UPDATE November 9, 2022: The winners are unchanged in Colorado at of 7 a.m., although the percentages aren't exactly the same. Nationally, Democrats are still on track to hold onto a thinner Congressional majority, but in the U.S. Senate race, Nevada has slipped into the Republican column, so the split is likely to be 49 Democrats and 50 Republicans with Georgia currently held by a Democrat headed to a runoff election. Democrats fared well, overall, in races for Governor nationwide.
Colorado Results In Notable State and Federal Races
In Colorado, at least, Democrats are exceeding expectations.
In statewide races in Colorado, Republicans are getting crushed.
Governor D 58.32% R 39.70%
U.S. Senate D 55.63% R 41.93%
SOS D 54.86% R 42.77%
AG D 54.43% R 43.67%
Treasurer D 53.65% R 43.45%
School Board At Large D 52.87% R 43.91%
The results in statewide races suggest that there are a solid 39.7% of voter who are Republicans, a solid 52.87% who are Democrats, and 7.43% of voters in Colorado who will swing based upon the candidate, although this analysis disregards turnout differences between the races.
Democrats are winning as expected in the 1st, 2nd, 6th and 7th Congressional Districts while Republicans are winning as expected in the 3rd and 4th Congressional Districts.
But, Democrats are leading in both the Republican leaning 3rd Congressional District and the extremely competitive 8th Congressional District (as well as in the open 8th Congressional District seat on the state school board, although the Republican is leading in the open 8th Congressional District CU-Regent race).
In CO-3, Democrat Adam Frisch leads Republican Lauren Boebert by 3.25 percentage points without any third-party candidate running with 261,727 votes counted so far, and all counties in the district reporting results. Trump won in CO-3's current boundaries by 8 percentage points.
In CO-8, Democrat Yadira Caraveo leads Republican Barbara Kirkmeyer by 2.26 percentage points with 169,884 votes counted so far, and all counties in the district reporting results. CO-8 was almost perfectly evenly split between supporting Trump and Biden with a very slight Trump lean.
The fact that CO-3 is less close with more votes counted than CO-8, despite being Republican leanings rather than very evenly split on partisan grounds goes to show just how weak a candidate Boebert was in this race.
The U.S. House delegation from Colorado in 2023 may have six Democrats and two Republicans, while Democrats hold both U.S. Senate seats from Colorado, and all statewide offices in Colorado. In all likelihood, Democrats have also retained control of the state house and state senate. This is a worst case scenario for Colorado Republicans,
U.S. Senate Control
Nationally, Democrats have won 48 Senate seats so far and have an 11 percentage point lead in Nevada with 42% of the vote counted and an 16 percentage point lead in Arizona with 53% of the vote counted. Democrats are also currently leading by small margins in Georgia (by 0.8 percentage points with more than 97.4% of the vote counted), so Democrats will keep a 50 seat majority in the U.S. Senate and may expand their majority to 51 seats in the U.S. Senate, if they can hold onto their lead in Georgia.
The close U.S. Senate race in Wisconsin will probably be won by a Republican, although that race is tightening to a 1.4 percentage point margin in later returns with 93% of the vote counted. Republicans are also expected to win in not yet called races in Utah and Alaska, leaving Republicans at least 48 seats, and probably 49, in the U.S. Senate.
If Democrats could win Wisconsin as well as the three close races they are leading in, securing 52 seats, they would have the votes to use the "nuclear option" to abolish the filibuster and secure real legislative power for the next two years.
U.S. House Control
It is too early to tell yet how the balance of power in the U.S. House will turn out. Democrats can only afford to lose four seats to hold onto the majority there. So far a Washington Post analysis of 64 competitive seats shows Democrats with a plausible chance of holding onto a U.S. House majority, even without considering the 3rd Congressional District in Colorado which a Democrat is posed to win despite the fact that the race was not supposed to be competitive.
Currently Republicans are in the lead in 11 competitive seats held by Democrats, while Democrats are in the lead 9 competitive seats held by Republicans plus CO-3. So, Democrats are currently on track to keep a thin majority reduced to three seats.
No clear results are in yet from four competitive U.S. House races in California, two currently held by Democrats held competitive house seats and two currently held by Republicans, as of 11:52 p.m. But one would expect, on average, for control of those seats to remain unchanged. Even if Democrats lost both too close to call races currently held by Democrats, they'd maintain control of the House by two seats.
Polling predicted a worse result for Democrats. One presumes that it was wrong because the turnout models for women and young voters underestimated how many of them would vote in reaction to the repeal of Roe v. Wade by the Dobbs decision.
The redistricting results were also stronger for Democrats than might be been expected. And, the fact the Biden had no coat tails in 2020 also reduced the number of fragile Democratic contenders in Congress.
Particularly weak Republican candidates in a number of key races like Georgia and Pennsylvania (as well as CO-3) have not helped either.
Continued Democratic party control of both houses of Congress and the Presidency, even if their U.S. Senate majority is too slim to abolish the filibuster or pass partisan legislation, would be a positive development. It would allow Democrats to continue to stay in budgetary control and confirm Biden's Presidential appointees.
It may take a day or two in order to know if this has happened, however. If it has happened, this year's election is on track to be the best midterm performance by the party holding the Presidency in recent memory.
The political polling industry, in contrast, comes out of this election cycle tarnished yet again in their credibility.
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