LONDON (AP) — World leaders who have sparred with the “America first” President Donald Trump greeted the rout of his Republican Party in the U.S. midterm elections with a measure of relief on Wednesday, allowing themselves to hope for a less combative U.S. foreign policy.
But that hope was seasoned with expectation that American voters’ rebuke would not necessarily end the U.S. conflict with Iran or change Trump’s policies on tariffs or his lukewarm-at-best support for Ukraine and America’s European allies.
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Cynthia Aguiilon Bernard reacts as they watch results at an election night event for Democratic Texas gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa in Austin, Texas, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis) ADDITION: Adds name
American flags are displayed ahead of Democratic congressional candidate Justin J. Pearson's election night watch party at New Direction Christian Church in Memphis, Tenn., Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Kevin Wurm)
Brayson James, 8, watches his father, Daniel Reeves, vote at the Emery Heights Community Center, Tuesday Nov. 3, 2026, during the midterm elections in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
A banner with a portrait of President Donald Trump is seen hung outside the Department of Justice, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
The sun rises behind the U.S. Capitol on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Allison Robbert)
Progressive politicians cast the results as part of a trend of liberal comebacks around the world, following recent defeats for populists on the right in Hungary, Brazil and Serbia.
Spain’s social democratic Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez wrote on X that Americans had voted “Against hate. Against machismo. Against climate denialism and against the privileges of the elites.”
“It happened in Brazil. It just happened in the US. And it will happen soon in Spain,” wrote Sánchez, who faces an election on Nov. 29.
Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said the majority of Americans had sent a clear message that “they have had enough of MAGA and now want a different course. Enough of polarization.”
British Prime Minister Andy Burnham expressed hope the election results would focus minds in Washington and other capitals on ending the Iran war, which has sent fuel prices soaring — a major source of frustration for voters.
“The world has an opportunity now to unite around the issue that is affecting us all, and that’s the cost of living,” Burnham said during a visit to the Commonwealth summit in Antigua. “But I can’t get people’s cost of living pressures down until the conflict in the Middle East is resolved.”
That and “the conflict in Ukraine started by Russia. These are the things we have to focus on now."
But others in Europe cautioned that, with Trump in power for two more years, there would be no quick change to American foreign policy, which has strained defense, economic and diplomatic alliances. The president has berated European leaders over everything from immigration to wind farms, roiled their economies with tariffs, threatened to pull the U.S. out of NATO and expressed a desire to take over Greenland, a semiautonomous territory of NATO ally Denmark.
Austrian Foreign Minister Beate Meinl-Reisinger said that “independently of the election outcome, our security and prosperity in Austria and Europe must not depend on how people in Kansas or Iowa vote. That’s why we are strengthening our own defense capability and our own competitiveness.”
Laurel Rapp, director of the U.S. and North America program at the Chatham House think tank, said there won’t be “a ‘we’re back’ moment in the U.S. relationship with Europe.”
“I don’t expect this will significantly change the administration’s approach to Europe,” she said. “It’s been a very transactional one, one that has deep skepticism about the value Europe can offer the U.S. in terms of a defense relationship.”
The United States’ immediate neighbors reserved judgment on whether the Republican defeat would smooth rocky relations with Washington.
“We must wait and see,” said Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum.
Canadian Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc said it’s not clear whether the election result will strengthen Ottawa’s hand in talks aimed at cooling a bitter trade war.
“I guess we’ll see in a few weeks,” when the new Congress takes over in January, he said.
But Ontario Premier Doug Ford, whose province has been battered by Trump’s tariffs on automobiles and steel, said the Democrats’ sweeping victory would give Canada “a little more leverage” and declared it a win for the country and the world.
“I was doing cartwheels down the street,” Ford said.
The Trump administration also has tried to pressure Ukraine to end a war that Russia started with its full-scale invasion in 2022. Ukraine accused Washington of delaying the delivery of vital interceptor missiles and reported that a temporary disruption to the Starlink and Starshield satellite internet service impeded its ability to defend against Russian attacks.
Last month, even as he fired insults at Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Trump waived sanctions on Russia even though Congress had overwhelmingly approved the measures as part of legislation aimed at supporting Ukraine.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday that Russia hoped Trump “will continue his peacemaking efforts” regardless of the election outcome.
