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Hochul defeats Republican challenger for New York governor

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) is projected to defeat Republican nominee Lee Zeldin and win her first full term in the governor’s mansion.

NBC News and ABC News called the race for Hochul shortly after 11 p.m. E.T.

Headed into Election Day, Hochul was leading Zeldin, a Trump-endorsed congressional lawmaker, by just a few points. The race was largely seen as a toss-up in the final stretch.

Hochul was the lieutenant governor under former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), who stepped down last fall amid allegations of sexual harassment and accusations he covered up nursing home deaths during the pandemic.

When she filled Cuomo’s spot, Hochul became the state’s first female governor.

Her reelection campaign got off to a rocky start after the April resignation of Lt. Gov. Brian Benjamin (D), who was charged by the FBI in a corruption scandal.

Hochul spent her first year as governor tackling a number of issues, including expanding access to reproductive health care over the spring as the Supreme Court was poised to overturn the constitutional right to abortion.

She also signed into law over the summer major gun control legislation, bolstering restrictions on the permitting process for concealed carry firearms.

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Trump-backed Vance wins Ohio Senate seat

Republican candidate J.D. Vance, who received former President Trump’s endorsement in a crowded primary race earlier this year, was projected Tuesday to win the Ohio Senate race. 

NBC News and ABC News both called the race.

Vance defeated 20-year Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio), who represents Akron and Youngstown, and made the contest surprisingly close by appealing to swing voters in eastern Ohio.  

Republican J.D. Vance was projected to win the Ohio Senate race against Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio). (Associated Press)

Trump played a key role in the race by endorsing Vance in the Republican primary, where he came from behind to defeat for state Treasurer Josh Mandel and businessman Mike Gibbons.  

Vance, the author of the best-selling book, “Hillbilly Elegy,” was stuck in single digits in the polls and third place before he stormed to the front of the pack in the primary, buoyed by Trump’s endorsement and the damage that Mandel and Gibbons inflicted on each other with personal attacks.  

Vance has criticized Trump in the past, telling interviewer Charlie Rose in 2016 that he was “a Never Trump guy” and “never liked him.”  

But Vance decided to embrace Trump during the primary and praised him in April as “the best president of my lifetime.” 

Trump has reveled in Vance’s turnaround.  

“J.D. is kissing my ass he wants my support so much,” Trump quipped at a recent campaign rally in Youngstown. 

Vance, who was a vocal critic of former President Trump’s in the past, embraced him wholeheartedly during his Senate campaign. (Associated Press)

Vance has taken shots at other Republican leaders and embraced Trump’s false claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 presidential election. 

“I think the fundamental problem is we had a massive effort to shift the election by very powerful people in this country,” he told Spectrum News in January. “I don’t care whether you say it’s rigged, whether you say it’s stolen, like I’ll say what I’m going to say about it.”  

He declared at a rally with Trump in April that “we’ve got a ridiculous leadership even on the Republican side that tries to undo some of the best things that Donald Trump did over the past four years.”  

Vance declined to commit to voting for Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) when asked about a potential Senate leadership race at a Fox News townhall event, only saying: “We’ll see what happens when I get to Washington, D.C.” 

McConnell, however, raised millions of dollars for Vance through an aligned super PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund, which poured more than $30 million into the Ohio Senate race.  

Another group affiliated with McConnell, One Nation, announced a $3.8 million multi-week ad buy in August to help Vance.  

The influx of spending from outside groups helped offset Vance’s lackluster fundraising performance.  

The Ohio Senate race remained tight through much of the fall, but Vance expanded his lead in the days leading up to the election. (Associated Press)

Vance raised $12.8 million during his Senate campaign while Ryan raised $48.1 million, according to the most recent public data posted online by the Federal Election Commission.  

The fundraising discrepancy drew criticisms from Republican strategists in Washington who wondered why Vance wasn’t raising more money and doing better in the polls.  

