Democrats Win Control of US House in 2026 Midterms, CBS Projects
Democrats have won control of the US House of Representatives in the 2026 midterm elections, according to a projection from CBS News. The result would end Republican control of the chamber after two years of Donald Trump's second presidency. Other news organisations have projected different seat totals. NBC News projects Democrats will win at least 248 seats, while the Washington Post projects 230 to 240 seats for Democrats. The BBC projects at least 218 seats, enough for control.
The House has 435 voting members, and a party needs a majority of them to run the chamber. According to the Guardian, Republicans currently hold 218 seats and Democrats hold 214. There is one vacancy in a Republican seat and one in a Democratic seat, and one Republican member has switched party affiliation to become an independent. Democrats needed to flip three seats to gain control, the Guardian reported.
Before the vote, markets in which people trade contracts on political outcomes gave Democrats a high chance of winning. Prediction market prices implied a 99 percent chance of a Democratic House, and a 97 percent chance of winning the Senate, according to Reuters, which described those Senate prices as highly volatile.
The Senate, where Republicans held a narrow majority, also saw Democratic gains. NBC News reported that Democrats flipped two Senate seats and that Roy Cooper won the open seat in North Carolina. AP reported that Democrats won Senate races in Georgia and New Hampshire.
If Democrats win a House majority, Hakeem Jeffries is expected to become speaker, the chamber's presiding officer. Jeffries is a Democrat from Brooklyn who was first elected to the House in 2012. He is 56 years old and would be the first Black speaker in US history, according to the Guardian.
Democrats have signalled that, with a House majority, they would investigate several matters. These include Trump's family business, immigration enforcement, issues related to Jeffrey Epstein, and how Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr has handled vaccine procedures.
The election was held on newly drawn congressional maps. At Trump's request, Republicans in Texas, Florida, Missouri and other Republican-led states redrew districts before the vote to add more seats favourable to their party. Lawmakers in Alabama, North Carolina and Tennessee redrew maps to eliminate districts where Black voters had been able to elect a candidate of their choice, following a Supreme Court ruling that weakened a key provision of the Voting Rights Act, the federal law protecting minority voters' access to the ballot.
Not every contest has followed the national pattern. In Kentucky's sixth district, an open seat, Democrat Zach Dembo, a Navy veteran and former prosecutor, faces Republican Ralph Alvarado, whom Trump backed. The Cook Political Report rates the race a toss-up, despite a partisan lean towards Republicans.
