Democrats rode a wave of discontent — both for the economy and President Donald Trump — and gained control of the Senate once again, making gains in places that just two years ago would have been unthinkable.
Kansas, South Carolina, Iowa are just a few of the Republican strongholds where insurgent Democrats not only won but did so with notable margins – with notable shifts in key demographic groups and voting blocs.
Here’s how we got here:
Georgia
Democrat Jon Ossoff is projected to win reelection to the U.S. Senate, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Ossoff, who narrowly won his Senate seat in a runoff election in 2021, earned more support from Georgia voters in this year’s race, winning the support of around 6 in 10 voters across the state.
Ossoff was able to improve his vote margins among white voters by about 10 percentage points compared to Democrat Raphael Warnock’s victory in 2022.
Younger voters helped propel Ossoff to victory in the 2026 Georgia Senate race, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Voters under 30 widened their support for a Democrat, from 21 points in 2022 to 69 points now. While 45 to 64-year-olds supported the Republican candidate by 8 percentage points in 2022, they supported Ossoff by a similar margin this year, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Ossoff was able to win solidly among independents, who make up 3 in 10 voters in the Georgia electorate, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Roughly 6 in 10 independents voted for Ossoff over his Republican challenger, Collins.
Ossoff built support among white voters in the 2026 election compared to Warnock in 2022. Roughly 4 in 10 white voters backed Ossoff in this year’s race (39%), while 29% supported Warnock back in 2022.
About 3 in 10 Georgia Senate voters say they are angry about the way things are going in the country today according to ABC News Voter polls. Around 9 in 10 Georgia gubernatorial voters who said they were angry about the country’s state of affairs supported Ossoff.
According to ABC News Voter Polls, about three-quarters of Georgia Senate voters rate the economy negatively, including about a third who say the economy is poor. Roughly 9 in 10 voters who describe the nation’s economy as poor voted for Ossoff in the 2026 Senate election.
According to ABC News Voter Polls, about 6 in 10 Georgia Senate voters disapprove of the way Trump is handling his job as president, including about half of voters who strongly disapprove. Roughly 9 in 10 voters who disapprove of Trump backed Ossoff in this year’s race.
South Carolina
Democrat Annie Andrews is projected to have defeated Republican Sen. Darline Graham, who held the seat after her brother, longtime Sen. Lindsey Graham, died in June.
Black voters in South Carolina supported Andrews over Graham by an 83% to 14% margin, according to ABC News Voter Polls, almost identical to the margin that Matthews had over Scott in 2022 when Black voters made up 22% of the electorate.
But white voters shifted heavily toward the Democrat this year. In 2022, white voters supported Republican Tim Scott by 54 percentage points. This time they supported Graham by only 14 points.
Women backed Andrews over Graham by just over 10 percentage points, according to ABC Voter Polls. In 2022, women backed Scott by 18 percentage points. While Graham won men this year, her margin was in the single digits — compared to a 34-point margin in favor of Scott four years ago. Among white men, in particular, Graham’s margin was around 20 percentage points — down from a 58-point margin for the Republican in 2022.
Roughly 4 in 10 South Carolina voters are 65 and older, and they backed Graham by 10 percentage points over Andrews, according to ABC Voter Polls. But that margin is much narrower than the 32 point margin that Scott held among these older voters in 2022.
Roughly 1 in 10 Trump voters in 2024 crossed over to vote for Andrews this year. Almost none of Kamala Harris’s 2024 voters supported Graham, according to ABC News Voter Polls.
College graduates backed Andrews by a margin of 17 points, according to ABC News Voter Polls. That was a flip from 2020 when 57% of college graduates voted for Lindsey Graham. In 2022, Scott won college graduates by 23 percentage points.
Suburban voters in South Carolina broke toward Andrews by 8 percentage points according to ABC News Voter Polls. In 2022, suburban voters favored Scott by 24 percentage points. Urban voters backed Andrews by a 27 point margin, more than double the margin from 2022.
Iowa
Josh Turek is projected to win the Iowa Senate race, becoming the first Democrat to represent Iowa in the upper chamber since Tom Harkin was elected in 2008. His victory was propelled by strength among independents and by peeling off enough Trump 2024 voters.
Self-identified independents in Iowa prefer Turek by around 20 percentage points, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Party-switching among Democrats and Republicans is relatively muted, though Turek captured more Republicans than Democrats who voted for GOP candidate Ashley Hinson.
About 1 in 10 Iowa Senate voters who backed Trump in 2024 crossed over to Turek, while few Harris voters supported Hinson, according to ABC News Voter Polls.
Male voters in Iowa back Hinson by about 10 percentage points, while women support Democrat Josh Turek by a similar margin, according to ABC News Voter Polls. In 2022, Republican Chuck Grassley carried men by 24 points and women by 3 points.
In 2022, Iowa Senate voters under 30 were the only age group to back Democrat Michael Franken over Grassley by 9 percentage points. This year, voters aged 18 to 29 supported Turek by around a 2-to-1 margin, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Voters aged 30 to 44 also prefer Turek by about 10 points, those aged 45 to 64 back Hinson by around the same margin, and voters 65 and older are roughly evenly split between the candidates.
Ohio
Democrat Sherrod Brown is projected to win the Ohio Senate seat over Republican John Husted and retake the seat he lost in 2024. Here’s how he built a winning coalition.
