A blue wave, the color of the Democrats, swept Republicans out of control of the United States Congress this Tuesday and toppled conservative strongholds like Texas, in a harsh punishment for President Donald Trump, who will face the last two years of his term with an opposition capable of blocking his agenda.
Polls anticipated a clear Democratic victory in the House of Representatives and a tighter race in the Senate, but the setback for the White House and the Republican Party was greater than expected, and cleared up the main unknowns of election night earlier than anticipated.
Democrats regain the Lower House and extend their lead
The Democratic Party regained the House of Representatives with a majority that could reach 244 seats, well above the 218 needed to control the chamber. This new parliamentary arithmetic will allow the opposition to block Donald Trump's legislative agenda, open investigations, and initiate impeachment proceedings against the president or members of his cabinet, although an eventual removal would still require a two-thirds majority in the Senate.
Control of the Upper House will also give Democrats the ability to influence foreign policy decisions and block the confirmation of candidates to the Supreme Court, in a Congress that is expected to be hostile to the president and his administration during the final stretch of the legislature.
Texas, Kansas, and other Republican strongholds fall to Democrats
The opposition also achieved its most difficult goal, overturning the Senate, with victories of strong symbolic significance in Texas, Kansas, North Carolina, South Carolina, Iowa, and Ohio. In the Texan case, Presbyterian pastor and educator James Talarico became the first Democrat elected to the federal Senate for that state in 38 years, after defeating Ken Paxton, the state's attorney general and a personal bet of Donald Trump.
The blow did not end there. Republican Governor Greg Abbott, who was seeking a fourth consecutive term, fell to Democrat Gina Hinojosa, who will become the first Latina to hold that office and will end more than three decades of conservative dominance. The results in Texas also point to a possible shift in the Latino vote, which in 2024 contributed to Donald Trump's victory with historic support and has now turned its back on him.
In Kansas, another Republican stronghold, Adam Hamilton broke a streak of almost a century without a Democrat being elected to the federal Senate for that state.
Trump tries to distance himself from the electoral setback
In the middle of election night, Donald Trump tried to downplay the punishment suffered by Republicans with a message on his Truth Social platform, in which he attributed the setback to his name not being on the ballot and even reproached Greg Abbott, one of his main allies, for having distanced himself from him.
"I didn't run in the election, and if I had, we would have won by a landslide! Thank you for your attention to this matter," the president wrote.
Despite this attempt at distancing, Donald Trump personally threw himself into the entire campaign, with almost daily rallies and a message that turned the elections into a referendum on his figure, asking his base to go to the polls thinking of him.
His unpopularity ended up weighing on Republicans, hit by discontent over inflation, the rising cost of gasoline derived from the Iran war, the impact of tariffs, and his questioned immigration policy.
A more conciliatory turn after recognizing the extent of the Democratic victory
Later, in statements to The New York Times, the president adopted a more conciliatory tone, acknowledged that the results pointed to a Democratic victory, and expressed willingness to "work" with the new congressional majority.
This is an unusual gesture for a president who never accepted his defeat against Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential elections and who, before these elections, had warned that he would only accept the results if the elections were "clean."
With this result, Donald Trump will face the last two years of his term without the possibility of running for a third term in the 2028 elections, and with a strengthened opposition in both chambers of Congress.