2026 Election by the Numbers 

A drubbing. A landslide. A pasting. A rout. A spanking. A thrashing. A thumping. A tsunami. Whatever metaphor you prefer, Election Day delivered a historic victory for Democrats and an epic defeat for Republicans. With Democrats taking control of both the House and Senate, the political dynamics have been reset. Democrats will be looking to press their newfound advantage; Republicans will be looking to recover and rebuild. Both parties will have to confront internal divisions that they papered over during the campaign. They will be doing it under the shadow of the 2028 presidential campaign.  

Election Day generated many interesting numbers. But two merit particular attention. First, come January 3, 2027, President Donald Trump will face a bicameral Democratic majority for the first time as president. Democrats flipped control of the House in 2018, but Republicans held the Senate for the entirety of his first term. Trump started his second term in office with Republicans controlling both the House and Senate. The question all of Washington is now asking is whether he will respond to his new political reality by accommodating the Democratic Congress or confronting it. His history of doubling down rather than backing down when challenged, along with his decision to make administration hardliner Stephen Miller the new White House chief of staff, suggests that the latter outcome is more likely. If so, the next two years will be tumultuous. 

The second number to flag at the start is that the 2026 midterms mark the twelfth time in the past fourteen national elections (2000-2026) that control of the House, the Senate, and/or the White House changed. In the prior twenty national elections (1960-1998), control changed just seven times and only three times because control of the House or Senate changed. The inability of either party to establish a lasting dominance over the past quarter century either reflects how evenly split the country is or the inability of either party to address voters’ concerns. Or, perhaps, both. Of course, Democrats and Republicans both hope that the 2028 election will mark the thirteenth time in sixteen tries that control of the House, the Senate, and/or the White House changes. 

Now on to the rest of the numbers. 

A Historic House Rout 

As things stand today, Democrats have won 254 seats in the House and the Republicans 165, with 16 races to be decided. NBC News projects that when all the votes are counted, Democrats will hold 259 seats and the Republicans 176. If that is the final number, Democrats will have picked up 44 seats and would enjoy their biggest House margin since the 1990 midterms gave them 267 House seats. Whatever the final count, Democrats will fall well short of the 290 seats needed to have a veto-proof majority. If House Republicans stick together, they will be able to sustain a presidential veto. 

How high the Democrats’ victory (or Republican’s loss) ranks on the list of midterm routs depends on your preferred standard. If it is the number of seats gained, it is small beer compared to the 1894 midterms. The Democrats lost an astounding 127 House seats in that election. The Democrats’ victory last week also pales in comparison to the sixty-three seats they lost in the 2010 midterms.  

Of course, comparisons across election years are complicated by the fact that in some years congressional districts are more gerrymandered than in others. On that score, Republicans thought that they had given themselves a leg up in the 2026 midterms with an unusual round of mid-decade redistricting that in theory tilted fifteen seats their way. California responded with mid-decade redistricting of its own that tilted five congressional seats to the Democrats, and a ruling by Utah’s Supreme Court enabled Democrats to add another seat that leaned their way. But the mid-decade hijinks backfired on Republicans. While Democrats picked up all six of the seats that leaned in their direction, Republicans have thus far won only two of the fifteen seats they thought they had turned red, with one seat yet to be called (though the Democratic candidate is leading) and the other seat headed to a December run-off. The Republican gerrymander turned into a dummymander.  

If the standard for ranking midterm routs is percentage-point difference in the respective shares of the national popular vote won by the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, then the Democrats’ estimated 13-point victory is the second largest of every midterm election since 1942, training only the 1974 Watergate midterm. This year’s win topped the 1958 midterms, which saw Democrats outpoll Republicans by 11.9 points, and the 1982 midterms, which saw Democrats win by 11.8 points. As for that historic Republican pickup of 63 seats in 2010? The Republicans outpolled Democrats by just 6.6 points. 

The Democrats’ victory in the House did not come about because they outspent Republicans. The money advantage tilted in the opposite direction, with Republicans outspending Democrats by a considerable margin. This was not a victory that was bought.  