Ohio voters tonight were extremely negative about the state of the economy, frustrated with Trump’s tariffs and concerned about high costs, which a majority blamed on Trump, according to ABC Voter Polls. And Brown won big among the more economically disenchanted. He was also able to capitalize on the roughly 6 in 10 who said Husted was too supportive of Trump, gaining ground relative to his 2024 margins among most key demographic groups.
Brown won female voters in Ohio by roughly 15 percentage points over Husted, according to ABC Voter Polls. In 2024, women split about evenly between Brown and Republican Bernie Moreno. While Brown narrowly lost men, the margin was somewhat smaller than the 9 points by which he lost men in 2024.
Brown won voters under 30 by more than 40 percentage points, according to ABC Voter Polls — a sharp reversal from 2024 when voters under 30 backed Moreno by 4 percentage points. He also won voters ages 30 to 44 by roughly 30 points, compared with his 2-point margin in 2024. He carried those ages 45 to 64 by a very slim margin — a group he lost by 10 points two years ago. This year, though, he lost ground among voters ages 65 and older compared with 2024.
Independents backed Brown over Husted by 26 percentage points, according to ABC Voter Polls. This is a sizable increase over his margin with this group in 2024 (+9) and 2018 (+12), according to Edison. Brown also won nearly all Democrats and around 1 in 10 Republicans.
White Ohio voters supported the Republican Senate candidate by at least 10 percentage points in each of the last two cycles. But tonight, white voters broke nearly evenly according to ABC Voter Polls — returning to margins last seen in the 2018 midterms.
Brown’s margin among Black voters also increased from 71 points in 2024 to 82 points this year, according to ABC Voter Polls.
Ohio voters with a college degree backed Democrat Sherrod Brown by about 20 percentage points, according to ABC News Voter Polls. This is a slight improvement over his 14-point margin with this group in both 2024 and 2018. While he lost voters without a college degree to Republican John Husted by single digits, this improved substantially over the 14 points by which he lost this group in 2024.
Kansas
Democrat Adam Hamilton is projected to become the first Democrat to be elected to the U.S. Senate from Kansas since 1932. Here’s how he beat incumbent Republican Sen. Roger Marshall to win the seat.
Four in 10 Kansas Senate voters say they are angry about the way things are going in the country today, according to ABC News Voter Polls, and they supported Hamilton over Marshall by roughly an 80-point margin. Another roughly third are dissatisfied and they split their vote according to ABC News Voter Polls.
Nearly 6 in 10 Kansas Senate voters disapprove of Trump, including about half who strongly disapprove and they widely supported Hamilton over Marshall, according to ABC News Voter Polls.
About 4 in 10 voters in Kansas are Republicans and over 8 in 10 of them voted for Marshall, according to ABC News Voter Polls — but 12% of them split off to vote for Hamilton and nearly all Democrats supported Hamilton. Independents split for the Democrat by a more than 2-to-1 margin, according to Voter Polls.
Women supported Hamilton by a 10-percentage point margin and men supported Marshall by a 2-point margin, according to ABC News Voter Polls. In the 2022 election, both men and women supported Republican Jerry Moran by double-digit margins and he won his third term to the U.S. Senate by a wide margin. In 2020, when Marshall beat Democrat Barbara Bolinger for the U.S. Senate, men supported Marshall by 22 points, but Kansas women were about evenly split.
Essentially all of the Kansas voters who voted for Kamala Harris in 2024 supported Hamilton, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Trump voters were not as united around Marshall, with 10% of them peeling off for Hamilton.
Texas
Democrat James Talarico, an educator and member of the Texas House of Representatives, was projected to defeat Republican Ken Paxton. Talarico was propelled to victory by younger voters. Roughly 8 in 10 voters ages 18-29 (79%) supported Talarico in this year’s race, compared with about half of 18 to 29-year-olds who supported Democrat Collin Allred in 2024.
In the Texas Senate race, 58% of female voters supported Talarico, while men were roughly evenly split in their vote, according to ABC News Voter Polls. In the 2024 Texas Senate race, male voters favored Republican Ted Cruz by an 18 percentage point margin over Allred while women were about evenly split between candidates.
Talarico gained among Black and Hispanic Texans during his 2026 Senate victory, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Nine in 10 Black voters and two-thirds of Hispanic Texans supported Talarico over Paxton. This is roughly 10 percentage points higher than the shares Allred received from these groups during his 2024 candidacy for Senate.
Roughly 7 in 10 Texas Senate voters (71%) rated the economy negatively, including 34% who rated the economy as poor according to ABC News Voter Polls. Among voters who evaluated the economy negatively, 72% voted for Talarico.
About 4 in 10 Texas Senate voters (41%) said the economy was the top issue facing the country, while 29% said the state of democracy, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Voters who viewed democracy as the most important issue favored Talarico by a roughly 3-to-1 margin, while Talarico won economy-focused voters by a double-digit margin.
Nearly 6 in 10 Texas Senate voters disapproved of Trump, including half who disapproved strongly, and those voters supported Talarico by wide margins.
About twice as many Texas Senate voters said they were worse off (43%) than better off (20%) compared with two years ago, according to ABC News Voter Polls. Among voters who said their financial situation has worsened, 77% voted for Talarico.
-ABC News’ Sofi Sinovich, Bianca DiJulio, Alauna Safarpour and Will Lennon contributed to this report.
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