US Midterm Elections: Tight Race in Senate, Democrats Projected to Retake House

The midterm elections, which will determine the congressional landscape for the second half of U.S. President Donald Trump's term, are being held on the 3rd local time.

Voting will begin sequentially across the U.S. Eastern region, starting with parts of Vermont at 5 a.m. Eastern Time, followed by New York, New Jersey, and Virginia at 6 a.m.

Poll opening times vary slightly by state.

Vote counting will begin as soon as polling places close.

Polling in Indiana and Kentucky will close earliest at 6 p.m.

The final ballots outside the mainland in western Alaska will be cast at 1 a.m. the following day.

The elections will choose 35 of the 100 U.S. Senate seats with six-year terms, all 435 seats in the House of Representatives with two-year terms, as well as governors and state legislatures in 36 states.

Held midway through a four-year presidential term, midterms serve as an interim assessment of the current administration.

It is no exaggeration to say that President Trump's political fate hangs on the election results.

The general assessment is that the current landscape for the House of Representatives leans toward the Democratic Party.

The Democrats are widely expected to retake the majority, with projections suggesting they will secure 230 to 240 seats.

Simply retaking the House would allow the Democrats to exert much stronger checks on the Trump administration.

They are poised to mobilize congressional subpoena powers and compulsory testimonies, alongside legislation.

There is also discussion of the possibility that the Democrats could recapture the Senate majority as well.

Under the current composition (53 Republicans, 47 Democrats), if Democrats secure 17 or more of the 35 seats up for grabs in this election (22 held by incumbent Republicans, 13 by incumbent Democrats), they will secure a majority.

A key point to watch is how many seats the Democrats can secure in Senate races across battleground states such as Maine, Michigan, Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Texas, and Alaska.

For the Democrats, they must defend the Michigan Senate seat currently held by their party while stripping as many seats as possible from Republicans in the remaining states.

The Republican position is the exact opposite.

While U.S. media and forecasting organizations differ slightly in their projections for the battleground states, they largely agree on the analysis that Democratic candidates hold an edge within or around the margin of error in a significant number of these battlegrounds.

However, given that major battlegrounds are traditionally strongholds for the Republican Party, opinions are divided on how closely the polling figures will match the actual election results.

Arguments circulate that polls typically underestimate respondents who support Republicans, alongside counterarguments that the margin of error will not be substantial because the midterms are not being held alongside a presidential election featuring President Trump directly on the ballot.

Factoring in the vice president, who concurrently serves as Senate president and holds the tie-breaking vote, Republicans can maintain their majority status by securing just 50 seats.

In this scenario, President Trump would avoid the worst-case scenario.

He is expected to use the Senate as a shield and maintain the domestic and foreign unilateralism he has pursued since taking office last year.

Due to the bicameral structure, if Democrats win the House but fail to seize control of the Senate, major legislation is expected to fall into a deadlock, making bipartisan negotiations inevitable regarding key administration appointments, budgets, and bills.

If the Democrats manage to retake the Senate as well, President Trump could face the possibility of an "early lame-duck" period.

This is because it would be difficult for him to escape responsibility, having virtually spearheaded candidate selections and campaigning, while also bearing blame for high inflation and the Iran war that dominated election issues.

Asked in a media interview the previous day how he would respond if Democrats take control of Congress, he replied, "I suppose I'll be 'Mr. Veto'."

This signifies his intention to actively exercise his presidential veto power.

A clash is thus foreshadowed between the Trump administration—with two years remaining in its term—and a Congress controlled by the Democrats.

Consequently, the U.S. political sphere is expected to gradually shift into a competitive mode among potential presidential contenders looking toward the 2028 presidential election.

Because the Senate race will exert a multi-layered impact on policy decision-making as well as the direction of U.S. political power, and has been fiercer and more unusual than ever before, its outcome may not easily come into focus.

While major media outlets are expected to announce winners for governors and federal lawmakers in regions where each party's dominance is clear early in the vote count, the electoral fate of candidates in battleground states is projected to be announced one by one late into the night on the 3rd or around midnight (2 p.m. KST).

U.S. media outlets predict that, given the unpredictable race in battleground states and the time required for tallying mail-in ballots and handling requests for recounts, the contours of the Senate majority will not emerge until the 4th at the earliest.

In particular, battleground states Alaska and Maine use unique "ranked-choice voting" systems, meaning it could take several days for results in those regions to be finalized.

Attention is also focused on the performance of Korean-American candidates running for the House of Representatives, including Dave Min (Democrat, California), Marilyn Strickland (Democrat, Washington), Dan Koh (Democrat, Massachusetts), and Young Kim (Republican, California).

Additionally, Democratic candidate Cindy Munson, running in the Oklahoma gubernatorial race, is bidding to become the first Korean-American governor in U.S. history.

(Photo: AP, Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.