After a rollercoaster of drama, the US Midterms are ending the way experts and pollsters thought they would.
The Democrats are now expected to gain the House of Representatives and the Republicans to hold onto the Senate.
Not quite a blue wave
It hasn't been an overwhelming blue wave but instead a tight-fought seat by seat battle.
"This is not a blue wave. This is not a wave that's knocking out all sorts of Republican incumbents," CNN host Jake Tapper said as results continued to roll in.
"There is no tsunami," analyst Gloria Borger agreed.
"There's a lot of disappointment that I'm hearing.
"The excitement, the balloon is popping."
Some key results are going against the Democrats. They have failed to take congressional districts that were thought to be bellwethers, such as the sixth district in Kentucky. They continue to trail in the Florida Senate race.
There is a long way to go, but Donald Trump might be feeling relatively pleased right now.
Tremendous success tonight. Thank you to all!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 7, 2018
In Nevada, Clark County election volunteer Keith Hill has worked an election night for 12 years, he tells Herald reporter on the ground Natalie Akoorie.
Hill says he wanted the "blue wave" but rather than a tsunami it had been more like "the tide coming in".
That the Democrats won't take the Senate disappointments Hill greatly.
The closely watched races
Democratic challengers have unseated Republicans in at least 22 closely watched House races, moving the party closer to its long-sought goal of recapturing control of the House, according to projections based on exit polls and early returns from the Midterms.
Republicans, however, will retain control of the US Senate — and may even increase their majority, after winning closely-fought races in Indiana, North Dakota, Tennessee and Texas.
In Florida, Ron DeSantis (Republican) — a backbench House member who had based his campaign around his loyalty to President Trump — defeated Tallahasee Mayor Andrew Gillum (Democrat) in the race for governor. Most recent polls had shown Gillum ahead. In his concession speech, Gillum said "I sincerely regret that I couldn't bring it home for you, but I can guarantee you this: I'm not going anywhere," according to media reports.
In Kansas, by contrast, Republican Kris Kobach – an advocate for tighter immigration laws who also tied himself to Trump – was defeated, losing to Democrat Laura Kelly.
Democrats won races in several Republican-held seats, in states from Florida to Kansas. That moved them closer to taking the House majority for the first time since 2011, when the "tea party" wave swamped Democrats in President Barack Obama's first midterm elections.
In victory, Democrats regained some of the confidence — although less of the power — they lost in 2016, when Trump won a surprise victory over Hillary Clinton. In this election, they sought to energize groups that Clinton did not: young voters, Latinos, African Americans and infrequent voters.
They were helped by an inadvertent spokesman: Trump himself. The first two chaotic years of his administration — marked by staff turnover, a torrent of falsehoods, and insults toward immigrants, US allies and the news media — unified a Democratic Party that had fractured between center and left. The result was a huge increase in turnout, in part from voters who had never voted before.
By winning the House, Democrats will gain a powerful new pedestal to investigate Trump's administration, his personal finances, and the hotels, golf courses and other businesses he still owns. They are also likely to press for details about the 2016 election, asking whether Trump or his campaign colluded with the Russian government's efforts to sow misinformation and pro-Trump messages.
Democrats' disappointment
But, even in victory, Democrats saw the limits of their coalition — as Republicans snuffed out Democrats' hopes of winning the Senate. Indeed, the GOP seemed likely to increase its majority, by holding on to key seats in Texas and Tennessee and winning Democrat-held seats in North Dakota and Indiana.
So Democrats got the House, but did not get what they'd hoped for: a full rejection of Trump, who has governed with an unusual chaotic style, and who closed out this campaign with a torrent of falsehoods, and a demonization of immigrants and the news media. In many places, it appeared, Trump's approach was enough — making it unclear what divided government might look like, with such a cultural gulf between the two houses Congress.
At about 10pm Eastern time, Democrats had won Republican-held seats in Florida, Virginia, Kansas, Pennsylvania, Colorado, New York and Minnesota. Among the victors: Jennifer Wexton, who unseated Rep. Barbara Comstock in the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, DC, and Sharice Davids, who won a GOP-held seat in Kansas. Davids, a former mixed martial-arts fighter, will be the first Native American woman to serve in Congress.
In the races for the Senate, Republicans have taken a key seat in Indiana held by Senator Joe Donnelly (Republican). They also kept a seat in Texas, as Senator Ted Cruz defeated challenger Beto O'Rourke, and held on to the seat in Tennessee held by retiring Senator Bob Corker (Repubican).
In Florida, Republican Rick Scott also holds a narrow lead over incumbent Senator Bill Nelson (Democrat), though that race remains too close to call. For Democrats, the best news in the Senate was that they held on to at least five seats in states won by President Trump in 2016, including West Virginia — where Senator Joe Manchin (Democrat) won reelection in a state that went for Trump by 20 points.