The race was close to even for much of October with the two candidates in a statistical dead heat, according to an average of polls compiled by Real Clear Politics.  

Vance appeared to widen his lead in the final week of the campaign with polls by Republican-leaning Trafalgar Group and Democratic-leaning Data for Progress both showing Vance ahead by 10 points.  

He pledged last week to accept the outcome of the Ohio race, which he said he expected to win.  

“I expect to win,” Vance said at a town hall event in Columbus. “But of course, if thing don’t go the way that I expect, I’ll support the guy who wins and I’ll try to be as supportive as possibly can, even accepting that we’re going to disagree on some big issues.” 

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Hassan wins critical New Hampshire Senate race

Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) is projected to win a second term representing the Granite State, fending off Republican challenger Don Bolduc in a key victory for Democrats.

NBC News and ABC News both called the race.

The victory allows Democrats, whose hopes of keeping the Senate would have been diminished with the loss of the seat, some breathing room as they wait for answers in other key swing states.

Sen. Maggie Hassan’s (D-N.H.) victory gives Democrats some breathing room in their goal of retaining Senate control. (Associated Press)

Republicans had long seen New Hampshire as a prime pick-up opportunity going into 2022, but Hassan maintained a solid polling lead through much of the campaign after GOP voters nominated Bolduc, a retired Army general aligned with former President Trump.

The state’s Republican governor and other GOP moderates during the primary had voiced opposition to Bolduc, who repeated Trump’s claims about his 2020 loss and questioned New Hampshire’s elections. 

At one point this fall national Republicans withdrew funding from the campaign, seemingly writing the seat off and focusing their energies on races in Pennsylvania and Georgia. 

Hassan’s Republican opponent Don Bolduc received criticism from GOP moderates during his primary for supporting former President Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. (Associated Press)

But Bolduc tacked closer to the center during the general election campaign, the Republican establishment came to his side and polls in the state tightened considerably in the closing weeks of the campaign. That, combined with a favorable political climate for Republicans, fueled hope among some in the GOP that Bolduc could pull off an upset.

Senate Republicans’ campaign arm late last month jumped back into the race with a new seven-figure investment.

But those efforts ultimately did not pay off on Tuesday, with Republicans failing to take back the Senate seat they controlled as recently as 2017.

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Florida shifts from swing state to solid GOP

Florida is looking more like a red state than ever.

The nation’s one-time premier swing state was the site on Tuesday of a series of Republican victories that appear likely to raise questions about whether the Sunshine State remains competitive for Democrats.

The two Republicans at the top of the ballot, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, routed their Democratic opponents, Rep. Val Demings (D-Fla.) and former Rep. Charlie Crist (D-Fla.), early Tuesday evening. 

Most striking were the Republican victories in Miami-Dade County, a traditional Democratic stronghold in South Florida. 

Florida’s rightward trend has been years in the making. In 2016, for instance, then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton won Miami-Dade County by more than 29 percent of the vote. In 2020, President Biden carried it by just little more than 7 points.

Both years, former President Donald Trump carried the state overall. 

Since then, things have only gotten more bleak for Democrats. About a year ago, Republicans surpassed Democrats in voting registrations for the first time in the state’s modern political history. That advantage has grown to more than 300,000.

At the same time, Florida saw itself stripped of several competitive congressional districts this year after the Republican-controlled state legislature approved a new political map pushed by DeSantis that created four new GOP-leaning seats.

Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.) on Tuesday soundly defeated state Sen. Annette Taddeo in Florida’s Miami-based 27th District, the most competitive House district in the state. Democrats also lost in Florida’s 13th District, which was previously represented by Crist. That district was made less competitive for Democrats under the new congressional map. 

Florida Democrats, meanwhile, have been roiled by internal disputes and fundraising woes for years. The state party found itself in a financial crisis two years ago that ultimately resulted in it allowing its employees’ health insurance lapse.

