Reversal of power expected in the House of Representatives: by late Tuesday evening, the Republicans were on their way to taking control of the Lower House of Congress. But this victory will probably not be as spectacular as expected.
Posted at 1:14 a.m.
By 12:30 a.m., Republicans had won 174 of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives. The Democrats had 133. The vote count was not far enough along in the other races to determine a winner.
The latest forecasts had predicted a harvest of around twenty additional seats for the Republicans, who already held 212 before the elections. This harvest could ultimately be a little less, between 10 and 15 seats. Florida notably delivered three new seats in the Republican camp.
House Republican headliners were easily re-elected. Marjorie Taylor Greene is back in Congress, having beaten her Democratic rival who raised more money than any other candidate in the country. All this loot will not have been enough to stop the one who became known during her first term for her racist, anti-Semitic and conspiratorial remarks.
PHOTO YUKI IWAMURA, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with constituents in the borough of Queens in New York on Tuesday
Among the Democrats, the most prominent representatives like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib – the trio nicknamed “The Squad” – will be back in the House.
In Florida, Democrat Maxwell Alejandro Frost was elected in the Orlando area. Aged 25, the minimum age to sit in the House, he will be the first representative of “Generation Z” and the first Afro-Cuban to enter Congress.
Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi was also re-elected in her riding in California.
Unfavorable redistricting
In this battle for control of the House, Democrats found themselves having to defend certain seats in what were considered blue castles.
This is the case of the suburbs of New York. Longtime Democratic Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney had to defend his turf more fiercely than expected against his Republican rival and trailed by six points at press time. Four other districts in the region, held by Democrats, have also been the scene of heated struggles after a redrawing of the electoral map.
According to the Politico website, the practice of “gerrymandering” (which consists of redrawing the boundaries of a constituency to favor the election of a party) has been more strictly regulated in recent years in the States where the Democrats are in power than in Republican states. In New York State, for example, the redistricting was done under the supervision of judicial authorities, which was not the case in Florida or Ohio, according to what Politico reports.
That said, it’s far from unusual for a president to suffer losses in the House of Representatives in midterm elections. Under Donald Trump, Republicans lost 40 House seats in 2018, while in 2010, during Barack Obama’s first term, Democrats lost 63.