United States midterm election

While Article II, Section 1, Clause 1 of the United States Constitution sets the U.S. president's term of office to four years, Article I, Section 2, Clause 1 sets a two-year term for congressmembers elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. Article I, Section 3, Clause 1 then sets a six-year term for those elected to the U.S. Senate, with Clause 2 dividing the chamber into three "classes", so that approximately one-third of those seats are up for election every two years. The elections for many state and local government offices are held during the midterms so they are not overshadowed or influenced by the presidential election. Still, a number of state and local governments instead prefer to avoid presidential and midterm years altogether and schedule their local races during odd-numbered "off-years". ==Historical record of midterm==

Midterm elections are regarded as a referendum on the sitting president's and/or incumbent party's performance. The party of the incumbent president tends to lose ground during midterm elections: since World War II, the president's party has lost an average of 26 seats in the House, and an average of four seats in the Senate. Since direct public midterm elections were introduced, in only eight of those (under presidents Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Donald Trump, and Joe Biden) has the president's party gained seats in the House or the Senate. Of those, only two (1934, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and 2002, George W. Bush) have seen the president's party gain seats in both houses. The losses suffered during a president's second midterm tend to be more pronounced than during their first midterm, in what is described as a "six-year itch". ==Comparison with other U.S. general elections==