Election Day brought a big blue earthquake of anti-Trump sentiment that rumbled as far inland as Kansas and shook GOP ground in the Carolinas and Texas. By the time late victories rolled in on Tuesday night, there had been so many wins that subsequent Democratic pickups had begun to feel more like aftershocks, even in states that haven’t voted blue since Bill Clinton was in the White House.

Florida narrowly missed the quake, with Republicans winning all the major statewide races by the thinnest of margins. The one-time quintessential purple state, a so-goes-the-nation bellwether with a relatively even amount of registered Republicans and Democrats, turned remarkably red in the Trump era following Barack Obama’s back-to-back wins in 2008 and 2012. The state legislature redrew its maps to enshrine a supermajority, and a post-Covid influx of GOP transplants seeking lower taxes and lax regulations shifted the balance significantly. A Democrat hasn’t made a fight of the governor’s race this decade, and no Democratic Senate candidate has come close to winning since Bill Nelson lost his reelection bid in 2018.

Angie Nixon felt different. The Jacksonville organizer and bookstore owner ran a proudly democratic socialist campaign, advocating for universal healthcare in a state beset by multiple insurance crises and affordability issues. Her polls looked good up to Election Day, and on Tuesday night, victories across the country made her race in the Sunshine State look winnable. Ultimately though, Nixon could not replicate the victories of other rabble-rousers like Dr. Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan and James Talarico in Texas. She lost to incumbent Ashley Moody, who was appointed by Gov. Ron DeSantis to fill the seat left vacant by Marco Rubio’s confirmation as secretary of state, by less than two percentage points. Moody outspent Nixon by more than double to barely eke out a majority. 

The Florida Democratic Party deserves some blame for being woefully behind the times. After a 2019 squeaker between DeSantis and the progressive Andrew Gillum, the party moved as fast as it could from any candidate that might excite its base. They ran a former Republican for governor in each of the last two gubernatorial races, no doubt depressing turnout and enthusiasm among the Democratic base with their moderate picks. 

But a close look at the rest of the Florida races reveals the culprit in Nixon’s narrow loss. Despite a gerrymander meant to calcify Republican supermajorities in the state and a political stiff in the form of David Jolly at the top of the ballot for governor, the GOP lost seats in the state legislature. The energy in Florida and, remarkably, throughout the South, was with anyone running against Republicans. The blame for Nixon’s defeat lies almost solely with national Democrats and their stubborn refusal to back Nixon with either messaging or money. 

Since her shock primary win in August, Nixon has complained about Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee recalcitrance to anyone who will listen. In September, she told MS NOW hosts Symone Sanders Townsend and Eugene Daniels that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was less than thrilled about her race.

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“When I did speak with Sen. Schumer on the phone, it was basically a ‘we will see,’” she said. “He’s going to look into it. That’s what was said, that he’s going to look into it.”

Nixon went on to say that Democrats were wary of throwing in behind a Black woman in the South following Kamala Harris’ 2024 loss: “Folks are a little gun-shy because, unfortunately, Vice President Harris lost as a Black woman, and so people are being very hesitant in terms of funding Black women, especially in the South.”

In later interviews, she claimed that national Democrats wrote off Florida in advance, declining to put money behind her candidacy because they believe the state is “racist.” 

The pale blue dots on Florida’s election map tell the story. The democratic socialist was able to win in Miami-Dade County, despite a Cuban-American population that shudders at anything that sounds like revolution. On the other end of the state, typically Republican Jacksonville swung to the left. An enthusiastic push in the state’s timidly liberal cities could have narrowed the gap in favor of Nixon and added tens of thousands of votes to her final total. According to analysis by Wesleyan Media Project, the national party and affiliated PACs spent 10 advertising dollars in Iowa for every one they spent in Florida in the race’s final weeks, and it showed. The Hawkeye State now has a new Democratic governor-elect and senator-elect.

