Three days after the U.S. elections, the battle for the Senate majority continues to be a stalemate. With both Georgia’s two Senate seats up for re-election, the outcome of who will eventually take control of the Senate may be delayed until next January.
With the addition of the two independent Senate seats, which have traditionally been aligned with the Democrats’ voting preferences, the two parties are now tied in terms of political power in the Senate at 48 seats.
Congressional Democrats are now pinning their hopes for control of the Senate on the state of Georgia. Republican Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.), running for re-election, and Democratic frontrunner Jon Ossoff (D-N.Y.) have 49.8 percent and 47.8 percent of the vote, respectively, according to an exit poll released Friday morning by the Associated Press. They will have to split the vote in a special election to be held on January 5 of next year.
Georgia statute states that if a candidate does not receive a simple majority of the votes cast in the election, the two candidates with the highest percentage of votes will again go to a runoff.
In addition to Perdue’s seat, which faces a special election, Georgia’s other Senate seat was also scheduled for a special election two days ago. Both incumbent Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) and Democratic challenger Raphael Warnock (D-CA) also failed to break the halfway threshold.
Democratic Congressional Race Fails to Perform as Expected
According to original estimates, the Democrats would only need a net gain of three to four seats out of the 35 Senate seats up for election this year, out of the 23 Republican seats up for election, in order to take the majority in the Senate.
However, the Democratic Party’s opening performance in the congressional elections was not as optimistic as expected. While the Democrats managed to capture two Republican seats in Colorado (Sen. Cory Gardner, R-CO) and Arizona (Sen. Martha McSally, R-AZ), the Republicans also fought back to win one Democratic seat in Alabama (Sen. Doug Jones, D-AL). Doug Jones (D-AL), but the Republicans also fought back to win a Democratic seat in Alabama. In other words, the Democrats have only gained one seat so far this year from the current 45 seats in the GOP Senate race.
The Democrats had hoped to take advantage of Biden’s surge of support in this congressional election to take two Republican seats in Maine and Iowa. The two parties polled very close in these two battleground districts before the election. However, this plan did not work out as planned, and the incumbent Republican senators were re-elected by narrow margins.
Losing seats in Maine and Iowa, two key battleground states, made it much more difficult for the Democrats to achieve their goal of controlling the Senate.
In addition, neither North Carolina nor Alaska have declared results yet, but Republican incumbent federal senators in both states, including Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK), are leading in the vote count so far.
Georgia is the last hope for Democratic control of the Senate.
If the two incumbent Republican senators from North Carolina and Alaska are re-elected, the Republican Party will have 50 seats in the Senate. Therefore, it is clear that the special election for two seats in Georgia next January is the last hope for the Democrats to take control of the Senate.
Do the Democrats have a chance to win the two Georgia seats in one go? The answer is yes, but it is quite difficult.
Georgia has traditionally been considered to be politically pro-Republican. The last Democratic federal senator from Georgia was Zell Miller, who left office in 2005. Since then, Republicans have represented Georgia in the Senate.
If the Democrats win the Georgia special election for two seats next January, they will maintain a 50-50 split in the Senate political landscape. If the Democrats also win the presidency, Vice President Harris will be able to cast a tie-breaking vote for the Democrats at a critical voting moment.
On the other hand, if the Republicans win one of the two special elections, the Republicans will have a 51-seat majority in the Senate and will continue to hold a narrow majority in the Senate.
What is certain is that the battle for the Senate majority is not over yet, and the Georgia special election will be key.
U.S. Scholars: Regardless of the Result, Congress’ Position on China Will Not Change Dramatically
However, Kevin Kozar, a congressional political scientist at the American Enterprise Institute, believes that regardless of which party ultimately wins control of the Senate, Congress’ position on the China issue will not change much.
China is a pretty complex and interesting issue because I think it’s an issue that cuts across both party lines,” Kozar told VOA. “We know that there’s been a kind of bipartisan consensus over the last 20 years or so that the United States should try to make China a major player on trade and other issues,” Kozar said. A partner in normalization. But in the last few years at least, we’ve seen that kind of thinking being rethought, whether it’s issues involving intellectual property rights or China’s treatment of ethnic and religious minorities, and it’s led both parties to start questioning old policies and to consider taking a tougher stance.”
“Whether the Congress is fully controlled by the Democrats or there is a divided Congress, I don’t think we’re going to see a big change in the new position of the United States being more vigilant toward China,” Kosar continued.
On the diplomatic front, Borgat, director of the Legislative Affairs Program at George Washington University’s Department of Political Science, said he believes that if the Democrats return to a majority in the Senate, the direction of Congress in the foreign affairs arena will be closer to that of the Obama administration.
You’ll probably see (Congress trying to) go back to the policies of the Obama administration, trying to regain America’s standing, making sure that our allies know that we are once again their ally, that we want to be part of the world stage again, that we want to rebuild our relationship with the U.N. and possibly NATO,” Borgat said. So it’s going to be a different focus.”
Democrats will remain in control of the House, but with significantly less clout
In the House race, the Democrats are also not doing well in the opening vote. Although there is no doubt that the majority position in the House of Representatives will continue to be controlled by the Democrats, the Republicans have unexpectedly captured a number of key battleground districts in this election, injecting more new blood into the Republican Party and expanding their power in the House of Representatives.
As of Friday evening EST, the Democrats had won 212 seats in the House of Representatives, while the Republicans had 194 seats, adding four seats. Twenty-nine of the House’s 435 districts have yet to declare results.
It is widely expected that the Democrats will still be able to break through the 218-seat threshold and continue to control the majority in the House of Representatives, but their control will shrink and they will not be able to maintain the current 232 seats.
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