FRANKLIN, Tenn. — Republicans solidified their grip on the U.S. Senate in Tuesday’s midterm elections as a spate of key battlegrounds loyal to President Trump held back Democratic challenges.
Republicans beat back the rough headwinds for the GOP that were still threatening to sink the party’s majority in the House.
With Republicans holding Tennessee and picking up Indiana, had to hold all their remaining competitive seats, including North Dakota, and flip Arizona, Nevada and Texas to win the Senate – which would have been an almost unprecedented electoral feat. That dreams died when North Dakota and Texas were called for the GOP.
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In Tennessee, a state that delivered a whopping 61 percent of its vote to Trump two years ago, Republican Rep. Marsha Blackburn was confident heading into the final hours of voting. Her defeat of Democratic former Gov. Phil Bredesen here proved to be an insurmountable obstacle in his party’s bid to capture the Senate majority.
Bredesen, a centrist Democrat who was a popular chief executive, had run a near picture perfect campaign in this conservative stronghold. But as with Democratic incumbents and challengers on their heels in a collection of other ruby red, pro-Trump states, an issue set that favors the GOP, and the president’s popularity, was too much to overcome.
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“Our president has made such a difference already, he’s energized the Republican Party again. It’s so exciting to see that happen and he’s making a difference all across the board, in the economy, in immigration,” said Marcia Clark, a middle-aged voter from an exurban community northwest of Nashville.
“He asked us to support her, and that’s really came to know her so well is by paying attention to what he asked us to do,” she said. Voters like Clark are why Republicans were expressing confidence that their 51-49 majority would survive, and possibly grow, despite the host of seats that entered Tuesday within the margin of error in public polling.
Democratic incumbents with a history of winning tough contests were fighting off strong Republican challenges in Indiana, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, and West Virginia — red states all. The Democrats were also struggling to maintain a seat in purple Florida.
Perhaps the best shot Democrats had of holding down losses, or still running an inside straight to the majority, was in the southwest, where the party was waging valiant challenges against Republican incumbents in Arizona, Nevada, and Texas.
The former two were nail-biters as the robust turnout that began in the early voting period continued on Election Day; the latter contest seemed out of reach, but Democrats were refusing to give up on Rep. Beto O’Rourke, who raised more than $70 million for his bid to unseat Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas.
“The map really has shifted over the course of the election cycle, and it’s coming down to races we knew would be the most competitive at the outset,” a Democratic operative said. “The Democrats in these states still have a path.”
Although Democrats tend to disagree, most Republicans believe that the contentious Senate hearings to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh amid uncorroborated allegations of sexual misconduct nearly single-handedly blocked the Democrats from the majority.
The episode awakened a complacent Republican electorate settling in for a doom and gloom midterm election and gave Trump a cause to wield on a MAGA rally road show that returned several times to states like Tennessee, where Blackburn has more voters available to her than does Bredesen.
“There are some issues that repeatedly comes up is constitutional judges,” Blackburn told reporters on Tuesday, citing Kavanaugh as a defining issue of her campaign to succeed retiring Republican Sen. Bob Corker.