Florida Democrats elected their current party chair Manny Diaz early last year, hoping the former Miami mayor could leverage his political ties to rebuild the struggling party. But despite his efforts, national donors and outside groups were reluctant to invest in Florida, given the state’s trend toward Republicans.

Some Florida Democrats have long complained about the state party’s organizing efforts. Thomas Kennedy, a Democratic National Committee member from Florida, acknowledged that it would take years to rebuild the Florida Democratic Party, but accused the current leadership of neglecting to even try.

“A lot of us are realistic,” he said. “We didn’t expect all the problems to be fixed in two years and we all know how midterm elections go for the party in power. But it’s the lack of trying and lack of energy that’s bothering a lot of us.”

In a pre-election night memo to party leaders, even Diaz himself appeared to acknowledge the lack of interest in Florida’s midterm elections from national Democrats, saying “every pundit, prognosticator and many Democratic leaders counted Florida out.”

But Republicans also spent years building up their political muscle in Florida through year-round voter registration efforts and outreach programs. The state also became something of an epicenter for Republican politics in recent years; Trump now lives in the state, while DeSantis actively branded it as a refuge from pandemic-related restrictions during the COVID-19 outbreak.

Even before the election results were called on Tuesday, some Florida Democrats were already expressing dismay about their party’s prospects in the state. Kevin Cate, a longtime Democratic strategist and ad-maker in Florida, predicted that in just a few years, an independent gubernatorial candidate might have better odds of winning an election than a Democrat.

“At the rate Florida is going, an NPA candidate for governor may have a better shot than a Democrat in 2026,” Cate tweeted. “It’s that bad. Complete collapse.” 

“We either reset or go extinct,” he wrote. 

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Marjorie Taylor Greene glides to reelection

GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene is projected to easily win reelection on Tuesday, fending off a challenge from Democrat Marcus Flowers, an Army veteran, to secure a second term in Georgia’s deep-red 14th Congressional District.

The Associated Press called the race at 8:55 p.m.

In just two years on Capitol Hill, Greene has solidified her place as one of Congress’s most prominent — and controversial — conservative voices, building a national right-wing following for her opposition to COVID-19 restrictions, her endorsement of Christian nationalism and her avid support for former President Trump, to include the promotion of his false claims that the 2020 election was “stolen.”

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who was projected to win a second term in the House, has become one of the loudest, most controversial conservative voices on Capitol Hill. (Greg Nash)

Greene’s provocations came with a political price: Just a month after she arrived in Washington, the House voted to strip her of her committee assignments in response to revelations that she had previously promoted a long series of conspiracy theories, including QAnon, as well as violence against Democrats, including the idea of assassinating Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). 

All the attention has made Greene one of the most polarizing figures on Capitol Hill. And Tuesday’s race took on outsized national dimensions as donors from around the country showered money on both candidates, making it the single most expensive House race of the 2022 cycle, according to OpenSecrets.

Flowers benefited most from all the attention, hauling in more than $15 million — an enormous number that reflected the appetite among national Democrats to defeat the figure who, perhaps more than any other congressional Republican, has come to exemplify the GOP’s populist turn under Trump.

In the end, it didn’t matter. The conservative district, where 68 percent of voters chose Trump in 2020, sided with Greene.

Greene has had a contentious relationship with her own Republican leadership, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.). (Greg Nash)

Back in Congress, Greene will be closely watched next year. While a darling of the right, she has also been an outspoken critic of her own Republican leadership, particularly House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.), who is in line for the Speakership if the House changes hands. 

McCarthy has taken long steps this year to get into Greene’s good graces. But the tensions linger, and McCarthy will have to walk a delicate line if Greene and other far-right lawmakers press GOP leaders to advance a host of conservative demands, including the impeachment of President Biden and members of his Cabinet. 

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DeSantis wins reelection as Florida governor

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is projected to win reelection, defeating his Democratic opponent Charlie Crist in a race that appears likely to cement DeSantis’s growing influence in Florida — and in the modern GOP.