A prominent German lawmaker urged Republicans to see the result in part as voters’ verdict on Trump’s “wrong foreign policy.”
Jürgen Hardt, a foreign policy spokesperson for the parliamentary group of Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s center-right bloc, told ARD television he hopes that Trump will “exercise more reason” on foreign affairs.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, who has been a target of Trump’s baseless claims that his government discriminates against the country’s white minority, said the Democrats taking control of both houses of Congress would “introduce a new era in world relations.”
But Rapp, from Chatham House, said that Congress will have an easier time constraining Trump domestically than in foreign policy.
“On a lot of the foreign policy tools in his tool kit, Trump retains a lot of latitude to use them at his will,” she said.
Gillies reported from Toronto. Associated Press writers Geir Moulson in Berlin, Suman Naishadham in Madrid, Claudia Ciobanu in Warsaw, Poland, Gerald Imray in Cape Town, South Africa, and María Verza in Mexico City contributed to this story.
Cynthia Aguiilon Bernard reacts as they watch results at an election night event for Democratic Texas gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa in Austin, Texas, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis) ADDITION: Adds name
American flags are displayed ahead of Democratic congressional candidate Justin J. Pearson's election night watch party at New Direction Christian Church in Memphis, Tenn., Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Kevin Wurm)
Brayson James, 8, watches his father, Daniel Reeves, vote at the Emery Heights Community Center, Tuesday Nov. 3, 2026, during the midterm elections in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
A banner with a portrait of President Donald Trump is seen hung outside the Department of Justice, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
The sun rises behind the U.S. Capitol on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Allison Robbert)
Democrats have won control of Congress in Tuesday’s 2026 midterm elections in a widespread repudiation of President Donald Trump and the Republican Party, a drubbing that reached deep into reliable GOP territory.
Democrats flipped at least seven Senate seats in ruby-red states and battlegrounds alike: Kansas, which hasn’t elected a Democratic senator in nearly a century, Iowa, Texas, Ohio, Maine, North Carolina and South Carolina. They held on to battleground seats in Georgia and Michigan. In the House, Democrats flipped more than two dozen districts, some that voted for Trump by double digits in 2024.
Democrats Keisha Lance Bottoms in Georgia, Amy Acton in Ohio, Rob Sand in Iowa and Gina Hinojosa in Texas won races for governor, flipping GOP-held offices.
Trump faces a profoundly reshaped Washington for the last two years of his presidency. Democrats will have the power to block his legislative agenda, reject his appointees and investigate his administration.
After telling voters repeatedly to “pretend I’m on the ballot,” Trump tried to shift the blame away from himself, saying Democrats “did a good job” in their campaigns and blaming GOP candidates for losses. Most voters appear to blame his administration for high costs and want Congress to impose more checks on him, according to The AP Voter Poll.
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Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff’s reelection has made him a national star for Democrats looking to stymie Trump’s final White House years.
A top Republican target and the only Senate Democrat seeking reelection in a state Trump carried in 2024, Ossoff became a staple of social media feeds as he raised more than $100 million, sparking speculation that he could run for the presidency in 2028.
“The American people have rebuked the depravity, corruption and incompetence of the failed lame duck president, Donald J. Trump,” Ossoff said. He added: “Together, we’ve affirmed that our task is not just to contain one president’s wickedness, but to heal the brokenness beneath.”
Democrat Kristina Knickerbocker has declared victory in her challenge to 12-term Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Turner of southwest Ohio.
The 35-year-old nurse practitioner delivered her remarks to supporters early Wednesday in the tight contest, whose result has not yet been called by The Associated Press. Turner has not conceded.
Knickerbocker said Tuesday’s election results represented everyday people standing up to the status quo in Washington.
“As an Air Force veteran and a mom of two young kids, I was so tired of watching families suffer needlessly because policies were built to hurt them, not protect them,” she said, adding she wants to see Ohio families “thrive, not just survive.”
Scalise will seek the leadership post after Speaker Johnson decided not to stay on as leader after Democrats trounced the GOP.
That’s according to a person familiar with Scalise’s thinking who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private plans.
