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Midterms
Midterm results live: Democrats flip a Senate seat early as they seek to build blue wave
Here are some of the very early developments on the night.
LAST UPDATE | 33 mins ago
POLLS ARE CLOSING across US in the midterm elections, with Democrats poised to seize the House and in with an increasingly strong chance of winning the Senate.
Early results are starting to give hard evidence to back up pre-election polls that voters are unhappy, so much so that US President Donald Trump may now face a hostile Congress for the final two years of his presidency.
Republicans losing the House would give Democrats the power to stall Trump’s legislative agenda and launch sweeping investigations of his administration.
A Senate defeat would also threaten his ability to appoint any more Supreme Court justices, having already appointed three during his first term.
Main points
- Democrat Jon Ossoff is predicted to win his Senate seat, potentially boosting his 2028 White House ambitions.
- Democrat Cooper flips US Senate seat in North Carolina
Senate race
There are 35 of the 100 Senate seats up for grabs on election day, but as with all US elections, most races aren’t really competitive and are seen as solidly for one party or another.
We have a rundown here of the battleground races, with experts putting the number of battleground seats at maybe seven to ten, depending on how wide you want to cast the net.
Before tonight, the Republicans held the majority in the Senate and Democrats need to win four seats from them, and hold their own, to wrest control.
North Carolina (Democrats flip seat)
Democrat Roy Cooper bested former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Whatley to win the US Senate election in North Carolina, giving his party one of the seats previously held by Republicans they need to win control of the Senate.
Whatley was running for the Republicans to keep the seat being vacated by retiring Thom Tillis, a vocal Republican Trump critic.
Georgia (Democrats hold seat)
Incumbent Democrat Senator Jon Ossoff of Georgia wasn’t a true battleground race as his star has been on the rise since he was first elected in 2020, but his reelection is significant nonetheless given his potential 2028 ambitions.
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