NBC and ABC called the race for DeSantis around 8 p.m. Tuesday.

DeSantis won his first term as governor four years ago by one of the narrowest margins. Since then, however, he’s styled himself as a near-unbeatable political force in his home state, using his power as governor to pursue an ultra-conservative agenda that has won him adherents nationwide.

Gov. Ron Desantis won his reelection bid against Charlie Crist, cementing his influence in both Florida and national politics. (Associated Press)

Crist was himself a former Republican governor of Florida who left the GOP more than a decade ago before eventually winning a U.S. House seat as a Democrat in 2016. Throughout his campaign, he cast himself as a moderate, seeking to counter DeSantis’s brand of combative politics.

But DeSantis proved to be a particularly difficult opponent. After a relatively quiet first year in the governor’s mansion, he carved out a reputation during the COVID-19 pandemic as a conservative warrior who bucked the advice of public health officials in order to bolster Florida’s economy.

That won him praise from many Republicans, who quickly began eyeing him as a potential 2024 presidential nominee. It also drew to him the ire of Democrats, who have cast him as a right-wing opportunist more interested in his own political ambitions than in his job as governor.

DeSantis, who rose to national attention as a conservative warrior during the COVID-19 pandemic, is viewed as a likely 2024 presidential contender. (Associated Press)

Working in his favor was Florida’s rightward shift in recent years. Once the nation’s largest and most volatile battleground, the Sunshine State has seen Republicans gaining a significant advantage: The GOP surpassed the Democratic Party last year in voter registrations, and has only continued to grow that gap.

DeSantis also benefited from Republicans’ growing strength among the state’s Hispanic voters, a vast and critical constituency that Democrats once relied heavily on.

Crist, meanwhile, made the case that he would restore a sense of normalcy and decency in Florida politics, harkening back to his time as governor. Still, he faced strong political headwinds and struggled to gain traction for his campaign; polling throughout the race routinely showed DeSantis with a distinct lead that in some surveys reached the double-digits — an abnormality for Florida, where elections have often been decided by razor-thin margins.

DeSantis’ Democratic opponent Charlie Crist attempted to make the case to voters that he would bring a sense of normalcy back to Florida politics. (Associated Press)

DeSantis’s victory is likely to fuel speculation of a potential presidential run. While he hasn’t said whether he plans to run for the White House in 2024, he’s notably refrained from ruling out a bid.

If he does run, however, it could put him in direct conflict with former President Trump, who has repeatedly flirted with the idea of another White House run. 

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Here's what the early exit polls are telling us

Election night is just beginning but preliminary exit poll results are already rolling in, offering a taste of what’s on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots on Tuesday.

While those polls don’t necessarily reflect the election results, they offer some insight into what issues are top-of-mind for Americans ahead of an election that has been billed by both parties as particularly consequential.

Here are five takeaways from the exit polls so far.

Inflation, abortion are at the top of voters’ minds

It shouldn’t come as any surprise that the two issues that have dominated the midterms – inflation and abortion rights – were on voters’ minds as they went to the polls on Tuesday.

Exit polling from Edison Research found that abortion was the top issue for 44 percent of voters who are backing Democrats, while roughly half of those supporting Republican candidates pointed to inflation as their biggest concern.

Similarly, a poll from ABC and the Washington Post found inflation was the top issue for voters at 32 percent. But abortion wasn’t far behind, coming in at 27 percent.

Exit polling out of Pennsylvania – a key battleground state – from CBS News found that 36 percent of voters are most concerned about abortion. Inflation came second place at 28 percent.

Democrats have campaigned throughout the summer and fall on a message of preserving and protecting abortion rights after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the landmark reproductive rights case, in June.

Republicans, meanwhile, have sought to put blame on President Biden and Democrats for the stubbornly high level of inflation, seizing on the age-old political bet that Americans will ultimately vote with their pocketbooks.