Scalise, who represents Louisiana, is currently the House Majority Leader and is likely to face rival Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, who is also eyeing the leadership position.
Republicans are expected to hold their internal party elections next week.
Asked if he’d support Schumer to continue as leader in the new Congress, Van Hollen said Democrats needed to have a “full, open and honest discussion” about “where we want to take the party.”
“Whoever runs for leader should be able to lay out a clear vision about how we’re going to use this power for good,” the second-term Maryland senator told the AP in a telephone interview Wednesday.
Van Hollen has become a prominent voice among progressives, and he endorsed candidates in Democratic primaries over Schumer’s preferred picks.
He has talked about running for president and told AP that he was still “very actively kicking the tires on 2028.”
Sen.-elect James Talarico invoked a Biblical reference to describe how Democrats overcame money and other challenges to win in Texas.
“David wasn’t as big or as strong as Goliath, he didn’t have as many weapons, but he had hope, he had faith, and he had a slingshot,” he told a crowd of supporters in Austin. “The people of Texas were my slingshot. And tonight we defeated Goliath.”
“We just took back Texas. We just proved that all the money in the world is no match for the people of Texas. We just showed that a politics of division is no match for a politics of love,” he added.
In a lengthy online post, the vice president seemingly sought to distance himself from election results seen as a referendum on Trump that featured big Republican losses across the country.
“The reason we lost is the war,” Vance wrote, adding, “If you’d like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so. Argue it was a worthwhile cost to pay. Agree or disagree, that’s at least honest.”
Speaking on CNN Wednesday, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand — who has chaired Democrats’ Senate campaign arm for the midterms — expressed confidence that her party would work with Republicans to put an end to Trump-backed efforts like the war in Iran, which she called “unnecessary, unauthorized, unwanted.”
Asked how Democrats would turn back the president’s efforts without a veto-proof majority in the Senate, Gillibrand called Democratic efforts to clamp down on tariffs and improve elevated costs she traced to the war “common sense, arguably bipartisan ideas.”
Voters, she added, showed they are “fed up” by supporting Democratic candidates in states where Republicans had long held Senate seats, including Texas, Iowa and South Carolina.
Gillibrand said she “certainly” would back fellow New York Sen. Chuck Schumer as her party’s leader in the chamber.
Democrat Cindy Holscher has a lead of less than a percentage point over Republican Ty Masterson in the Kansas governor’s race.
Holscher’s 5,557-vote lead, with an estimated 98% of votes counted, comes after Democrat Adam Hamilton became the first member of his party to win a Senate seat in nearly a century.
Both Holscher and Masterson serve in the state Senate, where the latter serves as its president.
The Associated Press will only declare a winner when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow the trailing candidate to close the gap.
Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins has a 20-percentage-point lead over Republican Bernadette Wilson in Alaska’s governor’s race.
Kreiss-Tomkins’ share of the vote is 49.2% with an estimated 74% of ballots counted.
Under Alaska’s ranked choice voting system, the election advances to another round if no candidate gets more than 50% of the votes.
Troy Jackson, 58, a fifth-generation logger and former state Senate president, had a little more than 100 days to sell himself to Maine voters after he replaced Graham Platner as the party’s nominee in July.
“We had a party to unite, a movement to build and a senator to defeat,” Jackson said in his victory speech. “This morning, the people of Maine have elected that logger to the United States Senate.”
Democrat Mary Peltola has a 626-vote lead over Republican incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan in Alaska.
The Associated Press has not called the contest yet. If neither candidate gets more than 50% of the vote, then it will go to ranked choice voting under Alaska law.
Peltola’s share of the votes stood at 48.2% compared with 47.9% for Sullivan, with an estimated 74% of ballots counted.
The AP does not make projections and will only declare a winner when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow the trailing candidate to close the gap.
In his victory speech in Michigan’s Senate race, Abdul El-Sayed used the middle name Trump often invoked while telling voters they should fear the progressive Democrat.
“My name is Abdulrahman Mohamed Sayed, and I am so proud and honored to stand here as your senator-elect from the great state of Michigan,” he said.
Ron DeSantis, the outgoing Republican governor of Florida, said his state demonstrated how the GOP can win in a tough political environment.
