Image source, Getty Images

Scott Colom, the Democratic candidate for Mississippi's Senate seat, says he is "very happy" about where the race currently stands.

He tells a news conference: "I'm very confident about where we are and I'm very confident that we're going to win."

At 10:00 ET (15:00 GMT), only 43 votes separated Colom and Republican incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith for the seat, with 96% of the vote counted, according to AP.

Colom says that those who voted by affidavit ballots - also known as provisional ballots - due to problems such as not having voter ID available will have until 10 November to resolve any issues.

The Democrat's campaign earlier estimated there are 15,000 affidavit ballots that remain to be counted, the BBC's US partner CBS News reports.

The candidate says he does not want to estimate the time it will take for the count to be completed, but wishes to ensure the process is protected.

"We have got lawyers who are ready to make sure that the law is followed," he adds.

Image source, AP

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis says the Republicans have suffered "close to an extinction-level event" following their losses in the midterm elections.

Speaking during a news conference, the outgoing Republican governor says the results will have a "huge" impact and were "probably the political worst case scenario for a midterm election".

He says that keeping the US Senate "would have been a win", even if his party lost two or three seats.

"We knew it could be worse, but I don't think most of us thought it would be quite this bad," he says.

DeSantis adds the party is "in a deep hole nationally because of this election", but emphasises "this was a rejection of Republicans in Washington" and not voters taking a "positive view" of the Democrats.

The US Senate has undergone a "generational remake" that will have "huge consequences for history", the top Democrat in the chamber, Chuck Schumer, says.

Schumer, currently the minority leader in the Senate, says voters told Democrats that they wanted the party to address two primary issues: the cost of living and corruption in government.

"We have an amazing crop of new senators," Schumer says at a press conference in Washington. "What we have now seen is a generational remake of the Senate map that is going to change America."

Schumer says Democrats are also willing to launch investigations into US President Donald Trump.

"Whenever Trump defies the will of the American people or the law, we will launch investigations, take him to court and entangle him in legislative razor wire," he says.

"The days of Trump's supplicant Senate are over."

Asked how far the Democrats will go with investigations, Schumer says they need to take place because "there was such rampant corruption".

"But we're not going to take our eye of the ball," he says. "Number one: Reducing costs, ending corruption."

Grace Eliza Goodwin
US reporter

As we've been reporting, Vice-President JD Vance has shared a lengthy post on social media that gives his take on the Republican defeat in elections.

Here are some key points he made:

• The main problem, Vance says, was not that Republicans didn't turn out to vote - it was that "many people who voted for Trump/Vance in 2024 voted for Democrats in 2026"
• That's partly because "our economic messaging wasn't sharp enough"
• But what those former Trump voters cared most about was for Republicans to end the war in Iran, focus on inflation and the cost of living, put America first, and change the US relationship to Israel, Vance says, pointing to recent polling
• He also says he's open to the idea of changing immigration enforcement by focusing more on businesses that hire illegal labour
• The real reason Republicans lost is the war in Iran, he says, adding that Trump agrees

To those who are upset about the results of the midterms, Vance says: "Let’s take that anger and get back to the work of saving our country."

Vance offers blunt post-mortem on election resultspublished at 16:19 GMT

16:19 GMT

Daniel Bush
Washington correspondent

JD Vance believes the Iran war cost Republicans control of Congress. The vice-president says "the reason we lost is the war", in a lengthy election post-mortem statement that offers an unusually candid assessment of the midterm elections.

Vance acknowledges that the Iran war, rising costs and other issues led Republican voters who backed him and President Donald Trump in 2024 to abandon the party this year.

He also notes that voters took issue with the administration’s immigration agenda, and says he was open to some reforms.

Vance notes that Trump also singled out frustration over the war with Iran last night. Still, the US vice-president was more blunt than Trump after months of backing the war in public.

The statement immediately fuelled interest in Vance’s 2028 plans, as pundits speculate that he used the moment to signal his plans to run for the White House.

Vance has sidestepped that question up until now. But with the midterms in the rear-view mirror, he’ll face growing pressure to announce a decision soon.

US Vice-President JD Vance reacts to Republicans' midterm loss in a lengthy post on X, claiming the US war in Iran was the reason for his party's defeat.

