WASHINGTON (AP) — The strength of Democrats’ majorities in the House and Senate remains undetermined one week after Election Day as more than a dozen races are still too early to call Tuesday.
Democrats are on track to hold 54 Senate seats in January, but could pick up one or two more from Republicans as votes are counted in Alaska and Mississippi. With 255 seats in the House, Democrats will have their largest majority elected to the chamber since the 2008, with the potential to pick up several more seats as the remaining races are called.
Here’s a look at where things stand in some of the uncalled races:
Late in the afternoon Tuesday, Democrat Scott Colom was about 2,600 votes ahead of Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith in the race for Senate in Mississippi.
There are two key deadlines in the vote-counting process in Mississippi this week: Mail-in absentee ballots must be received by Tuesday, and counties are required to submit their certified election results — including tallies of provisional ballots — to the state by Friday.
It is unclear exactly how many ballots are left to count.
Unlike in some other states, there is no central vote reporting system for Mississippi, and few counties release election results online. Instead, Associated Press journalists and analysts communicate with each of the state’s 82 counties directly for the latest available information on vote counts.
The state will certify its results on Dec. 3.
On Monday, Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson said about 14,200 provisional ballots had been processed, of which about 80% were accepted, and about 2,700 mail-in absentee ballots had not yet been returned.
Mississippi does not have automatic recounts or permit candidates to request a recount. Recounts in the state are held only in the event of a court order. The AP may declare a winner in a race that is eligible for a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.
Democrat Mary Peltola led Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan by about 2,500 votes in Alaska's Senate race on Tuesday afternoon, with an estimated 76% of the vote counted. The results of some absentee ballots are expected to be released late Tuesday, though the final absentee ballots mailed back from outside the U.S. are accepted as late as Nov. 18, 15 days after Election Day.
Ranked choice voting could also affect the timeline. Peltola is just over 1 percentage point short of the majority needed to win outright. If neither candidate wins a majority, the race will proceed to ranked choice tabulation on Nov. 18. The state's “target date” for certifying the election results is Nov. 25.
Recounts in Alaska are automatic only in the event of a tie vote. Candidates may also request a recount within five days of the state's certification.
In most of the House races that have not been called, the margin between the leading candidates was less than 1 percentage point among votes counted as of late Tuesday afternoon.
In North Carolina, four races remain undecided, the most of any state, and Republican incumbents were being challenged in all. There are no automatic recounts in North Carolina, but candidates may request a recount if the margin between candidates is 1% or less of the total votes. The state must receive the recount request by noon Eastern time Nov. 17, two business days after the county canvass in the state. The state is scheduled to certify its results Nov. 24.
In California, only one of the remaining House races, in the 23rd District, will affect the chamber's balance of power. The other uncalled races are between two Democrats. Mail ballots must be received by Tuesday and counties must certify their results Dec. 3. The state will certify its results Dec. 11.
In South Carolina's 2nd District, a recount is ongoing in the race between Republican incumbent Joe Wilson and Democrat Zyon Khalia. Wilson led Khalia by only about 3,000 votes in the original tally by late Tuesday afternoon, when 99% of the votes had been counted.
In Minnesota's 1st District, the race was still undecided late in the afternoon Tuesday, with about 300 votes separating the top two candidates and an estimated 99% of votes counted. Recounts are not automatic in Minnesota, but a candidate can request a publicly-funded recount if the margin between the winning and losing candidates is less than 0.25% of the vote.
In Tennessee’s 4th District, about 300 votes lay between Democrat Victoria Broderick and Republican incumbent Scott DesJarlais as of late afternoon Tuesday. In that state, recounts are held only as part of a legal challenge in the courts. There are no automatic recounts, and losing candidates may not request recounts.
Democratic state Sen. Cindy Holscher led state Republican Senate President Ty Masterson in the race for governor of Kansas by less than 1 percentage point late Tuesday afternoon. On Nov. 4, the state announced that a close-race audit of election results requiring a hand count of selected ballots had been triggered in six close Kansas races, including the gubernatorial race. The audit must be completed before Nov. 16, the day by which counties must certify their results.
In the race for governor of Alaska, only about 76% of votes were estimated to have been counted late Tuesday afternoon, and the Democratic candidate, Jonathan S. Kreiss‑Tomkins was leading Bernadette M. Wilson by about 45,000 votes, 49.6% to 28.9%. The race will advance to ranked choice tabulation if no candidate receives more than 50% of votes.
Ballot bags are piled on the floor, Monday, Nov. 9, 2026, at the Rankin County Election Commission in Brandon, Miss., as the U.S. Senate race between Democratic candidate Scott Colom and the incumbent Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith remains uncalled. (AP Photo/Ellen Schmidt)
A stack of mail-in ballots are seen at the Anchorage Region II Elections Office, Thursday, Nov. 5, 2026, in Anchorage, Alaska. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Pope Leo XIV urged Argentines on Tuesday to follow the holy example of the country's best-known saints as he drew an estimated 650,000 people to the central city of Córdoba for Mass and an estimated 1 million more for a nighttime vigil in the capital Buenos Aires.
Faithful from all over Argentina drove hours to be on hand for the Córdoba service, from the farthest north of the country to southern Patagonia and points in between. After nearly 40 years without a papal visit, Córdoba was chosen to host Leo because of its central location.
Leo told them that Córdoba was a “land of saints,” home to some of Argentina’s best-known missionaries. They include St. José Gabriel del Rosario Brochero, known as the “ Gaucho priest,” and “Mama Antula,” who in 2024 became Argentina’s first female saint. They were both canonized by the Argentine Pope Francis.
