. He pointed to economic considerations and the functioning of the Romanian state, including taxation, as what generally attracts or deters business. He mentioned the auto industry and IT among sectors with American capital, and noted that some investment comes through companies registered in other European states, which makes the full US economic presence harder to measure.
He drew a distinction for nuclear energy, raising questions about small modular reactors: project transparency, technical and environmental risk assessment, and the role of political relationships in promoting them. He said these mini-reactors were facilitated or built on highly political considerations tied very directly to the MAGA camp, and spoke of possible links between certain economic interests and people close to the Trump administration. He added that some information on those relationships remains insufficiently documented, so political influence over the investments cannot be treated as proven. He said the projects might be negatively affected, and that this would not necessarily be a bad thing until Romanian businesspeople, US backers and what are described as the interests of the American state are clearer. A political change in Washington would not automatically withdraw American capital, he suggested, but could influence projects that depend more heavily on support from particular political circles. He acknowledged that his view of no considerable overall impact sits in tension with the point that a certain type of American investment depends heavily on who is in charge, and said that remains to be seen.