It was the same story throughout the South. Democrats overperformed in states where the national party bothered to fight. Blue Texas became a reality because of seemingly unlimited spending — it was the most expensive Senate race in history — and national messaging hits on behalf of Talarico. Louisiana and Mississippi offered two incredibly close Senate races in states long assumed to be GOP strongholds. In Louisiana, Democrat Jamie Davis lost to Republican Julia Letlow by only two points. As New York Times contributing opinion writer Steven Rattner pointed out, Davis kept the race close despite receiving zero advertising dollars from the national party in October, per the WMP’s analysis.

Mississippi, though, could turn out to be a miracle — in spite of the DSCC. With 96% of precincts reporting, Democrat Scott Colom, a district attorney, leads the incumbent Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith by only 138 votes, with around 15,000 provisional ballots outstanding.

Speaking to Anderson Cooper on Wednesday, Mississippi state Rep. Cheikh Taylor, a Democrat, blamed the nail-biter on a lack of investment from the national party.

“Early money always helps. Monies have come to the state of Mississippi, just not through the traditional means, though the DNC. We all know that the Colom campaign was locked out of that $30 million contribution to U.S. Senate races,” he said. “Even though the money didn’t come, in Mississippi, we figure it out.”

Don’t get me wrong. Colom, Davis and Nixon all deserve praise for their stunning performances, even if at least two of them came up short. Tuesday night’s news offered a rare glimmer of hope in a bleak few years, but Democrats had a chance to permanently rebuke MAGA — and instead they squandered it based on their own misconceptions about the South.

Grabbing two more close races via some well-placed funding for the party’s nominees would have left them in a much better position to harry and harass the president and block his MAGA agenda over the next two years. All it would have taken was not capitulating in advance.

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In Mississippi, the midterms have exposed a contradiction rooted in the country’s most complicated and enduring legacies. 

Across the country, voters are making their way to the polls in the climax of a vitriolic midterm election cycle set against the backdrop of an electorate souring on Donald Trump and Republicans. Inflation is up, consumer confidence is down, gas and diesel prices are through the roof, largely due to the president’s war of choice in Iran. The cruelty of his MAGA agenda has roiled the country and left a bad taste even in the mouths of some of his erstwhile supporters. 

Each election is billed as being consequential; this one lives up to the hype. As we await the results, it’s worth taking note of several questions:

How big will the blue wave be?

A tsunami, a trickle — or something in the middle? All are possible, but signs are pointing to significant Democratic gains, likely up to 25 seats in the House, as well as a Senate majority. Dr. Abdul El-Sayed looks increasingly likely to win in Michigan, and James Talarico has Democratic hopes up in Texas. Senate races in Maine, Kansas, Iowa and Alaska are in play, and it’s worth keeping an eye on South Carolina, Mississippi and Louisiana as well.

One sign will come at 6 p.m. when polls close in Kentucky’s 6th Congressional District, where Democrat Zach Dembo is facing off against Republican Ralph Alvarado. Once a Democratic stronghold, the seat went Republican in 2012 and, despite a close call in 2018, has remained in GOP hands since. Although the district has been gerrymandered to favor Republicans, the energy on the ground is with Dembo. If he posts and maintains a healthy lead, look for significant Democratic gains to unfold throughout the night.

What effect did redistricting have on the GOP’s chances?

The midterms will be the first test of the GOP’s redistricting strategy, which saw the party redraw congressional districts in Florida, Texas and other states, partly in response to the gains Trump made with Black and Latino voters in 2024. But polls show those margins have been largely erased as the electorate has turned on the president after nearly two tumultuous years in office, while Democratic legislatures in California and Virginia have imposed their own gerrymanders. According to a Politico poll, the GOP increasingly sees the coalition that returned Trump to office as “crumbling,” and may have gained little or nothing from all this adventurous map-drawing.

Will progressives be bolstered or chastened?

