Democrats get early taste of a big blue tsunami with two key midterm wins

Democrats are projected to flip a Senate seat in North Carolina and secure another in Georgia while picking up significant victories in tight House and state-level races in Republican-dominated states, an early glimpse of an expected Democratic sweep in midterm elections this year.

Georgia’s Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff is projected to win re-election, securing a seat that Republicans were hoping to flip to preserve their slim majority in the upper chamber of Congress.

And in North Carolina, former governor Roy Cooper is projected to triumph over Donald Trump’s ally Michael Whatley, former chair of the Republican National Committee. The GOP had largely abandoned the state in recent weeks — retiring Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican, has emerged as an outspoken critic of the president — but Cooper will likely be the first Democrat to win a Senate seat in the state since 2008.

Democrats had anticipated a challenging path to winning control of the Senate — the party needed to win at least two states that Trump won by double digits — but early victories on election night and tides turning in critical state-level races elsewhere suggest the road may be less murky.

After following Trump’s command to redraw congressional districts to give the GOP a legally dubious competitive boost in midterms this year, Republicans could end up losing in newly drawn districts they were expecting to win.

Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz is projected to win reelection after running in a Florida district that Republicans redrew to favor his Republican opponents. Trump carried Florida’s redrawn 25th district by nine percentage points in 2024.

In another welcoming sign for Democrats, the party has flipped enough seats in Florida’s state House to break a Republican supermajority.

Over the last several years, Florida Republicans have narrowly held two-thirds of both the Florida state Senate and House, giving them significant power to support Governor Ron DeSantis’s agenda while passing procedural rules without any Democratic input.

“Florida Democrats just delivered a decisive victory and smashed the Republican supermajority in the House. Florida Republicans have abused their power for years to push an unpopular and dangerous agenda, including attacking voting rights and rigging their congressional maps,” Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee President Heather Williams said in a statement on Tuesday night.

“Now that we have broken the supermajority in the House, Democrats are better positioned to fight back against rampant extremism and protect against attacks on our democracy,” she said.

Democrats are now looking to Texas and South Carolina — states that have not sent a Democrat to the Senate in decades.

This is a developing story