US Midterm Elections 2026 Live Updates: Republican blame game continues amid counting in Mississippi and Alaska

Kerala-born Nithya Raman has won the Los Angeles mayoral race, defeating incumbent Karen Bass and becoming the city’s first Asian-American mayor.

Democrats have taken control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate, handing President Donald Trump a heavy midterm-election defeat, US networks have projected. The party won the House first, then flipped Senate seats in at least four states, including Republican strongholds Texas, Kansas and South Carolina.  Most results have been called, but counting continues in a few seats. The outcome sets up a tense final two years of Trump’s time in the White House, with Democrats now able to block or challenge his plans in both chambers. Trump has said he accepts the result.

Trump says the Iran war played a part in the loss:  As more House races went to Democrats, Trump said it was “largely true” that the war in Iran added to his party’s heavy loss. Vice President JD Vance made similar remarks. Voters have shown unhappiness with the war, but Trump told reporters he isn’t considering replacing Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth.

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Republicans split on why they lost:  Senior Republicans gave their own reasons. Senator Thom Tillis, who is retiring, pointed to policies that were meant well but badly carried out over the past 18 months. Outgoing Senator John Cornyn said his party had forgotten the basic rules of building a winning coalition, according to the same report.

Key updates

• Democrats have won majorities in both the House and the Senate.
• CNN projects Democrats will take at least 240 House seats.
• The party has flipped seven Senate races, including Texas, Kansas and South Carolina.
• Trump says it is largely true the Iran war hurt Republicans, and Vance agrees.
• Trump says he accepts the result and is not planning to replace Hegseth.

Follow the latest updates on the 2026 US Midterm Elections Results here. This live blog tracks the key developments as the final days of campaigning and voting day unfold. The headline, introduction, and Top Developments section will be refreshed throughout the day to reflect the most important news from the vote.

Live Updates
Nov 5, 2026 11:56 AM IST
5 reasons why Republicans lost so badly

The Democrats have won control of Congress in the midterm elections, the BBC reports. The party in the White House usually does badly in these votes, but the size of the Republican defeat is seen as a rejection of Donald Trump’s first two years back in office.

Rising cost of living. Prices rose 3.7% in the year to September, pushed up by fuel and energy costs. A North Carolina voter who switched from Republican to Democrat told the BBC, “Gas prices, grocery prices, everything’s going up.” In voter polls, 79% said inflation had caused their family hardship, and more than six in 10 blamed Trump’s policies.
The Iran war. The US and Israel launched the war in February, and fuel prices rose after Iran effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz. In voter polls, 63% said the US was wrong to take military action, and 74% said the war was a major factor in their vote. Trump said the day after the vote that the war played a role, but told Fox News he had no choice because he had to stop Iran getting a nuclear weapon.
A clear Democratic message. Democratic candidates kept to the cost of living and access to healthcare, and many came across as genuine, including in Republican areas. Annie Andrews won an upset in South Carolina, Abdul El-Sayed held Michigan for the party, and Jon Ossoff won re-election in Georgia. Some Republican candidates, such as Ken Paxton in Texas, were criticised for campaigns that did not focus on voters’ concerns.
Trump’s low ratings. Prices and the Iran war were both tied to the president, and his approval had fallen even among Republican voters. He asked voters to imagine he was on the ballot, a move the BBC says appears to have backfired. In his final speech on Monday, he spoke at length about the Reflecting Pool renovation.
Hispanic and black voters moved back to Democrats. Democrats won all three House seats in the mostly Hispanic districts along the Texas-Mexico border. A New York Times analysis found majority-Hispanic counties moved more than 22 percentage points against Republican Senate candidates compared with 2024. Pew Research found 56% of Americans view ICE unfavourably. Counties with a black majority also moved towards Democrats, and the Senate race in Mississippi, where about 37% of voters are black, is too close to call.
Nov 5, 2026 11:44 AM IST
Who is the Democrats' Mississippi hopeful Scott Colom?

Just over 1,100 votes separate Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith and her Democratic challenger Scott Colom in Mississippi’s Senate race. Counting is not finished and could take some time. Colom is a district attorney who has also worked as a prosecutor and a judge.

