Take Voters’ Economic Concerns Seriously, Republican Senator Warns As Midterm Polling Continues To Favor Democrats.

The outcome of the midterm elections hangs in the balance and Republican candidates should heed voters' financial concerns, John Kennedy, the Republican Senator for Louisiana, said in an interview.

"I do think it [the midterm results] will be close. I think the biggest issue is cost-of-living," Kennedy told NBC's Kristen Welker on Sunday. "We have to tell the American people the truth. Telling them not to believe their lying checkbooks is not going to work," the Republican politician continued.

The issue of daily costs has featured prominently in campaign messaging ahead of the November vote. While holding a campaign rally for Republican Senator Jon Husted in Ohio on Saturday, President Donald Trump warned Americans that a Democrat victory would result "in a 1929-style economic depression".

The president also reiterated his promise to issue every American adult with $5,000, a policy which has been dubbed the "Trump dividend", if Republicans win in November.

However, Kennedy, who called Trump his "friend" in the interview, warned that the economic picture was not looking entirely favorable for Republicans, stating that inflation had "reared its ugly head under President Trump because of the war in Iran."

Inflation levels have remained higher than they were before hostilities began in February; in May the annualized inflation rate hit a three-year high of 4.2% and, although inflation has since eased, it remained elevated in August at 3.4%. Higher energy costs are largely responsible for this continuously high inflation.

Kennedy echoed Trump's repeated promises that prices would come down as soon as the conflict with Iran ends but, like Trump, did not specify a timescale for a potential settlement.

The Louisiana senator was also cautious in his predictions about certain key midterm races, stating that the senate race in Texas between Democrat James Talarico and Republican Ken Paxton was "very, very close" and effectively an "unpopularity contest".

Recent polling by the New York Times in Texas, a traditionally red state, shows Talarico pulling ahead. That same polling shows that Democrat candidates are posing serious electoral challenges for House and Senate races in several other Republican-leaning states, including Alaska, Ohio and Iowa.

The results of an NBC poll of Latino voters published on Sunday spelled more trouble for the Republicans and Trump, who won a record share of the Latino vote for a Republican presidential candidate in 2024. The poll showed that 69 percent of Hispanic Americans disapprove of the Trump presidency, with only 27 percent expressing approval.

The poll also showed that Latinos trust the Democrats more than the Republicans on the economy by a margin of 21 percentage points, a remarkable reversal compared to 2024, when Trump had a 4-point edge over Democrat presidential candidate Kamala Harris on the same issue.

However, the poll was not all good news for Democrats; the party now enjoys much lower net favorability ratings (-1 percent) amongst Latino voters compared to 2018 (+26 percent).

Regardless, Democrat Rahm Emanuel, a White House Chief of Staff under former President Obama and Ambassador to Japan under former President Joe Biden, was much more confident in his midterm predictions when he spoke to NBC's Welker before Kennedy on Sunday.

"This election is a referendum on President Trump ... all the corruption and affordability issues are all com[ing] together", Emanuel said. He also stressed to Welker that Democrats had to prove they could provide real change for voters "after the election, when we win."