GOP trifecta on the line with House control in limbo

The fight for the House majority is still too close to call.

While Donald Trump has won the presidency, it may be days or weeks until he knows if he’ll have powerful allies atop the House, due in part to close races in states that take longer to count ballots like California and Arizona. For months, neither party has held a significant edge, and both sides predicted modest gains if they get control of the House.

Results were still too close to call in a slew of battleground House races early Wednesday morning. The Associated Press projected that two Republican incumbents in New York would lose reelection: Reps. Marc Molinaro and Brandon Williams.

Both of them represent districts won by President Joe Biden in 2020. Democrats had invested heavily to try to wrest back control of the blue-state seats and saw them as a key path back to the House majority. In other battlegrounds, Republican Reps. Don Bacon (Neb.) and Anthony D’Esposito (N.Y.) were locked in close races, as were Democratic Reps. Susan Wild (Pa.) and Matt Cartwright (Pa.).

Other incumbents in competitive races held on. For Republicans, that included Reps. Zach Nunn in Iowa, Tom Kean Jr. in New Jersey, Nick LaLota in New York and Monica De La Cruz in Texas. Democratic incumbents, like Reps. Pat Ryan in New York and Gabe Vasquez in New Mexico, also prevailed.

With the Senate in Republican hands, Trump could get the sought-after trifecta if House Republicans win — paving the way for Republican legislative priorities on tax cuts and more. But if Democrats manage to flip the chamber, a split Congress could mean Trump faces the same partisan fights over spending and the debt ceiling that have plagued lawmakers over the past two years.

Speaker Mike Johnson, in a statement early Wednesday morning, vowed that “House Republicans stand ready and prepared to immediately act on Trump’s America First agenda to improve the lives of every family, regardless of race, religion, color, or creed, and make America great again” if the GOP keeps the majority. Johnson appeared with Trump as he spoke to supporters early Wednesday morning in West Palm Beach, Florida.

With the hopes of expanding their majority, Republicans were far more intentional with their candidate recruitment and which challengers they backed in the primaries than they were in 2022. House Republicans’ campaign arm worked closely with Trump, coordinating to boost candidates the party saw as the most likely to win the general election.

Meanwhile, Democrats, who held a commanding lead on fundraising and hammered on the message of abortion rights, relied in part on a slate of repeat challengers who narrowly lost in 2022. The bet was that they would benefit from existing campaign infrastructure and name ID among voters. It’s to be seen if that strategy pays off, as many of those matchups have yet to be called.

Both sides had hoped that redistricting would provide their side with a significant advantage, but several new maps in a handful of states ultimately didn’t heavily tilt in Democrats’ or Republicans’ favor overall. The creation of new districts in the South to provide more voting power to Black voters was largely offset by an aggressive GOP gerrymander in North Carolina, and a not-so-aggressive Democratic redraw in New York.