An unnamed Republican operative says morale inside the party is souring badly ahead of the November midterms, the elections that fall midway through a presidential term and will put every U.S. House seat, a third of the Senate, and dozens of governorships on the ballot.

Speaking to Politico's Thursday "Playbook" newsletter, a widely read Washington tipsheet, the operative — one of many Republicans working multiple races this cycle — offered a blunt assessment.

"The mood very bad right now," the operative said. "The polling is dropping like a rock, the map is expanding, and the knives are out among consultants."

The strategist said the party could still spare itself an electoral bloodbath, but only with a significant shift.

"There is a world where we win everything if folks can turn it around and there is a world where this midterm is a historical blow out. People are very on edge," the operative said.

Democratic pollster John Anzalone, who the report said polls alongside President Donald Trump's pollster Tony Fabrizio, looked back to the 1994 midterms — the wave election that handed Republicans control of the House for the first time in 40 years — and observed that Democrats have a knack for throwing things away.

"You were getting accidental congressmen [in 1994]. I mean that's really what was happening," Anzalone said. "Democrats always feel great in August, and then the spending is just so lopsided against us that we start s—— ourselves in September."

That pattern does not appear to be repeating this year, though, he said.

"We have never seen diagnostics like this," Anzalone said.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who chaired the Republican Governors Association when the GOP held 31 of 50 governorships, told Politico the party now holds 26 — one seat above an even split of the states' top offices.

"For the first time in 15 years, we could be in a position to lose a majority of the governorships," Christie said. "I think there's a scenario where Republicans wake up in the week or two after Election Day and say, 'We're just tired of losing.'"

As for the post-November landscape and emerging 2028 talk, Christie said Vice President JD Vance has bound his political fortunes to Trump.

"I think JD Vance has decided to make himself a disciple of Donald Trump, and I think that's the image that he's going to have to rise or fall with," Christie said.

He did not appear to anticipate much of a GOP remaining after Trump is finished with it.

Christie offered the remarks from New Hampshire, an early primary state for GOP candidates that has traditionally held the nation's first presidential primary, and said he plans to engage voters on the party's direction once the results are in.

"I really want to go out after the midterms are over, and depending upon what the results turn out to be, engage in a conversation with American voters about where we go from here," Christie said. "And for my own party: are we tired of losing yet?"