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Democrats will win enough seats in the U.S. House of Representatives to gain control of the lower chamber of Congress — propelled by a wave of discontent with the economy and the president, according to News projections and Voter Polls.
Democrats flipped at least six Senate seats, including in Republican strongholds like Kansas and South Carolina, News projects. And they flipped at least a dozen House seats as well as several governor’s seats — also in traditionally red states, making history in several cases.
In Texas, Democrat Gina Hinojosa denied Gov. Greg Abbott, a close ally of the president, a fourth term.
A shift in the balance of power could curb the executive influence of President Donald Trump and could have meaningful implications for domestic and foreign policy amid a generally unpopular U.S. war with Iran, climbing inflation and record-high fuel prices that have strained American households.
Two weeks ahead of the midterm elections, Trump’s approval rating dipped to 37%, the lowest of this presidential term, and his 62% disapproval rating is a record high over both presidential terms, according to an News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll conducted using Ipsos’ KnowledgePanel.
About two-thirds of Americans disapprove of how Trump is handling the economy (65%) — a record high over both of Trump’s presidential terms and roughly the same as then-President Joe Biden’s worst economy rating in /Post polling in September 2023 (64%).
Trump, who urged Americans at rallies across the country to “pretend I’m on the ballot” when they vote in the midterms, wrote on X Tuesday night that he was “not on the ballot.”
“I wasn’t on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!” Trump claimed.
The president told The New York Times in a phone interview on Tuesday night that he will accept the results of Tuesday’s elections and said that he is willing to work with Democrats.
“I am absolutely willing to accept those results,” Trump said.
“We’ll work with the Democrats, and we’ll, you know, look forward to working with them. We’ll probably work something out,” he added.
But he also posted a hat on social media with the word “VETO” on it.
Key Senate victories
As votes are tallied across the country, Democrats secured several key wins in consequential Senate races in both battleground states and red states that voted for Trump in 2024.
Thirty-five Senate seats are in play during the 2026 midterms, but the outcome of a few races in both battleground and traditionally Republican states will determine which party will control the upper chamber of Congress next year.
Texas: Democrat James Talarico will win the Texas Senate race, defeating Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and becoming the first Democrat to win a Texas statewide race in over 30 years, News projects. The last time a Democrat won a U.S. Senate election was in 1988. Talarico, a former state representative and Presbyterian seminarian, ran against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Paxton waded into the culture wars in his attacks against Talarico, while the Democrat has kept his message on the economy front and center and criticized the attorney general over a series of political scandals that have embroiled Paxton’s career.
South Carolina: Democrat Annie Andrews is projected to win the South Carolina Senate race, flipping a seat blue after it had been held by the late Sen. Lindsey Graham for the past 23 years.
Andrews, a pediatrician, ran against incumbent Republican Sen. Darline Graham, who was appointed to the Senate by Gov. Henry McMaster and succeeded her brother after he died unexpectedly in July.
Darline Graham was the first woman to represent South Carolina in the U.S. Senate, but Annie Andrews is projected to become the first woman elected in that position.
North Carolina: Democrat Roy Cooper, the state’s former governor, will win the North Carolina Senate race, News projects, flipping the seat blue.
Cooper ran for the open seat against Republican Michael Whatley, a former Republican National Committee chairman who was endorsed by President Trump. The seat is held by outgoing Republican Sen. Thom Tillis, a Trump critic, who announced his retirement last year.
Georgia: News projects that incumbent Democrat Jon Ossoff will win reelection in Georgia’s race for U.S. Senate against Republican Rep. Mike Collins, who represents Georgia’s 10th congressional district.
Ossoff, who is the only Democratic senator up for reelection this cycle in a state that Donald Trump won in 2024, was once viewed as one of the most vulnerable incumbent Democratic senators.
But polls showed a close race as Collins’ campaign has been marred by several controversies and the congressman has also faced some heat over his support for the generally unpopular war in Iran.
Maine: Democrat Troy Jackson’s campaign spokesperson Maggie Amjad told News that Republican Sen. Susan Collins, a moderate who was elected in 1996, called and conceded the Maine Senate race. Collins said in a statement on Tuesday night that she called to congratulate Jackson. “It has been the honor of my life to serve the people of Maine in the United States Senate. I’m proud of all I have been able to accomplish for our state and for our country in the past 30 years,” she said.
Kansas: Democrat and megachurch pastor Adam Hamilton will win the U.S. Senate race in Kansas, News projects, defeating incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall.
Republicans currently hold 53 seats, while Democrats have 45 seats, in addition to independent senators Bernie Sanders and Angus King, who also caucus with the Democratic Party, giving them a total of 47.
Democrats needed to win four additional seats to shift the balance of power, while Republicans can afford to lose up to three seats and keep the majority, with the tie-breaking vote of Vice President JD Vance.
A promise of ‘change’ in the House
All 435 seats of the House of Representatives are on the ballot on Tuesday for two-year terms in the 120th Congress, but 14 of those seats that News rates as toss-ups are crucial to determining the balance of power in the House next year.
Key races were in states like Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, Montana, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia, while a handful of other consequential races were in congressional districts that were redrawn by Republican legislatures in Alabama, Florida, Kentucky and Virginia.
To shift the balance of power, Democrats needed to gain at least three seats.
The Republican caucus, led by Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana, currently holds a slim majority over Democrats with 220 seats, while Democrats have 215.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who will become the first Black speaker of the House if he is elected to lead the party in January, vowed that “change” is coming.
“We’re going to push for dramatic reform of the Supreme Court,” Jeffries said at the National Association of Black Journalists conference in Atlanta in August.
“The Supreme Court, the conservative right-wing majority on the Supreme Court, has become basically a subsidiary of the MAGA Republican Party. The status quo is acceptable. It’s not,” he added. Democrats, who last controlled both chambers during the 117th Congress in Trump’s first term (2021–2023), are also aiming to make history by electing at least 100 Democratic women to the House, which would set a new record.
Out of 435 seats in the House, 125 are currently held by women, including 95 Democrats and 30 Republicans.
In the 14 toss-up races, seven Democratic women are running against Republican opponents.
News’ Juhi Doshi, Oren Oppenheim, Nicholas Kerr, Emily Guskin, Devin Dwyer, John Parkinson and Allison Pecorin contributed to this report.
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