The size of the blue wave could well come to be seen as a measure of progressives’ influence and power within the Democratic Party. Losses — or even narrow wins — by progressive candidates could be used as more evidence by the party’s establishment wing of the need to tack toward the middle ahead of the 2028 presidential election. Larger wins — and victories in unexpected places, such as Michigan’s 7th Congressional District where William Lawrence, co-founder of the Sunrise Movement, stands a real chance of unseating incumbent Republican Tom Barrett — would provide rocket fuel to the movement. 

Progressive groups are already on the offensive, getting a head start on spinning tonight’s election results, particularly in anticipation of a narrow El-Sayed win in Michigan. “Expect to hear narrow victories cited as evidence of weak electability,” a Progressive Change Campaign Committee memo obtained by Politico reads. “But a candidate’s first winning margin is not their electoral ceiling.”

Will the Haley Stevens drama matter in Michigan?

Haley Stevens, the Democratic congresswoman who narrowly lost to El-Sayed in Michigan’s Senate primary, has brought the drama in the race’s closing days. As late as Saturday night, she pledged to colleagues and friends that she was backing El-Sayed, only to turn up hours later at a church service with his Republican opponent Mike Rogers, and endorse the former congressman in a video. The cold-dish move has virtually drowned out El-Sayed’s closing message, with Stevens being formally kicked out of the Michigan Democratic Party.

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The question now is if any of it will matter, especially in light of a New York Times/Siena poll taken before Stevens’ move that showed El-Sayed leading Rogers by 11 points. Michigan Republicans seem to think it won’t, telling Politico they wish the congresswoman had crossed the aisle earlier. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report agrees, moving the race in their ratings to “Leans Democratic,” a shift that was already in the works before Stevens detonated her bomb. 

Still, the results in the state’s Democratic primary were far narrower than the polls showed, with El-Sayed besting Stevens by only 1%, or 14,893 votes. 

Will Elon Musk get his money’s worth?

The New York Times reported yesterday that the world’s first trillionaire has dropped a staggering $474 million this election cycle, an historic first. The amount has been spread out across a variety of groups, PACs and funds, but it doesn’t include the “dark-money donations” the Times reports he has also made. Most of the $168 million he contributed to the Senate Leadership Fund has served to shore up Ken Paxton, the GOP nominee for Senate in Texas, who is locked in a tight race with Talarico.

Musk has a lot riding on Tuesday’s results. Beyond the simple math of whether he got enough bang for his buck, there is also the issue of what will surely face him in the event of a Democratic congressional majority: investigations. If the blue wave materializes, Musk can expect congressional inquiries of his activities, including his reported interventions in Russia’s war against Ukraine and his leadership of DOGE during the early months of Trump’s second administration. 

Where will the surprises be?

Each election brings surprises. Think not one but both of Georgia’s Senate seats going to Democrats in 2020, or Republicans making big gains in New York two years later. 

This is the year we could hear the echo of Georgia’s 2020 election results in another Southern state. Despite boasting large Black populations, Senate seats in South Carolina, Mississippi and Louisiana have long been out of reach for Democrats. But there is now a path to victory for the party’s candidates in each of those states.

In South Carolina, the GOP incumbent Darline Graham, who was appointed to the seat at Donald Trump’s command following the death of her brother, Sen. Lindsey Graham, has proven to be a lackluster candidate, alarming even some Republicans with her performance in debates and on the stump. Democrat Annie Andrews has run a more nimble campaign, and between Graham’s performance and the national state of affairs, she appears to have narrowed the gap.

Mississippi’s incumbent GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith has also run a lazy campaign, expecting to coast to victory. But the national political environment under Trump, coupled with campaign gaffes, large Black turnout in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision to gut the Voting Rights Act and clever campaigning by Scott Colom, her Democratic opponent, have helped to put the race in play. 

Louisiana is also a wild card. The state, which is one-third African American, has also seen a surge in early voting among Black residents, and according to a recent poll, the race between Republican Julia Letlow and Democrat Jamie Davis, who is Black, is tied.

Polls are not predictive. The political history of these states continues to favor Republicans, but any of them could deliver one of 2026’s electoral surprises. If that happens, it will signal that the blue wave has become a blue tsunami.

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