A Rebuke in Both Chambers: Democrats Sweep Congress as Voters Turn on Trump

Democrats captured majorities in both the Senate and the House in Tuesday's midterm elections, Reuters reported, scoring sweeping victories that reached deep into Republican strongholds and delivering a scathing rebuke to President Donald Trump. The size and breadth of the Democratic wave were still coming into focus on Wednesday morning, with some races uncalled and formal certification still to come in every state, but the party had prevailed in states long thought out of reach, including conservative bastions such as South Carolina, Texas and Iowa. The result ends two years of unified Republican control of Washington and reshapes the final two years of Mr Trump's second term, in which a Democratic Congress will control committees, subpoena power, investigations and the confirmation of presidential appointments.

The Senate, the harder climb, fell on six Republican-held seats flipped by Democrats, Reuters reported, ensuring a majority even if Democrats do not hold their own competitive seats in Michigan and Minnesota. In Texas, Democratic state Representative James Talarico defeated scandal-plagued Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton, becoming the state's first Democratic senator-elect in 38 years. In Kansas, Adam Hamilton, a megachurch pastor, became the first Democrat to win a Senate seat there since the Great Depression nearly a century ago, defeating incumbent Roger Marshall. In Ohio, Democrat Sherrod Brown claimed the seat that belonged to Vice President JD Vance two years ago, defeating Senator Jon Husted. And in South Carolina, a state Mr Trump carried by nearly 18 points in 2024, pediatrician Annie Andrews triumphed over Republican Senator Darline Graham, who had been appointed to the seat after the death of her brother, Senator Lindsey Graham. Democrats also flipped North Carolina, where former Governor Roy Cooper defeated Trump-backed Republican Michael Whatley, and held Georgia, where incumbent Senator Jon Ossoff was projected to win re-election.

The House followed the same pattern. Democrats were on track to take control after flipping at least eight Republican seats in states including Kentucky, New Jersey and North Carolina, Reuters reported, and showing strength even in solidly conservative districts. They held on to three House districts in Florida that Republican lawmakers had redrawn earlier this year, all of which backed Mr Trump by at least nine points. The party's dominance extended beyond Congress: Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a three-term incumbent, lost to Democrat Gina Hinojosa, Democrats captured governorships in conservative Iowa and Ohio, and Keisha Lance Bottoms won Georgia's governorship, becoming the first Black woman elected governor of a US state, according to the Associated Press. Democratic House leader Hakeem Jeffries is positioned to become the first Black Speaker of the House, although his election to that role is not automatic.

Exit polls showed an electorate in a sour mood. According to polls conducted by SSRS on behalf of a consortium of US media outlets including major television networks and the Associated Press, half of voters nationwide said they saw the election as an opportunity to rebuke the president, and three-quarters said they were "angry" or "dissatisfied" with the way the country is headed. Nearly nine in ten voters said the cost of living was a crucial or major factor in their vote, while nearly two-thirds blamed Mr Trump for high prices. Reuters reported that voters expressed deep frustration with Mr Trump's stewardship of the economy and his decision to launch a war against Iran in February, which drove petrol prices up sharply. Mr Trump had campaigned heavily for Mr Paxton, Ms Graham and Mr Husted in a late blitz of more than two dozen rallies, telling supporters repeatedly to "pretend I'm on the ballot" — and, as it grew clear on Tuesday night that Republicans were in danger of losing their majorities, he wrote on social media: "I wasn't on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!"

Mr Trump told media outlets he would accept the election results and was prepared to work with Democrats, Reuters reported, and told The New York Times he expected the two parties to work out things important to his administration. The Associated Press reported that he also argued the losses reflected Republican candidates rather than a verdict on his administration. That acceptance matters after the fears, voiced by Democrats before the vote, that Mr Trump might challenge the results, as he did in 2020. It does not, however, settle the politics. The new Congress is sworn in on 3 January 2027, and a Democratic House could launch investigations into the administration's ethics, its handling of immigration enforcement and the Iran war, while a Democratic Senate could block Mr Trump's appointments, including to the Supreme Court. Online, the scale of the result was the story: a thread in r/news on Mr Talarico's Texas win drew more than 66,000 upvotes, and a Hacker News commenter called Democrats flipping Texas, Kansas and South Carolina "an absolute nuke": Reddit discussion, r/news

What happens next will be decided first by counting and certification, and then by negotiation. Several races remained uncalled on Wednesday, and the Associated Press's determination of congressional control is not a certified final national seat tally. But the direction of travel is clear: an electorate that Mr Trump asked to treat the midterms as a referendum on his presidency did so, and answered with divided government. Whether Democrats use their majorities for oversight, legislation or both — and whether Mr Trump, who also threatened to veto any "insane" bills they passed, finds common ground on issues such as immigration — will define the remaining two years of his presidency. For now, the party that began the night needing a net gain of four Senate seats and three House seats has taken both chambers, in places few forecasters expected it to win at all.