The biggest winners and losers of the 2026 midterm elections

The results are still rolling in on the 2026 midterm elections. But the overall contours of what just happened are already obvious: A historic Democratic victory, and a historic setback for what is now the lame-duck presidency of Donald Trump.

A look at some of the big winners and losers that tell the tale.

Black political power : Before Tuesday, only three Black governors had ever been elected. Next year, we’ll have five serving at the same time . That’s after wins by Florida GOP Gov.-elect Byron Donalds, Wisconsin Democratic Gov.-elect David Crowley, Nevada Democratic Gov.-elect Aaron Ford and Georgia Democratic Gov.-elect Keisha Lance Bottoms, who will be the first Black female governor ever. Also, Democrats won in the South due in large part to a surge of Black voters. And if a Black Democrat — Scott Colom — can beat Mississippi GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith in a Trump +23 state with its fair share of history with race issues, it will be perhaps the biggest statement of all.

The religious left : Two of the biggest Democratic over-performers Tuesday were Kansas Sen.-elect Adam Hamilton, who is a pastor, and Texas Sen.-elect James Talarico, who basically sounds like a youth pastor and often cited his faith on the trail. Bet on Democrats looking for more candidates like them, starting today.

Audra Melton for CNN

Jon Ossoff, times two : He won reelection to the Senate by a stunning 18-point margin in a swing state, bolstering his fast-rising national star. And Lance Bottoms’ win means he can run for president in 2028 without worrying about a major obstacle: a governor who would replace him with a Republican.

James Talarico : He had a deeply flawed opponent in Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, yes. But virtually nobody had him winning by double-digits. (He’s currently ahead by 12, in a state Democrats where the party hadn’t won in a statewide race since 1994.)

Gina Hinojosa : But don’t sleep on the other big statewide Democratic winner in Texas, Gov.-elect Hinojosa. She appealed to voters of all walks from all corners of the state, and she beat a three-term GOP governor in Greg Abbott who was on nobody’s radar at the start of the election.

Win McNamee/Getty Images

Annie Andrews : Also expect plenty of focus on the South Carolina senator-elect. The pediatrician benefitted from appointed GOP Sen. Darline Graham’s problems, but Andrews was well-liked in her own right in preelection polling. She ran a very strong campaign.

Democrats’ presidential hopes : Not only do Ossoff, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and other potential 2028 hopefuls emerge smelling like roses, but Democrats proved they can compete all over the place . If they can make Texas competitive — a big if , sure — it completely recasts the Electoral College math in their favor. And Tuesday’s results suggest the Trump coalition, which we already knew didn’t turn up as much when he’s not on the ballot, is crumbling.

Democrats’ power in the state : We’re still awaiting some key results, but Democrats have gained full control of at least six state governments , per Bolts magazine’s Daniel Nichanian. The GOP has long benefitted from superior control in the states.

The Supreme Court’s left flank : The size of Democrats’ Senate majority makes the GOP’s ability to confirm a conservative justice to replace Samuel Alito and/or Clarence Thomas appear rather distant — possibly as distant as the early 2030s, Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis argued late Tuesday .

Mark Schiefelbein/AP

Ron DeSantis : OK, it’s not just him. But Tuesday was an argument for the GOP to look outside the Trump administration — and beyond Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio — for their 2028 nominee. Florida was at least one of the few states were Republicans notched some key wins, and DeSantis has created some distance from Trump’s political approach of late. Also keep an eye on outgoing Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who is even less tethered to Trumpism. ( Vance’s X post Wednesday blaming the Iran war for GOP losses suggests he sees the need to distance himself, too.)

Washington, DC, lawyers : The Trump administration’s laissez-faire approach to ethics and self-enrichment has given Democrats a bevy of potential targets. Incoming Democratic House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Robert Garcia of California said it all late Tuesday in a two-word statement: “Lawyer up.” (And administration figures already had been .)

Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

Donald Trump : It’s obvious, but it’s hard to overstate what a rebuke this election was to the president personally. Not only did Trump suffer a crippling loss that leaves him as a lame duck; he made the GOP campaign overwhelmingly about him. He took sole ownership of the economy with his tariffs and the Iran war in ways that clearly backfired. He meddled in GOP primaries in ways that produced a slate of less-electable candidates (a repeat of 2018 that suggests he didn’t learn any lessons there). And his conduct down the stretch in the campaign was downright bizarre, dismissing affordability concerns and frequently focusing on overwhelmingly unpopular things like the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool less than 24 hours before Election Day. There are no good signs about what lay ahead for the GOP and Trump over the next two years, but Republicans are still clearly afraid to blame him.

JD Vance : Trump is now the millstone around his neck. He can try to distance himself from Trump on the Iran war and Israel — as he clearly set about trying to do on Wednesday — but it’s going to be an exceedingly difficult thing to do. Trump, after all, won’t want his VP constantly undercutting his policies and supposed legacy items like the Iran war. And Trump isn’t one who willingly takes the heat to help other members of his party.

Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

Elon Musk : He spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the GOP — including much of it specifically on one of the party’s biggest flops, the Texas Senate race. Indeed, much like in the 2025 Wisconsin Supreme Court race, it seemed to give Democrats a bogeyman to run against — their own Republican version of George Soros. Also, he moved Tesla to Texas in recent years, and now it’s governed by Democrats.

The tariffs : This was Trump’s and the GOP’s original sin. Voters seemed open to the idea, but it’s not clear they really knew what tariffs were. Then Trump implemented them in bizarre, scattershot and on-again-off-again fashion. A recent study from the New York Federal Reserve found that the overall cost of consumer goods would have fallen without his tariffs in 2025. Congressional Republicans must be ruing that they didn’t assert their authority — or at least try harder to talk Trump out of it.

Mike Johnson : The GOP House speaker claimed for weeks that the polls were wrong and — rather laughably — that Republicans were going to “defy history” by keeping their House majority. He was either just saying stuff, or he has terrible political intel. And now he’s not even going to try to stay in charge of the House GOP; he won’t run for House minority leader (though maybe he’s looking forward to giving up one of the most thankless jobs in Washington).

GOP poll denialists : But Johnson wasn’t the only one; a whole bunch of Republicans confidently predicted that the polls were under-sampling Trump’s supporters. In the end, the polls actually under-estimated Democrats — and often by some significant margins.

The GOP’s gerrymanders : Not only did the GOP’s map in North Carolina blow up in its face, but the party might fail to win any of the five seats it drew for itself in Texas and the four it drew for itself in Florida. It looks like the GOP’s whole brazen mid-decade redistricting push gained it next to nothing, at least in this election. And Democrats newfound control in many states means they could redraw their own maps ahead of the 2028 election, thanks to the precedent the GOP has now set.

Previous wave elections : Sorry, 2010 and 2006. Apologies, 1994. The 2026 election appears to have set the post-Watergate benchmark for a political rout in a midterm election. Democrats appear to have won the popular vote by around 13 points, which would be the largest margin for any party since 1976 , per the Economist.

Allison Joyce/Getty Images

Darline Graham : It almost seems cruel to put her here, because she never seemed to truly ask for any of this after her brother died. And you could certainly blame Trump for the weird decision to elevate her. But the appointed senator turned out to be a disastrous candidate, with voters overwhelmingly saying she didn’t have the qualifications to be a senator. It’s a cautionary tale for anyone who might feel compelled to throw themselves into the cauldron of national politics.

Roger Marshall : It can feel difficult to isolate the truly bad candidates when voters were generally so against the GOP. But Marshall is certainly near the top of that list. His fundraising was anemic and he didn’t seem to really have much of a campaign operation until it was too late. He also reportedly went rogue late in the campaign by cutting a video explaining his pursuit of his medical patients’ debts. In the end, he lost a Trump +16 state by around 5 points.

Ken Paxton : Paxton’s under-performance was even bigger. He is losing a Trump + 14 state by 12 points — a massive 26-point swing.

Haley Stevens : The Democratic Michigan congresswoman’s late decision to flip her endorsement from her former primary opponent Abdul El-Sayed to Republican former Rep. Mike Rogers in the Michigan Senate race doesn’t seem to have made any difference, judging by El-Sayed’s seven-point win. About all it appears to have done is doom any shot Stevens had at a career in Democratic politics.

