On their first day back at the Capitol after lopsided defeats in last week’s midterm elections, Republicans were divided into two camps: those who saw the catastrophe coming and those who didn’t. “I told them exactly what was going to happen. I told them over and over again,” said West Virginia Sen. Jim Justice. “I said truly and truly, if you weren’t worried and you were a Republican, you were living in a cave. Those were my exact words.” “No one anticipated the magnitude,” said Congressman Warren Davidson of Ohio. “I mean, you can’t tell me that the guy who ran as a Democrat for senator in Mississippi thought he was going to win.” While Scott Colom has not officially been declared the winner in the tough U.S. Senate race in Mississippi — a state that has not sent a Democrat to the chamber since 1982 — there was in fact plenty of evidence before Tuesday’s vote that Republicans were close to winning. Approval ratings had collapsed among voters, even on issues on which he had previously polled, while Democrats had surged in both special elections and off-year elections. However, few pollsters or political analysts were publicly predicting the 54-seat Senate majority and 254-seat House majority that Democrats would win, both of which could expand further as vote counting continues. We haven’t delivered and we deserve exactly what we get,” said Senator John Curtis of Utah. His state is deeply red, but last Tuesday Democrats managed to break the Republican supermajority in the state House by winning at least 14 seats, a feat repeated in legislatures across the country. Mike Johnson arrives on Monday for a closed-door national security briefing. Photograph: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters Over the past two years, Republican lawmakers have wavered between doing what Trump wants ( rushed to pass his major domestic policy bill in time for last year’s July 4 Independence Day holiday) and stay on the sidelines, even as he has taken steps that appear to run counter to Congress’s constitutional role. That meant rejecting efforts to end the war with Iran (which Congress did not authorize) as well as repealing its tariffs. Last year, Republicans were wracked by a bipartisan rebellion over the investigation of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, before capitulating and. vote to release documents that Trump had hinted would come to light if he was elected. It all led to the worst midterm a party had suffered since the aftermath of the Watergate scandal in 1974, and among Republicans, theories abounded about where they had lost the plot. “Every election, at the end of the day, is a pocketbook issue,” said Glenn Thompson, the Pennsylvania Republican who chairs the House agriculture committee. months,” because of the “long-term success of the president’s policies.” “Unfortunately, all of those things are going to happen too late for this election,” Thompson said. Davidson, the Ohio representative who is among a small group of House Republicans who voted against the Iran war, said: “If we had followed through on the things we campaigned on in 2024, we probably would have had a different election outcome.” Republicans failed to do so, he said: “You can delve into a number of things, but already You know, it’s a mix. But I think a lot of people didn’t feel heard and they came out to make sure they got everyone’s attention.” “It’s a big mistake,” Hawley said. to extend, ideally through next September. A major defense policy bill remains unfinished, as does a long-delayed farm measure. All of this legislation will need bipartisan buy-in to move forward. “The House will work. We will stay here around the clock if we have to,” Republican spokesman Mike Johnson told reporters on Monday afternoon, calling the election results “a moment of sober reflection for us as a party.” Photograph: Nathan Posner/Anadolu/Getty ImagesBut first, House Republicans will have to deal with the unpleasant question of whether to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. The resolution is the swan song of Thomas Massie, a Republican dissident who has been a thorn in Trump’s side for much of his second term and who lost his primary because of it. There are some in the GOP who say the party should think bigger — after all, who knows when they’ll have control of Congress again under a Republican president. Maybe they could push another partisan bill on some policy like fighting fraud or defense funding, these lawmakers say. Technically, the votes are there to do those things, but it’s not clear. if it’s time, because the House of Representatives is scheduled to adjourn on December 17, and the Senate the next day. Democrats will likely do everything they can to resist enacting more items on Trump’s agenda, while members of his incoming majority are already milling around, literally. Hampshire were seen pushing through the crowd outside the Senate chambers. They were all at the Capitol for the orientation of new members. Looking to make a turn after voters gave him a complete rebuke, Trump has said he would like to work with Democrats on certain areas where he believes there is a deal to be made, although few in the party believe he is serious, particularly after he named immigration hardliner Stephen Miller as his chief of staff. for Talarico to beat him. “It’s going to be fascinating to watch,” the senator said, “from my television.”
