Gallup: record-low 43% of voters say their own House member deserves reelection; Congress approval at 14%

Only 43% of registered voters say their own member of Congress deserves another term, the lowest share in any final pre-midterm Gallup reading since the question was first asked in 1994, and the first time it has dropped below half. Before this year it ranged from 50% to 69%. Just 15% say most members of Congress deserve reelection, also a record low. The poll, released Oct. 28, is circulating widely on X on Election Day morning.

Approval of Congress stands at 14%, the lowest Gallup has recorded ahead of a midterm in its trend going back to 1974 (the all-time low was 9% in November 2013). Republican approval of the Republican-led Congress has fallen from 53% in February 2025 to 29% now; Democratic approval is 4%, and independents are at 13%.

By party, 51% of Republican voters say their own representative deserves reelection, compared with 45% of Democrats and 36% of independents. Gallup interviewed 1,200 adults by phone Oct. 1-19, including 1,057 registered voters, with a margin of error of about ±4 points.

Our read: The headline sounds like an anti-incumbent wave, but Gallup itself says the poll can't tell which party's incumbents are in more trouble, because it doesn't ask whether a voter's member is a Republican or a Democrat. Republicans, whose party holds the House, are actually the group most willing to send their own member back, which fits Gallup's long pattern of majority-party voters being more forgiving. The number to watch is independents at 36%: that's where close House races are decided. The fieldwork also ended Oct. 19, two weeks before today's vote, so it misses the final stretch of the campaign.