Following the 2026 midterm elections, the Democratic House majority surpassed 250 seats on Thursday, securing the party’s largest majority in the chamber in nearly two decades. Driven by voter dissatisfaction with President Trump’s policies—including tariffs and military actions that have raised the costs of everyday essentials—Democrats flipped numerous seats across the country, reaching a threshold not seen since Barack Obama swept into the White House in 2008.
While the House majority is solidified with more than 20 races still uncalled, attention has shifted to unresolved Senate contests in Alaska and Mississippi, where Democratic nominees held narrow leads over Republican incumbents.
In Mississippi, Democratic prosecutor Scott Colom gradually increased his lead over Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith to just over 1,800 votes as uncounted provisional and mail-in ballots continued to be processed. Lawyers for Senator Hyde-Smith have requested the preservation of all affidavit ballots, indicating potential legal challenges ahead.
In Alaska, former Representative Mary Peltola led Republican Senator Dan S. Sullivan by a few hundred votes. Because neither candidate reached the 50 percent threshold, the race heads toward a ranked-choice tabulation scheduled for November 18, pending the state's 15-day grace period for receiving absentee ballots. President Trump recently took to social media to call for votes cast for a second candidate named Dan Sullivan on the ballot to be transferred to the incumbent Republican, though a New York Times analysis suggests Ms. Peltola remains well-positioned to win the seat.
Elsewhere across the map, Democrats captured additional seats in states such as Montana, Arizona, Virginia, and Colorado, while Republicans managed to flip a seat in Tennessee. In local executive races, democratic socialist Nithya Raman defeated incumbent Mayor Karen Bass to become the next mayor of Los Angeles.