Americans aren’t happy with Biden

Midterm elections are often seen, with few exceptions, as referenda on the current president. And Biden is no exception.

Exit polling from Edison research shows only 45 percent of voters approve of Biden’s job performance. That’s about the same as where former President Donald Trump stood in 2018, when Democrats recaptured control of the House.

That same exit polling shows that nearly half of voters believe that Biden’s policies are mostly hurting the country, while just over one third – 36 percent – believe they’re helping the country.

Looking beyond 2022, voters aren’t particularly keen on Biden seeking a second term in the Oval Office. Exit polling from ABC and the Washington Post found that 30 percent of voters – including 38 percent of Democrats – don’t want to see Biden mount another campaign.

But Trump still isn’t popular

Biden may not be popular among most voters. But his predecessor also doesn’t have much of a leg to stand on.

Exit polling from Edison Research found that only 37 percent of voters have a favorable view of the former president, who has hinted that he’s on the verge of announcing another campaign for the White House.

Roughly 60 percent of respondents have an unfavorable opinion of Trump, the exit polling shows.

And most voters aren’t showing up to the polls to express support for Trump. The Edison Research polling found that only about 16 percent of Americans are casting ballots to show their support for the former president.

Voters agree that democracy is in danger

Democrats have argued that the 2022 midterms are a chance for voters to protect American democracy. Republicans, meanwhile, have pushed for tighter voting laws, occasionally casting doubt on the accuracy of the nation’s election results.

Those arguments appear to be reaching voters, 70 percent of whom say that American democracy is threatened, according to exit polling from ABC and the Washington Post.

That includes 72 percent of Democrats and 68 percent of Republicans. Independents, meanwhile, hew closer to Democrats. Seventy-one percent believe that democracy is in danger, according to the polling.

The electorate is skewing older

Exit polling from Edison Research shows that only about 1 in 10 voters this year are under the age of 30, while roughly one third are 65 or older.

Compare that to the last midterm elections in 2018, when 13 percent of voters were under 30 and about 26 percent were 65 or older.

It’s no surprise that senior citizens are voting at higher rates than young people. But those voters also tend to lean toward the GOP. That could be good news for Republicans, who are looking to reclaim their House and Senate majorities this year.

The Edison Research polling also found that about 40 percent of voters this year are white and college-educated. In 2018, those voters made up about 31 percent of the electorate.

Meanwhile, voters of color, a key Democratic voting bloc, are on track to make up a slightly smaller share of the electorate than they did four years ago.

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Trump touts Scott as 'likely candidate' to replace McConnell as Senate leader

Former President Trump said he will force Senate Republicans to replace Sen. Mitch McConnell (Ky.) as their leader if he wins the presidency in 2024 and endorsed Sen. Rick Scott (Fla.) as a “likely candidate” for the job.

In an interview Monday night with Fox News Digital aboard his private plane after holding a rally in Dayton, Ohio, for Senate candidate J.D. Vance, Trump slammed McConnell as a “lousy leader.”

And he praised Scott, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee and former two-term governor of Florida, as “highly underrated.”  

Scott is predicting that Senate Republicans will pick up between two and five Senate seats in the midterm elections, which will boost his political stock in Washington and particularly among Republican colleagues. 

He stirred speculation over the weekend when he declined to endorse McConnell for another term as Senate Republican leader, telling NBC host Chuck Todd that he’s not focused on anything beyond Election Day.  

Trump provided more fuel to speculation by describing Scott as “a likely candidate” for majority or minority leader.  

“I think Rick Scott is a likely candidate — he hates the guy,” Trump said, characterizing Scott’s feelings about McConnell. “He’s tough — he’s tough, and I think he would probably go for it.” 

Trump predicted Scott would “have a lot of support.”  

“People are very upset with Mitch McConnell — I’ll tell you who is upset with him — the public,” he said. McConnell stopped speaking to Trump after he lost the 2020 presidential election to President Biden but claimed, without evidence, that it had been stolen because of widespread fraud.  