Blocked judge pick: President Joe Biden nominated Colom to be a federal judge in the Northern District of Mississippi, but Hyde-Smith blocked the nomination in the US Senate.
Beef price advert: After Hyde-Smith told people unhappy about high beef prices to “pick another protein”, Colom turned the remark into a TV advert telling voters to “pick another Senator”. It drew national attention.
Possible first: If Colom wins, he will be the first Democrat elected to the US Senate from Mississippi in almost 40 years, and the state’s first Black senator since Reconstruction.

Nov 5, 2026 11:06 AM IST
Indian-American candidates in US midterms 2026: Who won and who lost

Indian-American candidates ran in races across the US midterm elections on Tuesday, from the House of Representatives and governor’s contests to state offices and city mayoral races. Democrats Suhas Subramanyam, Aruna Miller, Ro Khanna, Pramila Jayapal and Pia Dandiya have won, according to NBC News projections. Republican Vivek Ramaswamy lost the Ohio governor’s race to Democrat Amy Acton, AP and NBC News projected. Several other Indian-American candidates, including Nithya Raman in the Los Angeles mayoral race, were still waiting on results. read more

Nov 5, 2026 10:57 AM IST
US midterms: Trump loses Congress. What changes for India and the world?

US Midterm Elections Results 2026: Two years into his second term, US President Donald Trump has suffered a major political setback, with Democrats regaining control of both the Senate and the House of Representatives.

The results could have consequences well beyond Washington, particularly for India, which faces uncertainty over US tariffs, trade negotiations, immigration restrictions and the war in West Asia. They also raise questions about how Trump will pursue his foreign policy agenda with an opposition-controlled Congress. Read more

Nov 5, 2026 10:27 AM IST
How Jeffries and Schumer are teaming up to take on Trump

House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer are planning an aggressive legislative and investigative agenda to take on President Donald Trump’s policies.

Nov 5, 2026 10:26 AM IST
Indian-American candidates: Who won and who lost?

Won

Suhas Subramanyam (D): Virginia’s 10th district
Pia Dandiya (D): Florida’s 22nd district
Ro Khanna (D): California’s 17th district
Pramila Jayapal (D): Washington’s 7th district
Aruna Miller (D): Maryland lieutenant governor
Josh Kaul (D): Wisconsin attorney general
Aparna Raj (D): Washington, DC Council, Ward 1
Jyot Singh (D): Georgia House, District 97
Nithya Raman: Wins Los Angeles Mayor race

Lost

Vivek Ramaswamy (R): Ohio governor
Saritha Komatireddy (R): New York attorney general
Ritesh Tandon (R): California’s 17th district
Nirav Sheth (R): Washington’s 7th district
Mahesh Ganorkar (R): North Carolina’s 4th district
Anil Kumar (I): Michigan’s 11th district

Still to be called: Ami Bera, Amish Shah, Lisa Kaul, Priya Sundareshan, Ranjeev Puri, Sandeep Srivastava, Pooja Sethi and Shuchita Patel.

Nov 5, 2026 10:01 AM IST
First female Speaker Pelosi celebrates womens’ midterm wins

Nancy Pelosi, who served as the first female Speaker of the US House, is celebrating the more than 100 Democratic women elected to the House last night.

“When I came to Congress in 1987, there were only twelve Democratic women,” Pelosi wrote on X. “We made it our mission to change that.”

Nov 5, 2026 09:57 AM IST
Trump says he is ‘identical on trade’ with Bernie Sanders

President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida is scheduled to host former Brazilian presidential candidate Flavio Bolsonaro and Milorad Dodik, a Bosnian Serb leader from Bosnia and Herzegovina’s predominantly Serb entity, Republika Srpska.

The Conservative Political Action Conference has said that Bolsonaro and his brother Eduardo Bolsonaro, will be part of its annual gala on Thursday at Mar-a-Lago.

Nov 5, 2026 09:37 AM IST
Republican midterm loss result of a presidency ‘marked by war’

Domestic concerns exacerbated by Trump’s foreign policy missteps led to the Democratic landslide in Tuesday’s midterms, says Leslie Vinjamuri, the CEO of Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

In a post on X, Vinjamuri said that at the beginning of his second term, Trump promised “he would be the president to end wars and not to take America into new wars”.

“And we’ve actually seen the reverse” of that, she said, adding that Trump’s presidency has been “marked by war, and I think Americans haven’t liked that”.

Nov 5, 2026 09:32 AM IST
Nithya Raman wins Los Angeles Mayor race

Nithya Raman is projected to win the election for mayor of Los Angeles, California.