Leo urged Argentines today to follow their example.
“We are all called to holiness,” he said. "These saints and blesseds have already fulfilled their mission on Earth. Today, it is our turn to follow the radiant example of holiness they have left with us.”
Late Tuesday, Leo presided over a massive youth vigil at the Monumento de los Españoles, an intersection of Buenos Aires' grand boulevards that were packed for the nighttime vigil. It was the same place where Leo drew 2.5 million people on Monday for his main Mass in Buenos Aires, a record for his still-young pontificate.
The Vatican estimated 1 million people had turned out for the nighttime vigil.
“We young people lack motivation," said Emilia Caroti, who found a spot to watch the pope's vigil from a nearby park, where large screens were broadcasting for the overflow crowd.
"We are a generation that is deeply marked by what we see from the past and the little hope there is for the future, and we hope the Pope can renew our faith in ourselves a bit, that he leaves a message of motivation.”
The site for the Córdoba liturgy was the grounds of the Argentine Aircraft Factory, a plant run by the air force for much of the 20th century that built the attack planes Argentina’s military first used in late 1975 to strike leftist guerrillas.
That counterinsurgency campaign was a prelude to the state terror unleashed under the 1976-1983 military dictatorship, in which human rights groups estimate that around 30,000 people were killed or disappeared.
After Mass, Leo met privately with 20 people chosen by the archbishop, among them Alba Camargo, whose father, stepmother, aunt and uncle all disappeared under Argentina’s 1976-1983 military dictatorship.
Camargo said she told the pope she had come on behalf of relatives still searching for victims’ remains at La Perla, a former clandestine detention center outside Córdoba, and handed him a folder with photos of the excavations and the names of those identified so far.
“He was nodding, as if he knew all about it, and, looking deep in my eyes, took me by the hand and blessed the Franciscan crosses I had brought him,” she told The Associated Press.
Many others in the group, which included a rural worker, a soup kitchen organizer and a human trafficking survivor, were so overcome with emotion they could barely speak, she said. “It was unbelievably powerful to feel him so human, listening to you like that from 15 centimeters away.”
Camargo, 64, who herself was detained by security forces in 1976 at age 13, said the mere meeting was a "gesture showing that he sees us.”
Two weeks ago, forensic anthropologists found and identified the remains of nine missing people from La Perla, one of the dictatorship’s largest clandestine detention and torture centers.
Camargo said that she hoped Tuesday’s meeting “would bring change” at a time when President Javier Milei’s government has gutted funding for dictatorship memorial sites and organizations searching for the disappeared, and has promoted a revisionist account that casts the military’s crimes as little more than excesses in a war against leftist guerrillas.
“It’s exhausting to have people constantly telling you that what you’ve lived through your entire life isn’t true,” Camargo said.
Leo has only made a passing reference to the dictatorship while in Argentina. In his first speech delivered Sunday to President Javier Milei and government authorities, he spoke of Argentina’s history that included “reasons for gratitude and painful memories.”
He said then that it was up to each generation to “discern what deserves to be preserved, to confront past injustices and to add to its shared material and spiritual patrimony,” in comments seen as referring to the dictatorship.
While Leo’s Córdoba homily focused on faith and holiness Tuesday, his more pointed social calls during his first two days in Argentina were still reverberating in Buenos Aires.
Four senators from Milei’s party began preparing Tuesday to take up a stalled bill banning online gambling ads, which Milei has opposed and the church has promoted as a way to protect children. Argentina’s top diplomat defended the administration’s record against critics interpreting the pope’s words as a rebuke of Milei’s austerity, insisting Leo’s message to protect the vulnerable was meant for everyone.
But Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno also acknowledged that his remarks exposed the country’s shortcomings.
"It challenges the entire political class, the leadership class, it challenges us as a society and delivers a message about what we lack,” Quirno told Argentine TV channel TN. “We are working every day to address the pope’s message and what we lack.”
Visual journalist Cristian Kovadloff contributed from Buenos Aires.
Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
A faithful wearing sunglasses bearing the words "Pope Leo 2026" waits for the start of a youth prayer vigil led by Pope Leo XIV in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
Faithful with for Pope Leo XIV to lead a youth prayer vigil at Monumento de los Españoles in Buenos Aires, on the fifth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV waves from a balcony of the archbishop's residence in Cordoba, Argentina, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Gustavo Garello)
Pope Leo XIV addressed the faithful from a balcony of the archbishop's residence in Cordoba, Argentina, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Gustavo Garello)
Pope Leo XIV arrives to preside over Mass at the grounds of the Military Aviation School in Córdoba, Argentina, on the fifth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Members of the Catholic clergy attend a Mass presided over by Pope Leo XIV at the Military Aviation School in Córdoba, Argentina, on the fifth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Members of the Catholic clergy attend a Mass presided over by Pope Leo XIV at the Military Aviation School in Córdoba, Argentina, on the fifth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV arrives to preside over Mass at the grounds of the Military Aviation School in Córdoba, Argentina, on the fifth day of his twelve-day apostolic journey to South America, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Pope Leo XIV waves from a balcony of the archbishop's residence in Cordoba, Argentina, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Gustavo Garello)
Pope Leo XIV arrives to preside over Mass at the grounds of the Military Aviation School in Cordoba, Argentina, Tuesday, Nov. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Nicolas Aguilera)
