GOP on track to maintain Senate control as most incumbents hold on

Senate President Susan Wagle, a conservative Republican from Wichita, has worked to unite the caucus after eight moderates flipped conservative Senate seats in the August primary.

“Not since the removal of the party lever vote have we seen such a turnout in a presidential year for Republicans“, House Minority Leader Themis Klarides, R-Derby, said, adding that House Republicans ran on their record of “fiscal sanity” and their “common sense” approach to government.

Republicans, who have held the House since 2011, went into the elections holding 246 seats to the Democrats’ 186. Nebraska’s single chamber is nonpartisan.

Before Tuesday’s election, Republicans held 68 of the nation’s statehouse chambers.

In Illinois, Democratic U.S. Representative Tammy Duckworth defeated Republican Senator Mark Kirk.

The GOP also increased its majority of governorships from 33 to 31.

Even if they wind up winning North Carolina, Democrats can take no similar comfort from the governors’ races.

Republican Sen. Carl Marcellino of Syosset won a tight race against Democrat James Gaughran of Northport for the 5th District.

Another effect of the Democratic takeover of the House is that two-term GOP Gov. Susana Martinez now faces the prospect of spending her final two years in office with a Democratic-controlled House and Senate. But in state after state, they fell short.

Democrats believe they’ll be able to keep control of the House.

The balance of power in the Legislature has everything to do with what we can expect out of Augusta in the next two years, which are the final two years of Republican Gov. Paul LePage’s tenure.

Republicans started the night with a 54-46 majority in the Senate and were on track to end up with at least 52 seats, presuming they win a December runoff in Louisiana, as expected. “Are we going to get it back or will it remain as it has been, under Republican control?” The House has been in Republican hands since 2011 and has been a bastion of resistance to Democratic President Barack Obama’s agenda. Bill Dix, the former Senate minority leader now in line to become the new Senate majority leader. Republicans, for the most part, will not need many Democratic partners to achieve their policy goals.

With a Democratic Speaker of the House.

The Kentucky House had been the last state chamber in the South with a Democratic majority.

Voters also elected a Republican to the state Supreme Court for the first time since 1980.

Republicans also won the Kentucky House for the first time in almost a century and reclaimed the Iowa Senate from Democrats, giving the GOP control of both legislative chambers and the governor’s offices in those states.

The Business Council hopes the Senate GOP will push reform of the state’s workers compensation system, which he said is expensive to businesses, as well as tax reform for small businesses.

Most legislative incumbents elsewhere in the state coasted to re-election after facing only token opposition.

Democratic control remains in the House with a 79-72 majority.

There were other states where Republicans padded the score.

While Democratic Party leaders were reveling in their wins in the state Senate and House, they were agonizing over the apparent defeat of Clinton, who had hoped to make history as the first woman to ascend to the Oval Office.

“I’m not sure what happened (Tuesday) night, but it’s pretty clear that the citizens of Iowa have spoken”, said Sen.

“If a Trump presidency at all resemble the Trump candidacy, Democrats nationwide will be buoyed by Republican backlash in the next two election cycles”, Carolyn Fiddler, a spokeswoman for the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, said in an email.