Really ugly campaign tactics : Vivek Ramaswamy’s ugly and controversial ad featuring Democrat Amy Acton’s mom didn’t work; he did worse than any other statewide Ohio Republican. The GOP’s transgender slurs about Andrews and efforts to suggest James Talarico was a gay vegan seemed to do basically no good, as those two were among Democrats’ biggest over-performers. The situation is a little less clear in Alaska, where Democratic former Rep. Mary Peltola might still win after the New York Times reported that her campaign recruited a decoy Dan Sullivan; counting those votes will still take some time. Politics has plenty of ugly campaign tactics, but maybe voters don’t like ones that are so transparent and desperate? At the very least, these gambits didn’t seem to help.

Democrats stepping aside for independents : Independent Dan Osborn’s six-point loss to Nebraska GOP Sen. Pete Ricketts suggests Democrats didn’t glean much from their strategy of trying to let independents run with no Democratic opponents in dark-red states. Independents also lost by more than 20 points in similar set-ups in Idaho and South Dakota. And in Montana, their failure to get the Democratic nominee to drop out meant she and the independent split about half the vote. Tuesday’s results suggest Democrats might as well run moderate Democrats who fit those states.

2026年中期选举的结果仍在陆续公布。但刚刚发生的事情的总体轮廓已经很明显：民主党取得了历史性的胜利，而即将卸任的唐纳德·特朗普总统则遭遇了历史性的挫败。

让我们来看看一些主要的赢家和输家，他们的故事足以说明一切。

黑人政治力量：在周二之前，历史上只有三位黑人州长当选。明年，我们将同时拥有五位黑人州长。这得益于佛罗里达州共和党州长当选人拜伦·唐纳兹、威斯康星州民主党州长当选人戴维·克劳利、内华达州民主党州长当选人亚伦·福特以及佐治亚州民主党州长当选人凯莎·兰斯·博顿斯的胜选，博顿斯将成为佐治亚州历史上首位黑人女州长。此外，民主党在南方各州的胜利很大程度上归功于黑人选民的激增。如果一位黑人民主党人——斯科特·科洛姆——能够在密西西比州击败共和党参议员辛迪·海德-史密斯，而密西西比州在历史上也存在不少种族问题，那么这将是意义最为重大的事件。

宗教左派：周二民主党内两位表现最出色的候选人分别是堪萨斯州当选参议员亚当·汉密尔顿（他是一位牧师）和德克萨斯州当选参议员詹姆斯·塔拉里科（他的言谈举止颇似一位青年牧师，并在竞选活动中经常提及自己的信仰）。可以预见，从今天开始，民主党将会寻找更多像他们这样的候选人。

奥德拉·梅尔顿为CNN撰稿

乔恩·奥索夫双喜临门：他在一个摇摆州以惊人的18个百分点优势赢得连任参议员，进一步巩固了他迅速崛起的全国政治地位。而兰斯·博顿斯的胜选意味着他可以安心地在2028年竞选总统，不必担心一个重大障碍：一位共和党州长会取代他的位置。

詹姆斯·塔拉里科：没错，他的对手——德克萨斯州总检察长肯·帕克斯顿——确实存在诸多缺陷。但几乎没人认为他会以两位数的优势获胜。（目前他领先12个百分点，而德克萨斯州是民主党的传统票仓，该党自1994年以来就未曾在全州范围内赢得过选举。）

吉娜·希诺霍萨：但别小瞧了德克萨斯州另一位民主党全州选举的大赢家——当选州长希诺霍萨。她赢得了全州各地各行各业选民的支持，击败了连任三届的共和党州长格雷格·阿博特，而阿博特在选举之初几乎无人问津。

Win McNamee/Getty Images

安妮·安德鲁斯：预计南卡罗来纳州当选参议员也将备受关注。这位儿科医生受益于共和党参议员达琳·格雷厄姆的困境，但安德鲁斯在选前民调中本身就颇受欢迎。她的竞选活动非常成功。

民主党的总统候选人希望：奥索夫、宾夕法尼亚州州长乔什·夏皮罗和其他潜在的2028年总统候选人不仅表现出色，而且民主党也证明了他们在各州都有竞争力。如果他们能让德克萨斯州成为竞争激烈的战场——当然，这只是个美好的愿望——那么选举人团的格局将彻底向他们倾斜。周二的选举结果表明，特朗普的支持者联盟正在瓦解，而我们早就知道，当特朗普不在选票上时，这个联盟的投票率就会下降。