McConnell later denounced Trump’s unsubstantiated claims of election fraud as “wild falsehoods” and declared that the former president was “practically and morally responsible” for provoking the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.  

Trump acknowledged that he doesn’t have enough support within the Senate GOP conference to oust McConnell from his leadership position after the 2022 midterms, in which Republicans have a good chance of recapturing the Senate majority.  

But Trump predicted that if he runs for the White House and wins in 2024, McConnell’s career as Senate GOP leader will be over.  

“I think we’ll probably have to live with him for two years,” Trump said. “And if I run and I win, I will say don’t send me any legislation if he’s the leader, and he’ll be out in two minutes.”  

Asked Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” whether he planned to run for GOP leader if Republicans win the Senate majority, Scott replied: “I’m not focused on anything except getting a majority Tuesday night.”

When Todd said that was a “nonanswer” and concluded that a challenge against McConnell is “a possibility,” Scott didn’t dispute it.  

Senate Republicans are expected to elect their leadership team the week of Nov. 14 when they return to Washington the week after Election Day.  

The role of Senate Republican leader is decided by an anonymous vote of the GOP conference. 

McConnell has served as leader since January 2007, and Senate Republican aides and strategists say Scott has little to no chance of beating McConnell this month.  

But a Senate Republican strategist acknowledged in an interview Monday that Scott “might do it” anyway.  

McConnell told CNN in an interview last month that “I have the votes” to serve another two years as Senate Republican leader.  

McConnell has raised more than $380 million for Senate Republican candidates this election cycle through two affiliated groups, the Senate Leadership Fund and One Nation, according to GOP sources. 

The National Republican Senatorial Committee, by comparison, has raised $235 million and spent $235 million so far this cycle, leaving it with $13.6 million in cash on hand, according to the most recent fundraising data compiled by OpenSecrets.org, a nonpartisan group that tracks money in politics.  

Republican senators told The Hill before lawmakers left Washington at the end of September that they expected McConnell to easily win reelection as leader and that no senator, including Scott, had made any overt efforts to challenge him.

McConnell’s leadership team — including Senate GOP Whip John Thune (S.D.), Sen. John Cornyn (Texas), an adviser and former whip, and Senate GOP Conference Chairman John Barrasso (Wyo.) — hasn’t shown any inclination or desire to oust McConnell as leader. 

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Trump says DeSantis 'could have been more gracious'

Former President Trump on Tuesday complained that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) was not gracious enough to him for backing his first gubernatorial bid, the latest sign of a growing rift between the two men ahead of a possible 2024 presidential primary showdown.

“Ron is a person, I’ve always had a decent relationship with him, but when I endorsed him, he was gone,” Trump told NewsNation in an interview from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. (NewsNation is owned by Nexstar Media Group, which purchased The Hill in 2021.)

“He was not going to be able to even be a factor in the race, and as soon as I endorsed him, within moments the race was over,” Trump continued. “I got him the nomination. He didn’t get it, I got it. Because the minute I made that endorsement, he got it.”

“I thought that he could have been more gracious, but that’s up to him,” Trump added, noting he held rallies for DeSantis in the closing days of the 2018 campaign.

Trump has in recent days more freely gone after the incumbent Florida governor, who is widely seen as perhaps Trump’s most viable rival for the GOP presidential nomination.

At a Pennsylvania rally on Saturday, Trump mocked DeSantis as “Ron DeSanctimonious” as he read off polling numbers Trump had picked out that showed himself leading other potential primary challengers.

Trump also held a rally in Miami on Sunday but did not invite DeSantis, who is on the ballot for reelection in Florida. But at that rally, Trump urged supporters to vote for the governor, and Trump himself cast his ballot for DeSantis on Tuesday.

Trump on Monday appeared to set up the launch of a third White House bid, telling supporters in Ohio that he would make a “very big announcement” at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida on Nov. 15.

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