An Impressive Senate Victory 

As of today, Democrats have won 54 Senate seats, and the Republicans have won 44. Two seats—Alaska and Mississippi—have yet to be called, but the Democrats look poised to win both. If so, that means that Democrats will have netted nine seats in the 2026 midterms. Even so, Democrats will be short of the sixty seats they need to have a filibuster-proof majority. That’s means that if Senate Republicans hang together, they will be able to block legislation they oppose or force Democrats to make concessions as a price for moving forward with bills. 

How does the Democrats 2026 victory compare with past Senate midterm elections? Very well. It is tied for third for the biggest net seat gain for any midterm election since 1942. It is surpassed only by the thirteen seats that Democrats gained in 1958 and the twelve seats that Republicans netted in 1946. 

But not all Senate midterm elections are created equal. With only one-third of Senate seats up for grabs in any national election, the degree of difficulty in gaining seats varies election to election. Some years produce maps that favor one political party; other years produce maps that both parties think gives them a shot at coming out on top. 

By that criterion, 2026 began as a year that Democrats dreaded. The Senate map was so favorable to Republicans that in January Republicans were speculating that they might pick up seats. True, the Republicans had to defend twenty-two of the thirty-five seats up for grabs. However, twenty-one of those Republican seats were in states in which Trump won the popular vote in 2024; twenty of them were in states that Trump won by ten percentage points or more. Conversely, Democrats had to defend Senate seats in two states that Trump won in 2024—Georgia and Michigan—and in two states that Trump lost by less than five percentage points—Minnesota and New Hampshire.  

The magnitude of the Democrats’ Senate victory can be seen in where they won and the margins they won by. A Democrat had last won in Kansas ninety-four years ago before Adam Hamilton won by five points. A Democrat had last won in Texas in 1988 until James Talarico won by twelve points. A Democrat had last won in South Carolina in 1998 until Annie Andrews won by four points. Democrats had last won in Iowa and North Carolina in 2008 until Josh Turek and Roy Cooper won by four and nineteen points respectively. Alaska and Mississippi, the two states where the Democratic candidate leads but the race has not been called, last elected a Democrat in 2008 and 1982 respectively. Trump won all these states in 2024, with a margin of victory ranging from three points in North Carolina to twenty-three points in Mississippi.  

With the defeat of five-term incumbent Susan Collins of Maine by six percentage point, New England’s congressional delegation will have no Republican members. That has never happened before. In most of the 172 years since the Republican Party was founded, Republicans dominated the New England congressional delegation.  

A Different Congress 

The Congress that takes the oath of office on January 3, 2027, will look very different than the one that was sworn in on January 3, 2025. The House will have at least 118 new lawmakers and the Senate at least eighteen. Those numbers could go as high as 131 in the House—one race pits two incumbents against each because of mid-decade redistricting—and twenty in the Senate depending on how the uncalled races turn out. So roughly a quarter of the House and a fifth of the Senate will be new faces. 

At least 159 women will serve in the next Congress, seven more than in the current Congress and a record for any Congress. While women will hold 30 percent of congressional seats come next January, the gender trendlines are going in different directions in the House and Senate. 

At least 136 women will serve in the next House of Representatives. That is up nine from the number of women elected to the House in 2024, which set the previous record. Women in the House are overwhelmingly Democrats. The majority party will count at least 116 women in their caucus, up from ninety-five today. In comparison, Republicans will count at least nineteen women among their ranks. (Those numbers do not total 136 because two of the uncalled races feature two women candidates, meaning that a woman is guaranteed to win the seat. In the case of California’s seventh congressional district, both women candidates are Democrats. So Democrats are assured of having the seat.) 

The number of women serving in the Senate will drop from twenty-seven today to between twenty-three and twenty-five. The exact number depends up on the outcomes of the races in Alaska, where challenger Mary Peltola currently leads, and Mississippi, where incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith currently trails. As of today, the split is sixteen Democratic women senators and seven Republican women senators. 

The new Senate will be younger than the one it succeeds. The average age of the new senators is fifty-five, or fifty-four if Scott Colom wins Mississippi and Mary Peltola wins Alaska. That will bring the average age of the U.S. Senate down to at least 62.8 years. The oldest senator, Republican Charles Grassley of Iowa, will be ninety-three, and the youngest Senator, Democrat Jon Ossoff of Georgia, will be thirty-seven.  

