Republicans on course to retain Congress

Here’s how it played out.

Andrea Bozek, communications director for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said, “Democrats had a fatal and fundamental flaw in their plan to take control of the Senate: their efforts did not rely on having better candidates running better races than their opponents”.

Duckworth is a double-amputee Iraq war veteran. John E. Sununu. His election ends an era in which Democrats controlled the governor’s office for 18 of the past 20 years.

“It’s just our constitutional duty to keep the executive branch in check”, GOP Rep. Todd Young, the newly elected Republican senator in IN, told reporters in Indianapolis. Brad Schneider, D-Deerfield, took his old seat back after losing it in 2015. In the Senate, Democrats are expected to defend anywhere from 23 to 25 seats, while Republicans will likely have to defend just eight. Mark Kirk of-Illinois, lost to Democratic challenger Tammy Duckworth, the first Democratic pickup. The 2008 GOP presidential nominee was re-elected without much difficulty despite early predictions of a competitive race, and struck a reflective note ahead of the outcome. In the end, IN stays IN the Republican column.

Marco Rubio seemed to have a lead over Democratic Rep. Patrick Murphy, who was abandoned by his own party after Democratic bosses chose to pull ad money from expensive Florida and invest it in Missouri, North Carolina and in, instead. The race had narrowed in recent weeks, but stayed stayed within a margin of error. Pat McCrory in North Carolina. The closest race was in Montana where Gov. Steve Bullock fended off a stiff challenge from Republican software mogul Greg Gianforte, who sunk $5.1 million of his own money into late television buys.

Schumer is now the No. 3 Senate Democrat.

Toomey, the first-term Pennsylvania GOP incumbent who has refused to say whether he was voting for Trump, implored supporters in Harrisburg to keep up their enthusiasm. The GOP also gained at least two state Senate seats, with one race too close to call Wednesday morning. Kelly Ayotte and Democrat Maggie Hassan were neck-and-neck at votes were still being counted. Democrats were optimistic about picking up this seat. If the election results hold, Republicans will have the numerical majority when the Senate reconvenes in January. They had argued that Democratic control of the Senate and Assembly would make it easier to pass governmental ethics reforms, stricter campaign finance rules and other priorities the GOP-led Senate has blocked.

Although House Republicans passed bills in the past two years calling for tougher criminal penalties and changes to the state’s labor laws, the focus could shift under a Democratic-controlled House to jobs-related issues, possibly including a higher minimum wage.

Democrats had envisioned that voters’ repulsion by Trump comments about women and Hispanics could yield potentially big Election Day gains in suburban and ethnically diverse areas. The norms in the Senate tend more toward deliberation rather than the strong-arming used in the House.

Instead, Klein and his members have worked closely with Republicans in various power-sharing agreements as well as with Democratic Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo since 2012. They retook both chambers in the Nevada Legislature. Because of that power, majority status means somewhat less in the Senate than it does in the House.

The new Congress will not convene until Jan 3, but the “lame-duck” Congress will return next week and Republicans are set to begin the process of picking leaders for both chambers.

Malloy dismissed the idea the Democrats’ legislative losses were a rejection of his policies, even though he was personally mentioned in many state campaigns.