WASHINGTON — Republicans appeared on the cusp of losing control of the US House of Representatives hours after polls closed on Election Day, with Democrats having flipped several seats and kept their opponents’ gerrymandered advantages at bay in the midterm elections.
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The GOP held just 62 seats, while Democrats had taken more than 100 that had been called by the Associated Press by 10 p.m. in the 293 races on the line Tuesday night. NBC News and CNN were both projecting a Democratic takeover of the House.
If the projections hold, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and his party could secure their largest majority in more than a decade. Public polling suggests that voter anger over the economy, along with rising food and fuel prices, is driving the shift.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), watching the returns from his hometown of Shreveport, urged Republicans to “defy history and the polls, stand for common sense, and save America.”
Yet as polls closed across the East Coast, Democrats were already collecting early wins — including in Florida, where a Republican-backed redistricting plan failed to deliver the party nearly half a dozen additional House seats.
In the Sunshine State, Democratic candidates held off Republican challengers in at least four of the five districts that had been expected to give the GOP more room to maneuver in the House.
Democrats also scored a decisive victory in North Carolina. Jamie Ager, a farmer, defeated Republican Jennifer Capps Balkcom, a state House representative, in the 11th District by a margin of 60.1% to 38.5%, according to the Associated Press call at 8:53 p.m.
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The district had been represented by former Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-N.C.), who ended his re-election bid after a House ethics report found that he had engaged in “inappropriate conduct” with female staff members.
Rep. Richard Hudson, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, also appeared vulnerable in North Carolina. Richard Ojeda, a former West Virginia state lawmaker, was on track to defeat the Republican incumbent in the Tar Heel State.
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Republicans lost additional House seats in New Jersey, where Rep. Tom Kean Jr. had been serving his second term while spending an extended period away from Congress because of depression.
Democrat Rebecca Bennett defeated Kean (R-N.J.) by more than 20 percentage points in a race called shortly before 10 p.m.
In Kentucky’s 6th District, Democrat Zach Dembo also prevailed over Ralph Alvarado, most recently Tennessee’s commissioner of public health.
The Bluegrass State seat became open after Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.) won the race to replace retiring Sen. Mitch McConnell and easily defeated his Democratic challenger.
President Trump, meanwhile, appeared to be preparing for two years of congressional gridlock. In a phone interview with CBS News before the polls closed, he said he would become “Mr. Veto.”
“Historically, you veto for a couple of months and then they come and say, ‘We’ve got to make a deal,’” the president said.
Trump’s allies have already begun preparing for potentially multimillion-dollar legal costs if House Democrats pursue investigations into the first family’s business dealings and other alleged corruption involving individuals connected to the president.
