Democrats have taken control of the US Senate and are projected to regain the House of Representatives after a series of defeats for Republicans in the midterm elections, prompting Donald Trump to be branded a “failed lame duck president.”
In a sweeping result, the Democrats won a Senate majority and picked up seats in the former Republican strongholds of Texas, Kansas, South Carolina and Ohio. Several major US media outlets have reported that Democrats are also projected to regain control of the House, which they last held in 2023.
Midterms as Referendum on Trump
The midterms determine which party controls Congress and were widely seen as a referendum on the controversial Republican leader, who had urged people to pretend he was on the ballot paper. Democrats needed a net gain of four seats in the 100-member Senate to win a majority, while in the 435-member House they needed three.
Speaking to Fox News after Republicans lost control of the Senate, Trump admitted the result surprised him. “Well, I’m a little bit surprised. I thought they’d do better, we had tremendous rallies,” he said. “I thought that I could transfer those people into candidates.”
Key Democratic Victories
Potential 2028 presidential challenger and Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff won re-election in Georgia, a top Republican target. He told supporters: “In sweeping and decisive victories, the American people have rebuked the depravity, corruption, and incompetence of the failed lame duck president Donald J Trump.” The 39-year-old has been a leading critic of the president and his administration, raising his national profile.
Senate candidate James Talarico became the first Democrat to win a statewide office in Texas since 1994. The party also flipped a string of House seats in states like Kentucky, New Jersey and North Carolina. Elsewhere, former Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown won the upper house seat of Ohio, defeating Republican incumbent Jon Husted.
Reaction and Other Races
In the face of losses, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform: “I wasn’t on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!” He added: “And if, at times these last two years, amidst the ceaseless onslaught of brutality and indecency, you doubted whether our republic would survive, let tonight’s results give you courage that the first light of dawn is on the horizon.”
The Democrats also retained New Hampshire, with Chris Pappas seeing off Republican John Sununu. Pappas will replace retiring Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a three-term Democrat who ousted Sununu in 2008. He told supporters: “This has been a long campaign against the backdrop of chaos, corruption and costs coming out of Washington.” In California, long-shot Republican candidate Steve Hilton, a former top aide to David Cameron, lost to former state attorney general Xavier Becerra.