In other Senate races, Democrats won reelection in Ohio, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, all states that Trump carried in 2016 on his way to a surprise election victory. At one point, two years ago, Democrats might have rejoiced to win these states in "Trump country" — but they entered Tuesday with much higher hopes, believing that even control of the Senate might be in their grasp. Major Senate races remain undecided in Arizona, Nevada and Montana.
In Virginia, Comstock had been seen as one of the GOP's most vulnerable incumbents, representing a swath of suburbia that had voted heavily for Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016. But the scale of her defeat was still notable: With 67 percent of precincts reporting, she was down by 17 percentage points.
Anecdotal reports from around the country indicated that turnout was far above the levels from other recent midterms — and, in some cases, even approaching the levels from the 2016 presidential election.
The key issues
Earlier on Tuesday, new polling showed that voters cited Trump and health care as two of the most important factors as they chose their candidates in the midterm election, according to preliminary results from a Washington Post-Schar School survey of battleground districts. About 4 in 10 of those surveyed said one of those topics — Trump or health care — was among the two most important issues in their vote.
The economy and immigration were close behind, with roughly one-third saying each was one of the top two issues in their vote. Just over one-fifth said taxes was one of the top issues, followed by Supreme Court appointments. Fewer than 1 in 10 voters said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) — who could become the speaker if Democrats win control of the House — was one of the biggest factors in their vote.
"In some places, Trump was even more important to voters. In Virginia's 10th Congressional District, where Comstock was projected to be defeated, 56 percent of voters said Trump was one of the two most important factors in their vote.
Roughly 8 in 10 voters rated the economy positively, after months of job and wage growth, but even so, a small majority said they thought the country was headed in the wrong direction. About four in 10 respondents said they felt anger about this year's election, while 2 in 10 said they felt patriotic.
The poll was conducted Monday and Tuesday among voters across 69 competitive congressional districts and released Tuesday afternoon, as top Democrats predicted their party would take control of the House.
A barometer of Trump's popularity
Today's midterm served as a referendum on the chaotic and divisive first two years of Trump's presidency. As the first national election since Trump's presidential upset in 2016, it gave Democrats an opportunity to capitalize on his low, 40-percent approval rating, a restive national mood and frustration with one-party leadership in Washington under the GOP.
At stake was control of the House, the Senate, 36 governorships and hundreds of state positions, with dozens of key races remaining tight around the country. Republicans were cautiously optimistic about keeping their majority in the Senate.
Early voting tallies suggested record-breaking interest in the election, the most expensive midterm in history. With more than 38 million votes counted as early or absentee before Tuesday morning, 35 states reported early-vote totals that surpassed those in 2014.
Democrats were upbeat about their chance of winning the House after campaigns that emphasized kitchen-table issues and sought to harness opposition to Trump among suburban women and college graduates. The party had entered Tuesday's contests with a historical advantage, since the president's party typically loses more than dozen seats in his first midterm elections.
Asked Tuesday if she was 100 percent sure of a Democratic victory in the lower chamber, Pelosi said "Yes, I am."
To win congressional majorities, Democrats would need a net gain of 23 seats in the House and two seats in the Senate. But the latter posed an enormous challenge in light of the 10 Senate seats Democrats were defending in states Trump won in 2016.
Republicans said throughout the campaign that Democrats would block Trump's agenda while allowing undocumented immigrants and liberal "mobs" to overtake communities.
Trump, in his final campaign swing, repeatedly told supporters that Democratic victories would threaten their safety and stability.
"They want America to be a giant sanctuary city for drug dealers, predators and blood thirsty MS-13 killers," he said at a rally in Cleveland.
"There's only one way to end this lawless assault on our dignity, our sovereignty, and on our borders, and that's by voting Republican tomorrow," he said.
In the past few weeks, Trump has proposed revoking birthright citizenship, repeatedly called a migrant caravan headed for the United States from Mexico as an "invasion," sent more than 7,000 troops to the border to block it from entering the country and released a campaign ad that major television networks deemed too racist to air.
This hard-line approach to immigration politics in the final stage of the campaign defied conventional wisdom among establishment Republicans, who wished Trump would focus on the good economy and the party's tax cuts. Trump said Monday that he regretted not having a "softer tone" at times, but returned to form hours later by attacking Democrats at campaign rallies.
Trump had no public events scheduled for today and spent part of the morning on Twitter promoting GOP candidates and criticising Democrats. He campaigned on Monday (Tuesday NZT) in Ohio, Indiana and Missouri, states he won in 2016 where Republicans are hoping to flip Democratic Senate seats.
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