Democrats retake US Congress, projections show
· BehindLines newsroom
Democrats have won control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate in the midterm elections held on Tuesday, November 3, according to projections by several US news organisations. Tallies were still provisional on Wednesday, November 4.
In the House, CBS News projected a Democratic majority. The party held 214 seats before the vote, against 219 for Republicans (including one independent who caucuses with them) and two vacancies. Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said his side would win "at least 255 seats, if not more"; that is his own forecast, not a CBS tally. MS NOW estimates Democrats will take at least 250 seats, with 218 needed for a majority. CBS notes that the record for one party is 257 seats, set in 2009.
In the Senate, Democrats reached the 51 seats needed for control, according to the Associated Press as cited by MS NOW. They reportedly flipped at least four Republican-held seats, erasing a 53-47 GOP advantage. According to Al Jazeera, the wins include Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan over Mike Rogers, the first Muslim elected to the Senate; James Talarico, 37, in Texas over Ken Paxton; and Annie Andrews in South Carolina, the state's first Democratic senator since 1998. Al Jazeera also names Sherrod Brown and Roy Cooper among the Democratic candidates who flipped Republican-held seats.
On the Republican side, Al Jazeera points to Vivek Ramaswamy's loss in the Ohio governor's race to Amy Acton, and says Donald Trump, who was not on the ballot, will face a Democratic-controlled Congress for the rest of his term. It adds that Elon Musk had spent more than $400 million backing Republicans.
What remains unknown is the final count: CBS reported about 75 House races undecided at 4:18 a.m. Wednesday, later saying "several dozen", and the exact margins and the new Congress's legislative agenda are not yet established.