WASHINGTON _ Special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation could upend the 2018 midterm elections _ whether it reveals wrongdoing at the highest levels or exonerates the president. And yet campaign officials and party insiders on both sides are unprepared for it.
Interviews with two dozen political strategists reveal that there is very little planning underway for the possibility that Mueller will make significant news this year, potentially in the middle of a campaign cycle that history suggests will already be difficult for the president's party.
"It's something on everybody's minds," said one Republican strategist working on races in Tennessee, who like many sources interviewed for this story requested anonymity to discuss internal campaign strategy. "There's an unknown there. That's certainly a fear."
Many Republicans said it's nearly impossible to prepare for the myriad Mueller scenarios, and they argue their time is better-spent dealing with current realities of the race. Those Republicans who have given the issue thought have wildly divergent views about how they would advise candidates to proceed if there is a Mueller verdict, from dismissing negative results as "fake news" to pushing for a pivot to local issues.
Democrats, meanwhile, are in their own messaging quandary, caught between a desire to seize on a potential one-of-a-kind scandal or stick with pocketbook issues such as health care. Some party operatives even think Democrats would be better off in November if Mueller's investigation never existed in the first place.
"It's not as if Trump wasn't already the driving narrative of midterm campaigns," Mark Longabaugh, a Democratic strategist advising a handful of House and gubernatorial candidates. "But this would block out the sun to a large degree."
Here's a roadmap to how the political class is grappling with the most significant uncertainty of the 2018 campaign cycle.
