Democrats captured both chambers of Congress in sweeping election victories on Tuesday, delivering a decisive rebuke to President Trump’s second-term agenda. The party made gains in conservative states that had backed Trump by wide margins two years ago, including places where major races had rarely been competitive in recent decades.
Democrats won a Senate seat in Kansas for the first time since the Herbert Hoover administration and picked up seats in Texas, North Carolina and South Carolina. Republicans also lost House races in Southern districts where new, gerrymandered maps had been designed to give them an advantage.
The results included the defeats of Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a three-term Republican, and Maine Senator Susan Collins, who had served five terms. The scale of the wins surprised some Democrats. Dan Sena, a former executive director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, described the outcome as a “blood bath” and said Democrats would hold power in places they had not controlled for decades.
The outcome ended one-party rule in Washington. Voters pushed back amid high gas prices, an unpopular war in Iran and persistently high inflation, leaving both parties to confront an uncertain political period beyond the Trump era.
Sources: The New York Times Politics.