Editorial: The House vote was a referendum on Trump — and he lost

It was clear long before the ballots were cast on Tuesday that this year's enormously consequential congressional elections would be a referendum on the disruptive and often disgraceful presidency of Donald Trump. The president himself on Monday admitted that "even though I'm not on the ballot, in a certain way I am on the ballot." The press, he noted, considers the election "a referendum on me."

That it was, and the results in the House of Representatives are a dramatic and deserved rebuke for the president. Although votes are