A record share of Americans call themselves political independents as the country votes on Tuesday, and those voters could decide which party controls Congress and a number of state legislatures after the midterm elections.
Nearly half of U.S. voters, as many as 117 million adults, now identify as independent, Hoda Sherif reported for Al Jazeera, and Democrats and Republicans are both chasing them. Independent candidates haven’t had the same luck. Only two of the 100 senators, Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Angus King of Maine, are independents, and both caucus with the Democrats.
The clearest measure of the shift comes from Gallup. In 2025, 45 percent of American adults identified as independents, according to the polling firm, the highest share since it began regular telephone polling in 1988 and up from the previous high of 43 percent, reached in 2014, 2023 and 2024. Democrats and Republicans each drew 27 percent.
Younger adults are driving much of it. Gallup found that 56 percent of Gen Z adults call themselves independent.
Most independents still lean one way. Of the 45 percent, 20 percent leaned Democratic, 15 percent leaned Republican and 10 percent leaned toward neither party, according to Gallup. Counting those leaners, 47 percent of adults were Democrats or Democratic-leaning and 42 percent were Republicans or Republican-leaning, the first Democratic edge since 2021.
Gallup warned against reading that as affection for the Democrats. The party’s favorable ratings are no better than the Republican Party’s and are among the lowest Gallup has recorded for it. The firm compared the movement to the years from 2022 to 2024, when some Americans, especially independents, drifted away from the party of an unpopular president. Then it was Joe Biden’s Democrats. Now it is President Trump’s Republicans.
The gap widened this year. In the first quarter of 2026, 39 percent of Americans were Republicans or Republican-leaning independents, the lowest share since 2015, while 49 percent were Democrats or leaned that way, ABC News reported, citing Gallup data.
Turning those voters into votes for independent candidates is harder. The best-known test is in Nebraska, where Dan Osborn, a former union leader, is challenging Senator Pete Ricketts, a Republican. Mr. Osborn ran as an independent against Senator Deb Fischer in 2024 and lost by fewer than seven points. No Democrat is on the Senate ballot there this year.
Polls in the race have split, and the ones showing Mr. Osborn ahead were mostly paid for by groups that back him or lean Democratic. A New York Times/Siena College poll released Oct. 31 put Mr. Ricketts ahead 49 percent to 43 percent among likely voters, Political Wire reported. NPR rates the seat Likely Republican.
Democrats are also watching Montana, where Seth Bodnar is running for the Senate as an independent. Party strategists hope independents in Montana and Nebraska can beat Republicans in a part of the country where the Democratic brand has struggled, NPR reported.
Those races sit on a Senate map that has grown wider over the fall. Democrats would need a net gain of four seats to take the chamber, and a win by an independent who sides with them would count toward that.