"The reason we lost is the war," he says.

"Everyone knows why we lost," he goes on to say. "And any honest conversation about where we go from here must start there."

Image source, Getty Images

Grace Eliza Goodwin
US reporter

Image source, AFP via Getty Images

It may be weeks before we know the results of Alaska's Senate race - one of the most competitive in the country.

There, incumbent Republican incumbent Dan S Sullivan is running against Democratic candidate Mary Peltola and, in a twist that has stirred controversy, against an independent candidate named Daniel J Sullivan.

The expected delay is partly because Alaska has ranked-choice ballots, where voters can select more than one candidate in order of preference. And if a single candidate doesn't win a clear majority then the state recounts the ballots in a second round with the last-place candidate removed.

On top of that, Alaska allows 10 to 15 days for mailed ballots to be returned to the elections office.

"The results are not going to be fast, but Alaskans are patient," Peltola told supporters on election night.

It could take a while.

Democratic candidate Scott Colom is challenging Republican incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith for Mississippi's Senate seat.

At 10:00 ET (15:00 GMT), 43 votes separated the two candidates, with 96% of the vote counted, according to AP. The race is still too close to call.

While we may have a result today, it could also take several days for all the votes to be counted.

Read more: Democrat leads by fewer than 50 votes in surprisingly tight Mississippi Senate race

Image source, Reuters

Addressing supporters in Louisiana last night, Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson said: "Republicans will not be deterred by the outcome of one election. In fact, you know what we do? We double down."

He added that in the 2028 election Republicans would "take back the House and we will finish this job".

While Johnson, 54, won his race to return to the House, this morning he has said he will not run for House minority leader - which will become the top Republican post in the chamber once Democrats take control in January - according to reports.

Johnson has spent three years in the role, having replaced former Speaker Kevin McCarthy in October 2023 after a contentious selection process within the Republican party.

He began his career as a constitutional lawyer, spending close to 20 years in the profession before entering politics.

Grace Eliza Goodwin
US reporter

What do Republicans think of last night's Democratic victory? I asked one of the party's strategists.

Mark Bednar, who worked on the Trump-Vance transition team after the presidential election, tells the BBC it's clear his party "did not excite the Trump coalition that won a historic victory in 2024".

He says we can expect that with control of Congress, Democrats will use a lot of their energy to investigate - and possibly try to impeach - President Trump.

"But they will have their own internal fights that will only grow," Bednar adds.

And, he warns: "Republicans need to adjust to the reality that President Trump alone cannot be the driving force for voter turnout."

Image source, Getty Images

In an all-staff call this morning, Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson has confirmed he won't run for the minority leader position when Democrats take control of Congress in January, US media reports.

He added that he spoke with President Trump earlier this morning.

Addressing supporters in Louisiana last night, Johnson had said he was "disappointed" by the election's results.

Mitchell Labiak
Business reporter

US tech giants' share prices jumped on opening the morning after Democrats took both chambers of Congress, with Amazon, Microsoft, and Apple leaping 7.5%, 5.5%, and 5% respectively.

As a general rule investors like certainty, which is what a Democrat-controlled Congress could give US politics for the next two years.

But not all tech giants were winners.

Elon Musk's firms Tesla and SpaceX were down 4.9% and 3.4%, after many Democrats came out in opposition to the expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) data centres on the campaign trail.

Musk's relationship with Democrats could also be a factor. He spent millions in political donations against them in the midterms and he has been a vocal – and often controversial – critic of theirs for years.

As such, some investors might be considering what the erratic businessman's relationship with politics could mean for his companies when Democrats have so much control.

'This is a disaster': Angry Republicans blame Trump for defeatpublished at 14:53 GMT

14:53 GMT

Daniel Bush
Washington correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

"It's on him. It's not on anybody else. It's a total, complete rejection of President Trump," Republican lobbyist Bill Miller tells me, shortly after the midterm results became clear.

"This is a disaster of the first magnitude. Nobody saw it coming like this," he adds.

Inside the Republican Party, initial shock at the stunning election results on Tuesday night has quickly given way to anger with US president.

