‘ A NEW DAY IN AMERICA’
Democrats win House to break Republican hold on Congress in setback for Trump
WASHINGTON— Democrats decisively won back control of the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday as voters in suburban districts around the country showed their disgust with President Donald Trump by ousting members of his Republican Party.
The Republicans increased their hold on the Senate, fuelled by the enduring devotion of Trump voters in conservative states.
But the Democrats’ House takeover was an unmistakable national repudiation of a president who had conceded that the vote was a “referendum on me.”
The duelling Senate and House results mirrored the two-Americas pattern seen in 2016. Democrats were strong in cities and suburbs, Republicans stronger than expected in the rural areas that have been reliably loyal to Trump.
On the whole, though, the night was far better for Democrats than for Republicans, who already had a Senate majority and were favoured to keep it. Democrats’ House takeover, propelled by a wide lead in the national popular vote, was both a substantive turning point in Trump’s presidency and a vivid demonstration of the limits of his appeal.
As of January, House Democrats will have the power to stop Trump’s legislation, launch investigations into the administration, subpoena White House officials for public testimony, and, according to the law, to obtain his tax returns.
Democrats needed to gain 23 seats to take back the 435member House. They were poised to gain more than 30 as votes continued to be counted into the night.
Voters in high-income and diverse suburbs from Detroit to Denver to Dallas to Kansas City to Minneapolis to Richmond ousted Republican incumbents, dismissing Trump’s immigration-focused racial fearmongering and sending him a stark warning as the beginning of the 2020 presidential campaign approaches.
Democrats excelled in the Rust Belt states critical to Trump’s victory in 2016, easily winning Senate and governor races in Pennsylvania and Michigan and Senate races in Ohio and Wisconsin – though they lost the Ohio governor race they thought they might win.
And they secured upsets in some races outside their traditional comfort zones.
Democrat Laura Kelly beat Republican Kris Kobach, a Trump ally and immigration hardliner, for governor of Kansas. Democrat Kendra Horn managed to oust the Republican incumbent in a little-noticed race in the Oklahoma City area. Democrats also made gains in Iowa.
The House victory was sweet vengeance for Democrats carried by Trump’s upset victory in 2016. Liberals around the country, women in particular, had flooded congressional campaigns with money and volunteers, showing more enthusiasm for most of the year than Trump’s base.
“Thanks to you, tomorrow will be a new day in America,” said Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who is likely to return as House speaker. She said the night was about “restoring the Constitution’s checks and balances to the Trump administration,” protecting Americans’ health care and fighting corruption.
And she called for “unity — unity for our country.”
“We have all had enough of division. The American people want peace. They want results,” she said.
Trump’s initial approach to the loss of the House was to ignore it. “Tremendous success tonight. Thank you to all!” he tweeted after 11 p.m. in his only comments of the night to that point.
To the chagrin of some of his party’s House strategists, Trump had chosen an incendiary campaign message aimed at the conservative states key to the Senate outcome.
The president, deploying rhetoric untethered to reality, had issued a series of dire warnings about how Democrats were a “mob” that planned to abolish America’s borders and welcome violent criminals, impose Venezuela-style socialism, and take away citizens’ health care and guns.
Attempting to turn a distant caravan of Latino migrants into a top campaign issue, he deployed the military to the border.
His manoeuvring appeared to pay dividends in multiple Senate races.
Democratic Indiana Sen. Joe Donnelly lost to Republican state legislator Mike Braun, North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp to Rep. Kevin Cramer, Tennessee governor Phil Bredesen to Rep. Marsha Blackburn and star Texas challenger Beto O’Rourke to Sen. Ted Cruz. Democratic incumbents Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Bill Nelson of Florida were also trailing.
Republicans were always expected to fare much better in the Senate than in the House. Of the 35 seats on the ballot, and Democrats were trying to defend 26 of them — five of them in states Trump won by19 points or more. The election was widely viewed as a de facto referendum on the president. Trump had told his supporters to treat the election as if he was himself “on the ticket.” Former president Barack Obama had urged voters to make a statement against Trump’s lying, bigotry and con- tempt for some democratic norms, saying, “The character of our country is on the ballot.”
Democrats tried to avoid taking the bait, talking about health care above all else. Turning the tables from the 2010 midterm, in which Republicans successfully ran against Obamacare, they blasted Republican candidates for trying to repeal the law and abandon its insurance protections for people with pre-existing health conditions.
Trump had tried to distance himself from a possible House loss in the days leading up Tuesday.
He said he had not been able to campaign much for House candidates. And he said that, if a loss happened, he would simply “figure it out.”
The reality was that he was unwanted or unhelpful in much of the House battleground.
The key swing seats were found in suburbs where strategists from both parties said Republicans were being dragged down by Trump’s behaviour.