Democrats Win Senate Majority After Flipping Six Republican Seats, AP Race Calls Show

Democrats have won the Senate, according to Associated Press race calls late Tuesday, Nov. 3, with Iowa providing the tipping point. Control of the House has not yet been called.

Republicans began the year with a 53-47 majority and little expectation it was at risk. Democrats needed four flips. They got six.

How the Senate flipped

The pickups came in North Carolina, South Carolina, Ohio, Texas, Kansas and Iowa. Iowa was the tipping point, where state Rep. Josh Turek defeated Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson. It is the first Democratic Senate win in Iowa since 2008.

The other results were just as lopsided in places that have not voted this way in a long time:

• Texas: James Talarico beat Attorney General Ken Paxton. No Democrat has won a Senate race in Texas since 1988.
• Kansas: Pastor Adam Hamilton became the first Democrat elected to the Senate from the state since 1932.
• Ohio: Former Sen. Sherrod Brown won his old seat back.
• North Carolina: Roy Cooper won the seat Thom Tillis is leaving.
• South Carolina: Pediatrician Annie Andrews beat Trump-endorsed Darline Graham, the sister of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham. Decision Desk HQ called it around 10 p.m., with Andrews near 51% to Graham's 47% and 84% of ballots counted. No Democrat has won a Senate race there since 1998. Trump carried the state by nearly 18 points in 2024.

Democrats also held New Hampshire, where Rep. Chris Pappas beat former Sen. John E. Sununu, and Georgia, where Jon Ossoff won.

The candidates Trump picked

Several of the losses came with Trump's fingerprints on them. He elevated Graham in a contested primary. At a debate she said, "I'm not that informed on national security," when asked whether Taiwan and the South China Sea were U.S. security issues.

Nikki Haley said of the remark: "Lindsey Graham was well informed on the United States' national security. Graham admits she's not. This is not something you inherit."

Rep. Ralph Norman, who ran against Graham in the primary, attacked the process. "The voters in South Carolina are not buying the argument that everyone has to 'settle' for a candidate that has been propped up by special interest groups and a Republican president," he told CNN's Manu Raju.

Conservative radio host Erick Erickson said Trump's team "managed to do what the pre-Trump GOP never did, shrink the map of Republican states." He added: "Bush and Rove turned Texas red. Trump turned it blue."

Trump's response

Trump's explanation is different. He told the New York Times in a brief call Tuesday evening that he would accept the results. In a social media post, he said Republicans fell short because he was not on the ballot: "If I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!"

In the final weeks he had urged Republican voters to act as if he were on the ballot. Polls showed voters unhappy about the cost of living, the war with Iran, immigration enforcement, tariffs and allegations of corruption in government. Gas prices rose during the Middle East conflict, which Democrats used in Texas, Kansas and Iowa.

What Democrats can and cannot do

A Senate majority gives Democrats committee chairmanships, subpoena authority and control over which nominations move. That covers Cabinet picks and federal judges, including any Supreme Court vacancy. Combined with a House majority, if Democrats win one, it would open the door to investigations that could dominate the rest of Trump's term.

Passing laws is harder. In an interview with the Pod Force One podcast published Monday, Trump said he would block Democratic legislation. "I'll become Mr. Veto," he said. "And then at some point we'll probably make deals."

Democrats cannot override a veto on their own, and the 12 annual appropriations bills still need Republican votes to fund the government. Their affordability agenda is more likely to shape oversight hearings than the statute book.

Reason magazine noted that Trump joins George W. Bush as the only Republican presidents since 1954 to lose both chambers of Congress in a single midterm.

Still undecided: Alaska, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota

Counting continues in Minnesota and Michigan, where Democrats were defending open seats, and in Maine, where Republican Susan Collins is the last GOP senator from a state that voted Democratic for president. The Alaska race between Democrat Mary Peltola and Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan may take days to resolve. So the final size of the Democratic majority is not yet known.

Alaska is also the center of a legal fight. A federal judge on Sunday dismissed a Justice Department lawsuit seeking to delay certification if Sullivan loses by a margin that could be attributed to voter confusion from a second candidate named Dan Sullivan on the ballot. The department is appealing.

A person familiar with the matter told CNBC the department has sent more than 20 letters, some naming recipients as potential targets of a criminal probe tied to the ballot and others telling recipients to preserve records. The New York Times reported that election lawyer Marc Elias, who has represented Peltola, and at least one Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee official received target letters. It cited a person familiar with the investigation as saying the department is examining possible donor fraud and conspiracy.

A target letter is not a charge, and no charges have been filed. Elias said, "No one should be surprised that President Trump's Department of Justice is targeting me and my law firm on Election Day." Trump said on Fox News that Elias "should go to jail, in my opinion."

The next concrete markers are the Alaska count and the appeal of the dismissed certification suit. Whether either changes the outcome there will not be known for days.