Nov 5, 2026 09:07 AM IST
Ted Cruz says ‘communists’ and ‘Islamists’ have taken over Democratic Party

Texas Republican US Senator Ted Cruz says history made in “the most consequential midterm election of our lifetimes” needs to be “mourned”.

In a lengthy post on X, Cruz says: “The communists and the Islamists who have taken over the Democrat Party have now taken over the United States Congress. They will be unleashed.”

He says the Democratic majority “will attack Trump every single day, constantly”.

“Impeachment hearings, subpoenas, his family, cabinet members, business leaders, open persecution, and nonstop retaliation,” he said.

Nov 5, 2026 08:53 AM IST
Ro Khanna proposes ending Iran war, cutting Israel aid, releasing Epstein files

Democratic US Congressman Ro Khanna says he agrees with Vice President JD Vance that the reason Republicans lost in the midterms “is the Iran” war as well as “the corruption epitomised by the Epstein cover up”.

Responding to JD Vance’s post on X, Khanna proposed the Trump administration “support a continuing resolution prohibiting the financing of any combat activities of the US military in Iran” and end the war on Iran “like we did for Vietnam”.

Nov 5, 2026 08:34 AM IST
Democrats turn screws on Trump’s DHS day after midterm landslide

Democratic US Congressman Bennie Thompson, a ranking member of the US House Committee on Homeland Security, has demanded Trump’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to “preserve every record, email, and contract” in a letter published by House Democrats, a day after Tuesday’s landslide victory.

“Any agency employee who ‘willfully and unlawfully’ conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, destroys or attempts any such action against a Federal record, is subject to fine/and or imprisonment for up to three years,” the letter states.

Critics have accused DHS of covering up allegations of excessive force or impropriety during ICE raids.

Nov 5, 2026 08:15 AM IST
Oil falls for a fourth day on expectations for lower risk of Iran war escalation

Oil prices fell for a fourth day on Thursday on expectations the losses US President Donald Trump's Republican Party suffered in Congressional elections this week may reduce the risk of further escalation of the US-Israeli war on Iran.

Brent futures fell 97 cents, or 1.03% at $93.65 a barrel as of 0211 GMT, while US West Texas Intermediate crude futures were down $1.14, or 1.29%, to $86.98.

Both benchmarks tumbled by more than 8% in the previous session to settle at their lowest since ⁠August 31.

A ​weakened Trump, facing a Democratic Congress able to constrain his military options, has greater incentive to seek a deal, two sources close to Gulf government circles said on Wednesday. A full-scale assault on Iran now looks less likely, they said.

Nov 5, 2026 07:53 AM IST
Voters wanted to get back to the core values of the country's foundation, documentarian says

Documentarian Ken Burns has said the Democratic wave in the midterm elections shows that voters want to return to the values on which the country was founded, CNN reports. Speaking to Anderson Cooper, Burns said corruption, high prices, the costly war, tariffs and a broken political process were symptoms, but that the real disease was rising authoritarianism, which the founders tried to guard against. He said voters across party lines chose “restoration” over “retribution”, humility over hubris and service over self-dealing.

Nov 5, 2026 07:26 AM IST
Gay, Black, Muslim: 3 historic firsts in US midterm elections

The Democrats handed Donald Trump quite the rude shock Wednesday in the US midterm elections, snatching control of the Senate and House of Representatives to set up a blockbuster finish to the final two years of the President’s second term.

What does that mean… ‘a blockbuster finish’?

Well, it means the Democrats can delay or even block Trump’s agenda.

Now, a Democrat-controlled Congress can halt legislation and reject the President’s judicial appointments. It can force concessions on high-profile issues like immigration, and lean on Trump to potentially alter foreign policy, particularly over the wars in Ukraine and Iran. Read more

Nov 5, 2026 07:19 AM IST
Trump says Hegseth doing 'a very good job' as questions swirl about his future

US President Donald Trump backed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Wednesday, a day after Democrats won control of both chambers of Congress in midterm elections that reflected voter anger over the Iran war.

Asked whether he was considering replacing Hegseth, whom he has described as a champion of the war, Trump told reporters: "No, I think he's doing a very good job."

The response contrasted with then-President George Bush, who fired Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld the morning after the 2006 midterm elections, when voter discontent over the Iraq war helped Democrats win control of Congress.

But sources said Trump could still replace Hegseth as Republicans assess their losses.