民主党在该州的实力：虽然一些关键结果仍在等待中，但据《Bolts》杂志的丹尼尔·尼查尼安报道，民主党已完全掌控至少六个州的政府。长期以来，共和党一直受益于其在各州的绝对控制权。

最高法院的左翼：民主党在参议院的多数席位使得共和党确认一位保守派大法官来取代塞缪尔·阿利托和/或克拉伦斯·托马斯的能力显得相当遥远——佛罗里达州共和党州长罗恩·德桑蒂斯周二晚间表示，可能要到 2030 年代初才能实现。

马克·谢费尔贝因/美联社

罗恩·德桑蒂斯：好吧，这并非他一人之过。但周二的事件表明，共和党应该在2028年总统候选人的选票上，将目光投向特朗普政府之外——也应该超越副总统JD·万斯和国务卿马可·卢比奥。佛罗里达州至少是共和党取得关键胜利的少数几个州之一，而德桑蒂斯近来也与特朗普的政治路线保持了一定的距离。此外，还要密切关注即将卸任的佐治亚州州长布莱恩·坎普，他与特朗普主义的联系更为疏远。（万斯周三在X网站上发表的帖子将共和党的败选归咎于伊朗战争，这表明他也意识到了与特朗普保持距离的必要性。）

华盛顿特区的律师们：特朗普政府对道德和个人致富的放任态度，让民主党人有了一大堆潜在的攻击目标。即将上任的众议院监督委员会民主党主席、加州众议员罗伯特·加西亚周二晚间用两个字的声明道出了所有：“准备好律师吧。”（而政府官员们早已准备好了。）

Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

唐纳德·特朗普：显而易见，但这次选举对总统个人而言是多么沉重的打击，怎么强调都不为过。特朗普不仅遭遇惨败，沦为跛脚鸭总统，而且还让共和党的竞选几乎完全围绕他展开。他试图通过关税和伊朗战争来独揽经济大权，但这些举措显然适得其反。他干预共和党初选，导致候选人当选的可能性降低（这与2018年的情况如出一辙，表明他并没有吸取任何教训）。他在竞选最后阶段的行为更是匪夷所思，无视民众对经济承受能力的担忧，并在选举日不到24小时之际，频繁地将注意力放在像林肯纪念堂倒影池这样极不受欢迎的议题上。未来两年共和党和特朗普的前景并不乐观，但共和党人显然仍然不敢指责他。

JD Vance：特朗普现在成了他脖子上的一块沉重的包袱。他可以尝试在伊朗战争和以色列问题上与特朗普划清界限——就像他周三明显试图做的那样——但这将是一件极其困难的事情。毕竟，特朗普不会希望他的副总统不断地破坏他的政策和他所谓的政绩，比如伊朗战争。而且，特朗普也不是那种会为了帮助党内其他成员而甘愿承担责任的人。

凯文·拉马克/路透社

埃隆·马斯克：他向共和党投入了数亿美元——其中很大一部分专门用于该党最大的败笔之一：德克萨斯州参议员竞选。事实上，就像2025年威斯康星州最高法院大法官竞选一样，这似乎给民主党人提供了一个可以攻击的“假想敌”——他们自己的共和党版乔治·索罗斯。此外，近年来他还将特斯拉总部迁至德克萨斯州，而现在德克萨斯州由民主党执政。

关税：这是特朗普和共和党的原罪。选民似乎对关税持开放态度，但他们是否真正了解关税的含义尚不清楚。随后，特朗普以一种怪异、杂乱无章且反复无常的方式实施了关税。纽约联邦储备银行最近的一项研究发现，如果没有这些关税，到2025年，消费品总成本将会下降。国会共和党人肯定后悔当初没有行使他们的权力——或者至少没有更加努力地劝说特朗普放弃关税。

迈克·约翰逊：这位共和党众议院议长几周以来一直声称民调有误，而且——颇为可笑的是——共和党人将“打破历史”，保住众议院多数席位。他要么只是信口开河，要么就是政治情报能力极差。现在他甚至都不打算继续掌控众议院共和党了；他不会竞选众议院少数党领袖（尽管他或许很期待放弃华盛顿最吃力不讨好的工作之一）。