The 2026 midterm generated a range of historic firsts. Here are a few:   

If Scott Colom holds onto his narrow lead in Mississippi, he will be the state’s first Black senator since Reconstruction in 1875. If Democrats pick Hakeem Jeffries to lead them in the House, as they are expected to do, he will become the first Black speaker of the House.  

Near-Record Voter Turnout  

The Democratic victory was not a quirk generated by an uninterested electorate. To the contrary, 2026 saw near-record turnout. At least 123.5 million people voted. That equates to 49.1 percent of the voting-eligible population. That is the second highest voter turnout in any midterm election since 1914, eclipsed only by the 50 percent turnout in the 2018 midterms. The highest relative turnout was in Maine (65.7 percent) and lowest was in West Virginia (33.3 percent). 

As interesting as how many Americans voted is how the vote broke down across demographic groups. These numbers rely heavily on exit polls so they are never exact and can vary depending on the source. The early data suggest that when the votes for all House races are examined collectively, Democrats won every major demographic group except for white non-college educated voters. The shift among many demographic groups from 2024 to 2026 was dramatic. Those aged 18 to 29 swung 32 points to the Democrats compared to 2024. Whereas Trump won the support of 56 percent of young male voters in 2024, 59 percent of them voted for a House Democratic candidate in 2026. Support for House Democrats rose by 21 points among Asian and Latino voters, by 17 points among white voters, by 24 points among suburban voters and 16 points among rural voters, and by 20 points among independent voters. 

Another Polling Miss, But Different 

Pollsters have been on the defensive ever since Trump came on the political scene. Public opinion polls have regularly underestimated support for Republicans over the past several election cycles. That problem was particularly acute in the past three presidential election years, but it has also popped up during midterm elections. Pollsters have responded by trying a range of tweaks to locate so-called shy Trump voters and to minimize oversampling of Democratic-leaning voters. 

Now the shoe is on the other foot. Polls collectively underestimated support for Democratic congressional candidates by a larger margin than they underestimated support for Trump in 2016 or 2024. One popular aggregator of poll results had Democrats with a lead of 9 points over Republicans going into Election Day. As noted above, Democrats ended up with a 13-point victory. Back to the drawing board. 

Last But Not Least—The States 

Most national coverage of the midterms focuses on what happens with congressional races. I am guilty of that same bias. But midterm elections are also about what happens in state elections. And in 2026, Democrats did as well in state races as they did in federal ones. Democrats flipped governorships in Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, Ohio, and Texas and held onto governorships in Maine, Michigan, and Wisconsin. The Democratic candidates lead in the Alaska and Kansas races, though these elections have yet to be called. When 2027 starts, Democrats will control at least twenty-eight governorships and perhaps as many as thirty, marking the first time in sixteen years that a majority of the country’s governors will be Democrats.  

Democrats gained control of both legislative chambers in Arizona, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin, and they picked up one chamber each in Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Texas. As a result, come January, the Democrats will control twenty-three state legislatures, the Republicans will control twenty-two, and two states (North Carolina and Texas) will have split control. Democrats gained control of both legislative chambers in New Hampshire in Wisconsin, and they picked up one chamber each in Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Texas. Once new terms begin, Democrats will control the governorships in states totaling roughly three-quarters of the country’s population. 

State races also produced some significant results: 

One consequence of the Democrats’ success on the state level is that the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact may soon go into effect. The agreement is a pledge that states will award their Electoral College votes to whichever candidates wins the national popular vote, regardless of which candidate wins in their state. The compact is an effort to prevent someone who lost the popular vote from winning the Electoral College and the presidency. It only becomes effective, however, when the signatory states collectively represent least 270 electoral votes, the minimum number needed to win the Electoral College. Eighteen states plus the District of Columbia have signed up so far. They constitute 222 electoral votes. With Democrats now controlling the governor’s office and both chambers in five more states—Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin—the possibility exists that states representing sixty-one more Electoral College votes could join the compact, bringing the number to 283 and thereby putting it into effect. 

Even if those five states join the compact, that likely will not settle the matter. Legal challenges are likely,  based on the idea that the compact can go into effect only after Congress blesses the idea. 

Oscar Berry and Jack Patton assisted in the preparation of this article.