One Trump adviser said Hegseth "could be on the chopping block" because of the war. "Someone is ⁠going to ​get blamed for this and you know it's not going to be him (Trump)," the adviser said.

Nov 5, 2026 06:54 AM IST
‘Cautiously optimistic’: Delhi tracks shift in US after 18 months of rocky ties

For Delhi, the unpredictability of Donald Trump became more pronounced ever since he claimed to have brokered a ceasefire between India and Pakistan following hostilities in May 2025, his whims and diktats sending bilateral relations on a roller coaster.

On Wednesday, there was a collective sigh of relief in Delhi as Democrats seized control of both the Senate and House of Representatives, placing guardrails on the President’s unchecked powers so far in the two years of his Presidency.

South Block officials, who had been tracking the elections through the night Tuesday, told The Indian Express that they were “cautiously optimistic” about the results after a year-and-half of turbulence in bilateral ties. read more

Nov 5, 2026 06:30 AM IST
Senator Chris Van Hollen demands funding cut for US war in Iran

Democratic US Senator Chris Van Hollen has called for an immediate end to the war in Iran after his party’s landslide victory in both houses of the US Congress in Tuesday’s midterms.

Van Hollen told The Lever podcast, “Democrats should not advance spending to continue to fund this war” beyond the December 11 funding cut-off approved by Congress in September.

“This is an illegal war, and we need to make sure taxpayer monies are not used to continue an illegal war,” he said.

Van Hollen has publicly withheld immediate support for Senator Chuck Schumer to reclaim his position as Senate Democratic leader after Tuesday’s midterm landslide, arguing the party needs commitments to ensure their “bold agenda” before giving Schumer the role.

Nov 5, 2026 06:23 AM IST
Abdul El-Sayed says he will focus on these 4 things when he gets to the Senate

Michigan Democrat Abdul El-Sayed has set out his four main aims ahead of taking his Senate seat in January, CNN reports. He said he did not expect the race to “get so big” when he entered it, and he told CNN what he wants to do first.

Stop the Medicaid cuts. He wants to block the Medicaid cuts in President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” from taking effect. He expects some Republicans, especially from rural areas, to back him.
Take on big companies. He wants to deal with the power of oligopolies and monopolies. He said breaking up large corporations is one way to cut high costs and answer voters’ worries about affordability.
Strengthen unions. He plans to push for the Protecting the Right to Organise Act.
Cut outside spending in politics. After a race that saw hundreds of millions of dollars spent, he wants to limit spending by outside groups. “I ran on money out of politics,” he said.
Nov 5, 2026 06:00 AM IST
Former White House press secretary slams US war on Iran, disputes Vance statements

Ari Fleischer, who was press secretary to former US President George W Bush, has rejected Vice President JD Vance’s suggestion that the war on Iran caused the Republican Party’s midterm defeat. In a statement on X, Fleischer wrote: “The problem was not the Iran War. It was the cease-fire.” He argued that a country that starts a war must finish and win it, and he criticised the administration’s approach, saying the US was close to a more peaceful Middle East before it backed away.

Nov 5, 2026 05:29 AM IST
Oil futures plummet after Vance blames historic midterm loss on Iran war

Oil futures fell sharply on Wednesday as traders bet that the Republican Party's heavy losses in the midterm elections make a quick return to escalation in the Iran war less likely. Brent crude dropped nearly 8% to $95.70 a barrel in recent trading, while US benchmark WTI fell by a similar amount to below $90.
Traders bet on lower risk of escalation
Investors read the election result as a sign that the chance of fresh escalation in the Iran war has gone down, at least in the short term. That view drove the selloff in oil on Wednesday.
Vance blames the war for the result
The fall in prices gathered pace after Vice President JD Vance posted a long statement on X. In it, he blamed the military conflict for the election outcome.

Nov 5, 2026 05:22 AM IST
Midterm results ‘a clear message’ on Iran war, Blinken says

ormer US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said Tuesday’s midterm results “send a clear message” for a “diplomatic resolution to President Trump’s war of choice with Iran”.

“Americans understand that. When we alienate allies, appease autocrats, impose arbitrary tariffs, and drive needless conflict, American families pay the price,” Blinken said in a post on X.

He said US actions over the last two years have had “real consequences for our security, our economy, and our everyday lives”.

Nov 5, 2026 05:15 AM IST

Welcome to our live blog. We will bring you the latest updates on the US midterm election results throughout the day.

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