Democrats take majority control of US Congress

The Democrats win the Senate and the House in US midterm elections, taking control of Congress for the rest of Donald Trump’s presidency.

Victory in the Senate will deliver additional oversight powers to Democrats, who will now have a much bigger say on administration and judicial nominations.

They will also set the schedule for the Senate, and have new powers to call in administration officials for hearings. The string of Democratic victories sets the stage for Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to return as majority leader in 2027 and for hardball negotiations with Trump on an array of issues, including on federal spending levels.

It puts a significant crimp on Trump’s legislative powers and his ability to reshape the federal court system, though it will be necessary for Democrats to negotiate with the White House to win their own legislative victories. Democrats needed to net at least four seats to win the Senate majority, which had seemed a tall order given the fact that most of the competitive seats held by Republicans were in states comfortably won by Trump.

But high gas prices elevated by the war in Iran along with more general worries about the economy gave Democrats ammunition to go after Trump and Republicans. Senate Democrats flipped their first seat of the night in North Carolina when media election trackers declared former Gov. Roy Cooper (D) the victor over former Republican National Committee Chair Michael Whatley.

Democrats got their next biggest call of Election Night when pediatrician Annie Andrews was declared the winner over Sen. Darline Graham (R-S.C.), who had only been appointed to the seat in July after her brother, longtime Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), died suddenly.

Another big early call for Democrats came in Texas where state Rep. James Talarico handily defeated state Attorney General Ken Paxton, whom Trump controversially endorsed over Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) in the GOP Senate primary.

The political headwinds facing Republican candidates grew steadily stronger amid the deeply unpopular Iran war. Earlier in the year, Trump also took political hits from the killings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis shot to death by federal agents sent to the city by an administration focused on immigration. Trump also launched a trade war that raised prices, including with Canada, one of America’s oldest allies. That became an issue in a number of states, including those along the long border with Canada.

Political handicappers initially gave Democrats well below 50-50 odds of winning back control of the upper chamber, but by the final week of campaigning before Election Day, they were favored to win control of both the Senate and House.

Decision Desk HQ in the final week of the campaign gave Democrats a 60 percent chance of winning back the upper chamber. On Tuesday evening at about 6 p.m. on the East Coast, the Kalshi prediction market put the odds at 76 percent.

The loss of the Senate is a pointed rebuke of Trump, who campaigned extensively for GOP candidates throughout October, including Sens. Jon Husted (Ohio), Dan Sullivan (Alaska), Roger Marshall (Kan.), Graham and Paxton.

Democrats winning control of the Senate leaves Trump’s agenda, even in the postelection lame-duck session of Congress, in limbo. They have warned that Trump’s judicial and executive branch nominees will have a difficult time getting confirmed in the Senate.

Now, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) must decide whether to spend much of the lame-duck session trying to confirm as many Trump nominees as possible or spend weeks working on a budget reconciliation package to fund the Defense Department over Democratic objections.

Schumer is expected to be easily elected as majority leader when Senate Democrats hold their leadership elections in early December, even though some senators-elect, such as Juliana Stratton in Illinois, have threatened not to support him. Thune is expected to be elected as Senate minority leader when Republicans hold their leadership election next week.

The president campaigned in Rock Hill, S.C.; Chillicothe, Ohio; and Corpus Christi, Texas — among other battleground states — in the final week and predicted victory for Republicans, despite polls showing them down or tied even in GOP-leaning states.

Trump urged supporters to “pretend that I’m on the ballot” in hopes of driving low-propensity Republican voters who turned out in big numbers in the 2024 election to the polls on Election Day. Democrats in the Senate may now face pressure from their own base to turn their electoral victories into legislative wins, despite the reality that they will still need Trump’s signature to turn their bills into laws.

Democrats won big on election night despite being heavily outspent by Republican Party committees and aligned outside groups. Senate Republicans and aligned super PACs spent significantly more than their Democratic counterparts, drowning Democratic candidates in negative attack ads.

In Texas, outside groups spent more than $153 million against Democrat James Talarico while in Ohio groups spent more than $115 million against former Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), according to OpenSecrets.org, a group that tracks campaign fundraising.

In Michigan, GOP-aligned groups spent more than $91 million against Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, and in Maine, they spent more than $55 million against Democratic nominee Troy Jackson. A Republican source familiar with the Senate fundraising dynamics estimated that Thune and aligned outside groups spent nearly three quarters of a billion dollars to protect the Senate majority.