The short answer is that Republicans are poised to take the House, the Senate might not be decided until December, and the predictable patterns of base voting took hold early on.
Related: 2022 Midterm Election Results
With results still not available in several states, like Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, and Georgia, it’s impossible to call the Senate at this hour. That could change sometime today but if neither Walker nor Warnock can get to 50% in Georgia, we’re likely headed for another month of campaigning until a Dec. 6 runoff election.
If there are winners on election night in the broader scheme, awards have to be given to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for his blowout victory, and to Democratic candidates around the country for holding on tighter than most analysts predicted.
1. House (Barely) Goes Red
While the likely majority for Republicans in the House is still unknown, Nancy Pelosi’s time as Speaker is numbered. The GOP didn’t need to flip many seats and it looks like they will come up with the needed victories. It’s not going to be 20 seats, as per the “low-end” expectation, but it’s also not going to be one or two.
As NPR reports, the current results could provide a House majority of 8 seats, well below expectations set by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy:
The House still looks like it’s headed for GOP hands, but not by a huge margin. At 5 a.m. ET Wednesday, Republicans had flipped or led in 17 races, while Democrats flipped or led in nine. If that holds, that would only be a net gain of eight seats, on the low end of forecasters’ projections. It’s also far below the average for a president’s first midterm.
Since World War II, the party out of power has picked up a net of 28 seats and 43 seats when a president’s approval rating was below 50%, as President Biden’s is today. A Republican net gain of nine would be enough for a majority — they only needed five — but it will also make for lots of Republican hand-wringing.
That’s historically bad in perspective, but with redistricting and gerrymandering in every state, there are fewer competitive districts to win. Gone are the days of winning 40, 50, or 60 seats in any given year.
2. Senate Still Undecided
Any hope that Republicans were going to sweep unexpectedly close Senate races like New Hampshire or Pennsylvania dissolved fairly early on Tuesday night.
These races, if anything, were going to be tough for Republicans but the typical patterns of base voting were noticeable from the onset of reporting. As of this morning, some chairs in the Senate will be moved around a little but everything, as with 2020, might come down to a Georgia runoff election pitting Herschel Walker against Raphael Warnock to see which one can get to 50%:
Democrat John Fetterman won in Pennsylvania, which was seen as a crucial state for Democrats to be able to retain control. It is likely their one flip of the evening, as Wisconsin looks less likely.
That means Republicans now need a net gain of two pickups to gain control. So far, they have gotten none. They were expecting to win up to 52 seats, and that now appears unlikely. Nevada and Georgia are close, but the Republican was ahead in Nevada and the Democrat was ahead in Georgia. Arizona only had about 58% of votes in, and Democrat Mark Kelly was ahead at that point.
In Georgia, Democrat Raphael Warnock was narrowly ahead, but not quite above the 50% threshold needed for an outright victory. So, let’s say if Democrats hold on in Arizona, but lose in Nevada, then Georgia will decide control of the Senate in a runoff in about a month, Dec. 6. Wow.
Wow is right, it’s like we’ve all seen this movie before. On another note, Arizona’s entire voting system needs to be scrapped and replaced. The fact that voting machines failed on Election Day in Maricopa County is inexcusable. The state has had two years to fix problems since 2020 and had a dry run with a heavily competitive primary in the Spring yet the whole system crashed on Tuesday. It shouldn’t take this long to get results. It really is time to end widespread mail-in ballots, there’s no excuse to continue letting the practice gum up the system and prevent quick and accurate reporting of results.
Dr. Oz in Pennsylvania never seemed to build a connection with voters even though the race began trending in his direction late in the game. The Keystone State has 45 days of early voting so many ballots were already locked in before the embarrassing Fetterman debate performance on Oct. 25. In the end it wasn’t enough, especially with the race for governor ending so lopsided in favor of Democrat Josh Shapiro at the top.
3. Unsurprising Governors Races
While New York’s race was closer than it could’ve been, incumbent Kathy Hochul held on and defeated her Republican challenger, Lee Zeldin. The same happened in Michigan where Gov. Gretchen Whitmer defeated Tudor Dixon, her Republican challenger.
On the other side of the coin, Republican Gov. Brian Kemp easily topped Stacey Abrams to win re-election. In Florida, Democrats suffered an absolute bloodbath with Gov. Ron DeSantis cruising to a nearly 20-point victory over Charlie Crist thanks to flipping several areas, such as Mami-Dade county, a typically blue part of the state that went heavily Republican on Tuesday night. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott sent Robert Francis O’Rourke out to pasture yet again but he’ll be back in a year or two when someone else needs to burn a hundred million dollars and then lose.
The Governor’s race in Oregon has yet to be decided but it looks like Democrats might hold on there as well despite a surge of support and polls indicating that Republican Christine Drazan had a chance to make history.
4. Trump Endorsement Record
There will be plenty of finger-pointing this morning given that Republicans underperformed expectations in the House and the Senate depending on the forecast. If Trump’s endorsed candidates go on to lose and cause Republicans to stay in the Senate minority, his argument for a 2024 presidential run will become weaker while DeSantis’ argument will become stronger.
Look for some Republicans to further break with Trump as the party standard-bearer moving into the next cycle. If his preferred candidates coupled with the MAGA voting base can’t win statewide in these critical swing elections, then it will give some Republican voters second thoughts on giving him a repeat chance at the presidency next year.
Watching DeSantis deliver his victory speech around 9:15 pm Tuesday night was like watching an audition for the 2024 GOP primary. He was heavy on red meat but also brings a four-year winning record to back it up.
5. Inflation vs. Abortion
The abortion issue probably saved Democrats in several tight races and it appears that independents broke more evenly than some polls were predicting. In that scenario, President Biden will end up with a mixed judgment on his record and little reason to change course moving forward. Due to GOP expectations being built up so high, the White House will be claiming a victory this morning even if the Senate winds up in Republican hands by 1 or 2 seats.
Given the results in places like Florida, Georgia, Michigan, and New York, where each party’s base seemed to come out strongly and keep their party in power, there seemed to be highly motivated voters on both sides.
The playing field set up for 2024 is one where neither side has a visibly strong advantage but where Democrats will still be playing defense on Biden’s record.