共和党民调否认者：但约翰逊并非唯一持此观点的人；一大批共和党人自信地预测，民调低估了特朗普的支持者。最终，民调实际上低估了民主党人的支持率——而且往往低估幅度相当大。

共和党的选区划分：共和党在北卡罗来纳州的选区划分不仅彻底失败，而且该党在德克萨斯州为自己划分的五个席位和在佛罗里达州为自己划分的四个席位，可能一个都赢不了。看来，共和党在本世纪中期肆无忌惮的选区重划行动，至少在这次选举中，几乎一无所获。而民主党在许多州重新掌控大局，意味着他们可能会在2028年大选前重新划分选区，这都要“归功于”共和党如今开创的先例。

以往的选举浪潮：抱歉，2010年和2006年。抱歉，1994年。2026年的选举似乎为水门事件后中期选举的政治大胜树立了新的标杆。据《经济学人》报道，民主党似乎赢得了约13个百分点的普选票，这将是自1976年以来任何政党获得的最大优势。

艾莉森·乔伊斯/盖蒂图片社

达琳·格雷厄姆：把她放在这里似乎有点残酷，因为在她哥哥去世后，她似乎从未真正要求过这一切。你当然可以把提拔她的奇怪决定归咎于特朗普。但这位被任命的参议员最终却成了灾难性的候选人，绝大多数选民都认为她不具备参议员的资格。这对任何想要投身国家政治漩涡的人来说都是一个警示。

罗杰·马歇尔：当选民普遍对共和党反感时，要找出真正糟糕的候选人似乎很难。但马歇尔绝对名列其中。他的筹款能力极其薄弱，而且直到为时已晚，他似乎才真正建立起一套像样的竞选运作体系。据报道，在竞选后期，他还擅自剪辑了一段视频，解释他如何追讨病人的医疗债务，此举显得十分出格。最终，他在一个特朗普领先16个百分点的州以大约5个百分点的劣势败北。

肯·帕克斯顿：帕克斯顿的表现甚至更差。他在一个特朗普领先14个百分点的州落后12个百分点——这可是高达26个百分点的巨大差距。

海莉·史蒂文斯：这位来自密歇根州的民主党女议员在密歇根州参议员竞选中，临阵倒戈，从之前的党内初选对手阿卜杜勒·埃尔-赛义德转而支持共和党前众议员迈克·罗杰斯，但从埃尔-赛义德最终以7个百分点的优势获胜来看，这一举动似乎并未产生任何影响。事实上，这似乎彻底断送了史蒂文斯在民主党政坛的任何发展机会。

令人作呕的竞选策略：维韦克·拉马斯瓦米（Vivek Ramaswamy）那则丑陋且极具争议的广告，以民主党候选人艾米·阿克顿（Amy Acton）的母亲为主角，结果却适得其反；他在俄亥俄州共和党的全州竞选中表现最差。共和党对安德鲁斯（Andrews）的跨性别歧视言论，以及暗示詹姆斯·塔拉里科（James Talarico）是同性恋素食主义者的努力，似乎也毫无成效，因为这两位候选人恰恰是民主党表现最出色的候选人之一。阿拉斯加的情况则略显复杂，民主党前众议员玛丽·佩尔托拉（Mary Peltola）仍有可能胜出，此前《纽约时报》报道称，她的竞选团队招募了丹·沙利文（Dan Sullivan）作为诱饵；但计票仍需时日。政治中充斥着各种丑陋的竞选策略，但或许选民并不喜欢如此明目张胆、不择手段的手段？至少，这些伎俩似乎并没有起到任何作用。

民主党人让位给独立候选人：内布拉斯加州独立候选人丹·奥斯本以6个百分点的劣势败给共和党参议员皮特·里基茨，这表明民主党人试图让独立候选人在深红州不与民主党人竞争的策略并未取得多少成效。在爱达荷州和南达科他州，独立候选人在类似的选举安排下也输了20多个百分点。而在蒙大拿州，由于未能迫使民主党候选人退出，她和独立候选人瓜分了大约一半的选票。周二的选举结果表明，民主党人或许应该推出更适合这些州的温和派民主党候选人。