United States

The child migrant border surge, air strikes on ISIL (ISIS), and the 2014 midterm elections

As spring turned to summer, the United States was confronted with a growing crisis on its border with Mexico. Since October 2013 more than 50,000 unaccompanied children—most of them from Central America and many of them fleeing drug-related gang violence—had been taken into custody while trying to enter the United States illegally. The crisis arose against the backdrop of Congress’s acknowledgment that immigration reform had again stalled.

migrant childrenU.S. Border Patrol agents processing a group of Central American migrants who entered the U.S. near McAllen, Texas, on June 18, 2014.Jennifer Whitney—The New York Times/Redux

In September Obama ratcheted up the campaign against ISIL, authorizing air strikes inside Syria for the first time and an increase of those in Iraq. He continued to pledge that he would not return U.S. combat troops to the region but asked Congress to approve some $500 million for the training and arming of “moderate” Syrians. As U.S.-led attacks increased, Obama worked to grow the coalition of countries that had committed to confronting ISIL. By the end of the month, some 20 countries were contributing air support or military equipment to the coalition effort, including France, Britain, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Qatar, and Bahrain. Dozens of other countries provided humanitarian aid.

Framing the midterm congressional elections in November 2014 as a referendum on the presidency of Obama (whose approval ratings had plummeted to about 40 percent), the Republicans soundly defeated the Democrats to expand their majority in the House and retake control of the Senate. In gaining as many as 12 seats in the House, Republicans were in a position to match their largest majority in that body since 1947, and, by winning back seats in several states that had gone Republican in recent elections but tilted Democratic on the coattails of Obama’s 2008 presidential victory, Republicans gained nine seats in the Senate to reach a total of 54.

McConnell, Mitch: 2014 reelectionMitch McConnell celebrating with his wife, Elaine Chao, after he was reelected to a sixth term in the Senate, 2014.J. Scott Applewhite/AP Images