After Democrats won upset after upset in deep-red states like Texas, Kansas and South Carolina, some Republicans focused their ire on Trump, arguing that his focus on his legacy and indifference to voter concerns cost the party control of Congress.

"It was just one mistake after another," says Gregg Peppin, a Republican strategist in Minnesota, adding: "Clearly, in state after state, people did not like the president's policies."

A White House ally of Trump said anger with the president "is extremely high" after the Iran war, tariffs and the administration's immigration crackdown created a "perfect storm".

Mitchell Labiak
Business reporter

The S&P 500 index of the largest firms listed in the US opened up 1.13% following a series of historic wins for Democrats in the midterm elections.

Meanwhile, the tech-heavy Nasdaq index was up 1.17% on opening while the Dow Jones index was up 2.3%

Image source, Bloomberg via Getty Images

James Talarico, the Democrat who has flipped a crucial Texas Senate seat from Republicans, says one of his biggest priorities in Congress will be to "get big money out of our politics".

"Last night the people of Texas delivered a crystal clear message to the world's first trillionaire," he tells CBS, referencing Elon Musk, who poured more than $47m (£35m) into the campaign of Talarico's opponent, Republican Ken Paxton. "Texas is not for sale."

"We're all tired of these billionaires who own the algorithms, who own so many of the news networks, who own the politicians fighting on our screens," he adds.

Image source, CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

Now that Democrats have won a majority in the House of Representatives, Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, formerly the House Minority Leader, is poised to become the first black Speaker of the House.

Last night's blue wave was "an incredible victory for the American people all across the country, and a stunning rebuke [of] MAGA extremism", Jeffries tells MS Now's Joe Scarborough.

Responding to a question on what comes next for his party, Jeffries says "we won on affordability, and now it's our job to govern on affordability".

Turning to Congress, Scarborough asks about Trump's priorities for lawmakers.

Jeffries says the president needs to end the war in Iran, before the new Congress even takes power in January.

"That was clearly one of the messages that the American people decisively sent last evening," he says.

In the US House of Representatives, where all of its 435 seats were up for grabs in this election, there are still 68 that are yet to be confirmed.

The Democrats have so far won 228 seats, already comfortably past the 218 required for a majority, and have flipped 25 of those from the Republicans.

Image source, The White House/X

We're seeing the first remarks this morning from the White House in the wake of the Democrats' significant gains.

The official account for the White House posts an image of Trump leaning over the Resolute Desk, with a "public service announcement". Imposed on the image are the words: "PSA: Trump is still your president".

Trump reacted to the Republican defeat earlier today, conceding that Democrats "did a good job", while claiming Republican candidates would have done better had he been on the ballot.

Kayla Epstein
US reporter focused on election integrity

Last night, Trump acknowledged the Democrats’ wins, telling the New York Times,, external “I am absolutely willing to accept those results."

He also posted on Truth Social , externalthat if he was on the ballot, "We would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!"

Election law experts, voting rights advocates, and Democrats were prepared for the White House to potentially contest the results of the election.

Trump spent much of the year warning about voter fraud, external - which experts say is rare - and had previously claimed the 2020 election, which he lost to Joe Biden, was rigged against him.

The Justice Department launched unprecedented attempts to intervene in state election processes, and touted illegal non-citizen voting as a rampant issue despite evidence that this was rare.

But with the midterm results overwhelmingly in the Democrats' favour, that clamour from the administration has gone conspicuously quiet.

Despite a few technical hiccups in a handful of jurisdictions, so far it appears the election went very smoothly. That makes it very politically difficult to dispute the results.

Image source, Getty Images

Democratic governor of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro - who was comfortably re-elected on Tuesday - says the party's success in his state can be replicated elsewhere.

He describes the four candidates who ousted Republican incumbents in his state as "get-stuff-done Democrats" who attracted the support of Republicans, independents and Democrats.

"We showed last night, here in the toughest swing state in the entire country, that we elected candidates who could compete everywhere," he tells the BBC's US partner CBS News.

"I do think it's important that we have an ideological conversation with our family to determine what our party looks like going forward," he says.

"That's a healthy thing, and that's an important thing, and it needs to be done, with a focus on how we can deliver for people, how we can enable real fundamental change and reform in this country," he adds.