“People can look at Florida and show how you can deliver big results and how you can build a durable coalition,” he said.
The state avoided the brunt of Democratic victories, electing Republicans to the governor’s office and U.S. Senate. But DeSantis, a potential 2028 presidential candidate, was clear about the party’s struggles nationally.
“It’s going to take time to dig out of the hole that was there,” he said.
DeSantis, a former congressman, added, “You’re going to see a lot more conflict between the Congress and the executive.”
He said the chances of a Democratic Congress approving Trump’s nominations to the Supreme Court or Cabinet agencies were “zero.”
Mississippi’s contest is one of two Senate races in which the outcome is still unclear.
Democratic candidate Scott Colom leads Republican incumbent Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith by 43 votes with an estimated 96% of votes counted.
The Associated Press has not declared a winner in the race yet.
The AP does not make projections and will only declare a winner when it’s determined there is no scenario that would allow the trailing candidate to close the gap.
Mississippi does not have an automatic recount process, but a challenger can seek a court order for one.
The Associated Press has also not called Alaska’s Senate contest between incumbent Republican Dan Sullivan and Democrat Mary Peltola.
Speaking in Italian, Pope Leo XIV told hundreds of faithful gathered in St. Peter’s Square that “the political community exists for the sake of the common good.”
“The exercise of political authority must always be directed towards the common good, which must be structured and operate according to local and historical circumstances, but always with the good of the entire human family at heart,” said Leo, the first pope to vote in a U.S. election.
“Oh man, wow, wow, wow,” the Senate minority leader said in his victory speech. “Against all odds, we Democrats have won the Senate!”
Schumer said Democrats recruited great candidates who focused their campaigns on costs, chaos and corruption, while Republicans embraced “the worst president ever.”
“Republicans made a choice and followed Trump over the cliff,” Schumer said. “We listened, they didn’t. And the American people reduced the red brick wall to a pile of bricks.”
Schumer closed with a warning to his own party: “Americans voted for change and now, Democrats must deliver.”
Methodist megachurch pastor Adam Hamilton’s defeat of Republican Sen. Roger Marshall is the first Democratic Senate win in Kansas since 1932.
“It’s pretty exciting to make history … but to me it’s really more a statement of what’s wrong,” Hamilton said. “Kansans voted overwhelmingly to say this is not OK.”
“I think the people in Kansas, Republicans and Democrats, are saying that what’s happening in Washington is not OK,” Hamilton said. “Kansans are also fed up with the way politicians divide us.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson will not seek election as House Republican leader following the Democrats’ win. That’s according to a person who spoke on condition of anonymity to disclose the plans.
Democrats are riding their sweep of Congress into a new era. They’re eager to meet voter demands for change with plans to tackle high costs of living and confront President Donald Trump’s final years in the White House.
The results of Tuesday’s midterm elections set up a moment of divided government. Democrats ousted Republicans from coast to coast and in many surprising places in between. Voters rejected the president’s party for the promise of something different.
Democrats increased their support with moderate voters, particularly in key Senate races where Democrats flipped Republican-held seats.
Roughly two-thirds of moderates supported the Democratic candidate in their local U.S. House race, an uptick from the approximately 6 in 10 moderate voters who backed Harris.
A large majority of moderate voters, about 8 in 10, said Congress was not doing enough to provide checks and balances on the presidency, and a similarly high share said they had experienced at least a “moderate” hardship in the past year because of inflation.
Many Democratic candidates benefited from significant moderate support. In Kansas, Democrat Adam Hamilton won about 7 in 10 moderate voters, a substantial rise from the roughly half that Harris won in 2024. There was a similar pattern in Iowa as Democrat Josh Turek won about two-thirds of moderates, up from about half for Harris.
Supporters cheer as Democratic gubernatorial candidate Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford speaks at an election night event Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher)
Guests attend an election night event for Republican Senate candidate Mike Collins, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Ryan Murphy)
Supporters check a phone at an election night event for Republican gubernatorial candidate Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Hollywood, Fla. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
A supporter of Wisconsin Democratic gubernatorial candidate David Crowley touches an "I voted" sticker at an election night event Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Milwaukee. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)
Jerry Lorimer votes at the Kanwaka township hall Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, near Lawrence, Kan. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)
