So much for a GOP red wave
Republican hopes of sweeping victories in the US midterms came unstuck on Wednesday as a predicted ‘‘red wave’’ of new congressional seats proved to be barely more than a trickle.
The party appeared to be on the verge of taking the House of Representatives by just a handful of seats.
Predictions of a landslide, and a majority of 30 or 40 seats, proved incorrect as several candidates backed by Donald Trump struggled to win their races and Democrats held on in some tight contests.
The battle for the Senate, where the two parties were tied on 50 seats each before the election, was closer. The Democrats even stand a chance of a majority after the victory of their candidate, John Fetterman, in Pennsylvania.
Many Republicans in Congress had viewed taking the House as a means of stymying President Joe Biden’s agenda in the final two years of his first term.
Some had anticipated impeaching the president and opening investigations into Merrick Garland, the attorney-general, and Anthony Fauci, the White House medical chief. Garland’s department of justice has pursued Donald Trump over missing classified documents, and Fauci and Trump clashed repeatedly over the response to coronavirus.
While the White House will find it more difficult to pass legislation in a Republican-controlled House, a slim GOP (Grand Old Party) majority means that the party’s leadership will also take the blame for a lack of progress.
Some of the elected Republicans also said that they wanted to end divisions. Nancy Mace, a Republican from South Carolina, had clashed with Trump during the campaign but won her district by 14 percentage points.
‘‘I see my district as a bellwether, and I worked hard to let people know that I stood with my party on most things but I also stood against my party on other issues,’’ she told CNN.
Mace said she did not support impeachment of Biden or other officials ‘‘at this juncture’’, adding: ‘‘I really hope that when we get into the next legislative term we look at what is going to bring our nation together ... political violence is real, the divisiveness is real.’’
One reason for the Democrats’ relatively strong performance was the votes of younger people, something Biden acknowledged yesterday.
The White House recently decided to cancel vast chunks of student loans. A CNN exit poll indicated that Democrats had a 28-point lead among those aged between 18 and 29 and a two-point lead among those aged between 30 and 44.
Older voters strongly backed Republican candidates. The party has a 13-point lead among those aged 65 and above and led by 11 points among those aged between 45 and 64.
Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leader in the House, was calling colleagues yesterday to discuss strategy, CNN said.
He was also trying to cement his position as the next Speaker, arguably the most powerful job in the Capitol.
McCarthy told what had been billed as an election party that ‘‘when you wake up tomorrow, we will be in the majority and Nancy Pelosi will be in the minority’’.
That was yet to happen, with results giving the Republicans 204 seats and the Democrats 187 in the House, with 44 to be declared. The Republicans need a net gain of five for control. Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat and the present Speaker, said her party was ‘‘strongly outperforming expectations’’.
The Republicans did take some scalps, including in New York’s 17th district, which had been held by Sean Patrick Maloney, chairman of the Democratic congressional campaign committee.
But the Democrats could also claim seats they were not expected to win. Lauren Boebert, a Trump-supporting congresswoman in Colorado, appeared to be in trouble with more than 90% of the votes counted.
The picture in the Senate was even less certain after the victory of Fetterman, 53. He had a stroke in May and faced questions over his health.
Further doubts were raised last month after an awful performance in a televised debate against his Republican opponent, Mehmet Oz, a TV doctor who had Trump’s endorsement. On Monday, Donald Trump Jr mocked Fetterman’s poor health at a rally in Florida, saying that the serving Pennsylvania secretary of state had ‘‘mush for brains’’.
Fetterman said after his victory: ‘‘I’m just so proud of the race that we ran ... this campaign has been about fighting for everyone who’s ever been knocked down that ever got back up.’’
Pennsylvania was a Democrat gain, meaning that the Republicans needed two Senate seats in the three remaining tight races, in Arizona, where Kari Lake is their candidate, Georgia and Nevada.
Georgia will go to a run-off next month and the two others were too close to call.