白宫在周二晚上以谨慎的乐观情绪开启。随着民主党人开始连连获胜，唐纳德·特朗普总统的顾问们变得更加坦率——也更为挑衅。
The White House began Tuesday night with cautious optimism. As Democrats started racking up victories, President Donald Trump’s advisers grew more candid — and defiant.
特朗普在中期选举前的数周里横跨全国奔走，在短短一个多月内于20个州举办了30场活动，呼吁选民“假装我在选票上”。其结果是一次对共和党的中期选举否决，随着选举之夜的进行，白宫内部有人不愿承认这一点。
Trump spent the weeks before the midterms traveling across the country, hosting 30 events across 20 states in just over a month as he urged voters to “pretend that I’m on the ballot.”What resulted was a midterm repudiation of Republicans that, as election night wore on, some in the White House were unwilling to own.
“一位白宫官员对《Semafor》表示，‘特朗普总统并未出现在选票上，而事实证明，特朗普的选民只有在他出现在选票上时才会出现’，并辩称他‘在宣传许多候选人方面做得比候选人自己还好’。”
“President Trump was not on the ballot, and it’s proven that Trump voters show up when he is on the ballot,” a White House official told Semafor, arguing that he “did a better job promoting many of the candidates on the ballot than the candidates did themselves.”
特朗普本人在周二晚上的社交媒体帖子中呼应了这一观点：“我不在选票上，如果我在，我们本可以大获全胜！”周二晚上的初步结果清楚表明，特朗普的激进竞选推动不足以克服公众对伊朗战争以及其关税导致生活成本上升的怨气。民主党迅速翻转了北卡罗来纳州，守住了新罕布什尔州和乔治亚州——随后又翻转了长期红色的南卡罗来纳州。特朗普官员及与白宫关系密切的人士迅速承认，一股巨大的蓝色浪潮正在来临。
Trump himself echoed the sentiment in a Tuesday night social media post: “I wasn’t on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!”The early results on Tuesday night made clear that Trump’s aggressive campaign push wasn’t enough to surmount public frustration with the Iran war and his tariffs’ effect on the cost of living. Democrats quickly flipped North Carolina, held onto New Hampshire and Georgia — and then flipped long-scarlet South Carolina. Trump officials and people close to the White House quickly acknowledged that a massive blue wave was coming.
一位特朗普政府官员强调，这场战争对美国人的直接影响有多大。冲突加剧了选民的怨气，油价上涨，许多特朗普的支持者感到被一位曾承诺不发动新战争的总统背叛。
One Trump administration official emphasized how much the war has directly affected Americans. That conflict amplified voters’ frustration as gas prices climbed, and many in Trump’s base felt betrayed by a president who’d campaigned on launching no new wars.
另一位特朗普盟友更进一步，将战争形容为“一场灾难”，并感叹“共和党不懂特朗普联盟，尽管它已经存在十年”。官员们试图将这场惊人的中期选举挫败归咎于其他共和党领袖，这表明白宫没有计划与上升中的国会民主党多数和解。
Another Trump ally went even further, describing the war as a “disaster” and lamenting that “the Republican party doesn’t understand the Trump coalition, even though it’s 10 years in.”Officials’ efforts to pin their stunning midterm setback on other GOP leaders suggest that the White House has no plans to seek conciliation with ascendant congressional Democratic majorities.
这名白宫官员补充说：“无论今天结果如何，特朗普总统阻止激进左翼的决心只会变得更加坚定。做好准备吧。”特朗普周二晚些时候对《纽约时报》表示，他会接受选举结果。
“Regardless of how today plays out, President Trump’s resolve to stop the Radical Left is only going to become stronger,” the White House official added. “Buckle up.”Trump told The New York Times late Tuesday that he would accept the results of the election.
过去几周，一些政府官员已开始物色律师，以预先应对民主党主导的调查——这是他们知道周二晚间的结果可能不如人意的早期迹象。就此而言，一些顾问向Semafor表示，目前陆续出炉的结果对他们来说并不意外。过去几个月里，特朗普经常援引历史数据指出，完全掌控华盛顿的政党往往在中期选举中表现不佳。
In the past few weeks, some administration officials have begun looking to hire lawyers to preempt Democrat-led investigations — an early sign that they knew Tuesday night’s results might not go their way. To that point, some advisers indicated to Semafor that the results rolling in so far were not surprising to them. Trump has often pointed over the past months to historical data showing that the party holding total control of Washington tends to perform poorly in midterm elections.
甚至在全国各地投票站关闭之前，白宫就已开始散发谈话要点，强调特朗普在竞选活动中的努力。随着失利不断累积，这一基本信息——即总统已尽其所能提供帮助——在政府内部基本上一直延续。一名顾问告诉Semafor，特朗普的想法仍然如此：他已经做了他能做的。
Even before polls across the country closed, the White House began circulating talking points highlighting Trump’s efforts on the trail. That underlying message — that the president did what he could to help — largely persisted inside the administration as the losses mounted. One adviser told Semafor that Trump’s thinking remains along those lines: that he did what he could.
几名特朗普盟友还向Semafor争辩说，候选人素质不佳是共和党落败的部分原因，尽管总统公开支持了几名最终落选的候选人。
Several Trump allies also argued to Semafor that poor candidate quality was partly to blame for Republican defeats, though the president openly endorsed several of the candidates who fell short.
特朗普无疑让自己成为周二选举的核心人物。民主党人试图放大他的呼吁，即让选民假装他也在选票上，他们认为选民对政府如此不满，以至于一场针对特朗普的中期公投将对他们有利。
Trump certainly made himself a central figure in Tuesday’s election. Democrats looked to amplify his calls for voters to pretend he was on the ballot, believing that voters were so dissatisfied with the administration that a midterm referendum on Trump would reward them.
另一名白宫官员告诉Semafor，特朗普在白宫东厅与内阁成员、高级职员和政治顾问一起观看了选举结果的陆续出炉。他时不时上Truth Social，愤怒抨击福克斯新闻当晚的报道。
Trump watched the election results roll in from the White House East Room alongside Cabinet members, senior staff, and political advisers, another White House official told Semafor. At times, he took to Truth Social to rage against Fox News’ coverage of the evening.
一些工作人员从芝士蛋糕工厂餐厅订了外卖，这显然是对前总统巴拉克·奥巴马关于特朗普装饰风格的那句如今广为人知的俏皮话的一种致敬。
Some staffers ordered in from the Cheesecake Factory, an apparent nod to the now-famous quip from former President Barack Obama about Trump’s decorating.
今晚的结果对试图超越特朗普的共和党来说是一个警示信号。而且，这些结果很可能会引出一些特朗普助手早就知道迟早会面临的问题：推动特朗普上台的联盟能否重组，以及特朗普离任后该党将坚持什么。
Tonight’s results are a warning sign for the Republican Party as it tries to look past Trump. And they’re likely to surface a question that some of his aides knew they’d inevitably face: whether the coalition that pushed Trump to power can be reconstituted, and what the party will stand for after Trump leaves office.
今晚我联系的一些共和党人已经在面对这个问题。在未来几周和几个月里，任何瞄准2028年竞选的共和党人都需要审视中期选举结果，并找到以不同于特朗普的信息进行竞选的方式——同时又不惹恼特朗普或他的基本盘。
Some Republicans I’ve texted with tonight are already confronting that question. In the weeks and months ahead, anyone in the GOP who’s eyeing a 2028 run will need to look at the midterm results and find ways to run with a different message than Trump — while not angering him or his base.