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Democrats projected to flip US House & Senate from Republican control in stunning Trump rebuke
The election was held on Nov. 3.
November 04, 2026, 01:07 PM
Image via Unsplash & White House Gallery
The Democratic Party is now all but certain to retake both bodies of Congress, the national legislature by flipping both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate after Nov. 3’s midterm elections in the United States.
The governing Republican Party held a slim four-seat majority in the House and a three-majority in the Senate prior to the elections, but outlets like NBC News are projecting a significant majority in the House and at least 51 seats in the Senate for the opposition Democrats.
Result projections
NBC News, as of noon Singapore time, expected the Democrats to win 252 seats in Congress, as opposed to 183 Republican seats, giving them a majority of 69.
It is also projecting at least 51 seats in the Senate for the Democrats, with several seats yet to be called and at least one, Alaska, yet to begin counting.
House Minority Leader Hakim Jeffries, likely to become the first black Speaker of the House in the new term, has posted on social media, declaring Donald Trump and his administration to be “shook”.
Winning the House will give the Democrats control over its committees, giving them agenda-setting and subpoena powers, as well as power over appropriations, making it more difficult for the Trump administration to fund its policy initiatives.
Meanwhile, winning the Senate will give the Democrats significant power to check President Donald Trump's agenda, but perhaps none more crucial than limiting his ability to appoint Supreme Court justices, especially in an environment where the court looks likely to see a few retirements or need replacements.
Significant majority
It has been accepted for months that the Democrats will likely take control of the House, given the narrow Republican majority and their unpopularity.
The only question has been how large the majority would be.
As the Republicans have learnt over the past year, a slim majority means that the more radical aspects of the party have greater influence over legislation.
As Adrian Ang, coordinator of RSIS’s United States programme, told Mothership, a larger Democratic majority will mean that moderate elements of the party will have the greatest weight.
“There is going to have to be a lot of intra-party bargaining as to what the party’s legislative priorities will be for the next Congress.”
The Senate
However, observers were more circumspect about the Democrats winning in the Senate.
In any major election year, about one third of the Senate's 100 seats are up for election, as well as any special elections that might be held to replace retiring or deceased Senators.
Many of these seats for 2026 were in states considered to be "safe" for Republicans, like Texas, Kansas and South Carolina, which Donald Trump won with large majorities in the 2024 presidential election.
Furthermore, the Democrats are in opposition, meaning that even if they managed to tie in the Senate at 50-50, Vice President JD Vance would be able to break ties for the Republicans, meaning that the Democrats would have to win at least four seats to gain control of the Senate.
But with many battleground states turning favour of the Democrats, it looks all but certain that not only will they win a majority, it might end up being a sizeable one as well, although unlikely to be over the 60 seats needed to break the filibuster.
Unpopular parties
The result is credited to U.S. President Donald Trump’s massive unpopularity due to the rising cost of living and carrying out military strikes on Iran despite campaigning against foreign wars; his party has suffered in the midterm polling.
The vote appears to be more a rebuke of the Republicans and the president than an endorsement of the Democrats, with the party only marginally more popular than their opponents.
Ang also noted that in all but three examples, the party of the president traditionally looses seats during midterm elections.
However, Trump still wields executive power, including over foreign policy, which could see clashes with the new Congress in the days to come.
