Exclusive: President-elect Trump will not be on the ballot in the 2026 midterm elections, however Republican National Committee President Michael Whatley says Trump will play an “important” role in supporting GOP candidates.
Republicans achieved major victories in the elections that took place last month Trump's defeat Vice President Kamala Harris won the White House, as the Republican Party flipped control of the Senate from Democrats, retaining its slim majority in the House of Representatives.
“As we move forward in this next election cycle, the fundamentals will remain the same,” Whatley argued during an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital.
“We need to make sure that we build our parties in our states, that we build our ground game, and we build our election integrity apparatus to be ready to make sure that when we get those candidates through those primaries in '26, we will be in a position to move them to Finish line.
Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley rings in and calls the convention off on day one of the Republican National Convention at Fiserv Forum on July 15, 2024 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. (Chip Somodevila/Getty Images)
But the ruling party traditionally suffers setbacks below Midterm elections. Trump, who has been a pole in voter turnout, will not be on the ballot in 2026.
Although he will not be a nominee, Whatley said, “President Trump will be a very important part of this because at the end of the day, what we have to do is hold on to the House, hold on to the House.” “The Senate so we can finish his term and his agenda.”
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“Donald Trump will be very active on the Republican campaign trail. His agenda is the agenda we will run on,” Whatley predicted.
President Donald Trump arrives to speak during an Election Night event at the Palm Beach Convention Center on November 6, 2024 in West Palm Beach, Florida. (Chip Somodevila/Getty Images)
The Harris campaign and the Democratic National Committee outperformed the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee last cycle, but Whatley is confident that with the party soon in control of the White House, Republicans will be more competitive in the campaign's cash race in the midterms.
“We are very excited about where we are in terms of the fundraising we have done throughout this cycle and what we will do moving forward,” he said.
Whatley said his message to donors would be, “We have succeeded in putting Donald Trump in the White House, and we need to advance his agenda by maintaining the House majority and Senate majority.”
He also pushed back on persistent questioning of the ground game efforts of the Republican National Committee and the Trump campaign during the general election.
“We've been very focused on low-propensity voters. This has been a completely new system that we've put in place over the course of this election cycle. It's worked very well,” he said.
Looking ahead, he said, “In the midterm election cycle, low propensity voters, again, are going to be extremely important to us. So, we're going to continue to focus on building that type of platform.”
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“We also focused on outreach to communities that the Republican Party has not traditionally reached out to — Black voters, Hispanic voters, Asian American voters,” Whatley highlighted. That's why we've been able to see such seismic shifts toward Donald Trump versus where those blocs were in 2016 and 2020. We also saw seismic shifts among young voters, male and female, because we were speaking to every American voter. “Our ground game was very important.”
Whatley was interviewed a week after Trump asked him to continue as chairman of the Republican National Committee.
In March, when he secured the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, Trump named Whatley to succeed him Ronna McDaniel As RNC Chairman. Whatley, a longtime ally of the former president and a major supporter of Trump's election integrity efforts, served as general counsel to the Republican National Committee and chairman of the North Carolina Republican Party.
Trump is term-limited and will not be able to run for reelection in 2028. Vice President-elect Sen. J.D. Vance is likely considered the front-runner for the 2028 GOP nomination.
Vice President-elect Senator J.D. Vance of Ohio (L) and President-elect Donald Trump during an election night event at the Palm Beach Convention Center in West Palm Beach, Florida, US, on Wednesday, November 6, 2024. (Eva Marie Ozcategui/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
But when asked if the Republican National Committee would stick to its traditional role of remaining neutral in open and contested presidential primaries, Whatley said, “We will.”
“I'm very excited about the seat that we have in the Republican Party right now. You think about all the Republican governors, you think about all the Republican senators, the House members that we have, the leaders,” he added. “Across the country who participated in this campaign will be part of the president's cabinet.”
Whatley said the “America First” movement led by the president-elect is bigger than Donald Trump. He is the tip of the spear. He is the vanguard of this movement. But it's a very big movement right now.
The president also stressed that “Donald Trump has completely reshaped the Republican Party. We are now the party of the working class. We are now a party that connects and works with every voter, and talks to every voter about the issues that they care about. So, as we go into 2028, we are in a position to “Great to be able to continue the momentum of this agenda and this movement.”
The sign outside the New Hampshire Capitol in Concord honors the state's century-old tradition of holding the nation's first presidential primary in the race for the White House. (Fox News)
Unlike the Democratic National Committee, which upended the traditional in the 2024 cycle presidential nomination calendar, The RNC made no major changes to its starting lineup, keeping the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary as the top two contests.
In response to a question about the 2028 calendar, Whatley said, “I haven't had any conversations with anyone who wants to change the calendar on our end. I know the Democrats have done that during this election cycle, and I'm not sure that has really helped them with all that.” a lot.”
“We're very comfortable with the calendar as it is. But as we move toward 2028, we will have those conversations,” he added.
