Democrats vow to rein in Donald Trump as he shows off White House ballroom

Subscribed with another email? Trump’s policies, particularly the U.S.-Iran war’s ‌role in pushing the cost of living higher, helped Democrats take the Senate, where they flipped seats in deeply Republican states for ​a majority of at least 54-44. Trump, a Republican who also held the White House from 2017 to 2021, has had to contend with Democrats controlling both chambers of Congress. In Texas, the biggest Republican-led state before Tuesday (November 3, 2026), Democrats ended a decades-long losing streak in seismic fashion, winning their first Senate seat there since ‌1988 and ousting three-term Governor Greg Abbott. Kansas elected its first Democratic senator since the Great Depression nearly a century ago, and in South Carolina, a ​state that Trump carried by nearly 18 points in 2024, Democrats turned aside his hand-picked Senate candidate. Extremely close Senate races in Alaska and Mississippi remained uncalled as of Wednesday, leaving open the possibility that the Democrats’ majority could increase by two more seats ⁠to 56-44. Once seated in January, Democrats are expected to use their power to investigate Trump’s administration, family and allies and demand concessions on major legislation. The Democratic Senate can block Trump’s nominees, including any US Supreme Court ‌justices should a vacancy arise. The Democratic victory is fueling questions about the longevity of the Supreme Court’s two eldest justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, and the durability of its conservative majority. If you’d like to argue it was worth it, ​that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so.