Democrats broke Republican holds on the South that stretched back decades on Election Day, winning statewide in Texas for the first time in more than 30 years and electing South Carolina’s first Democratic senator since 1998.
In Georgia, voters elected the first Black woman governor in U.S. history and gave Democrats the governor’s office for the first time since 1998.
North Carolina elected its first Democratic senator since 2008, and in Mississippi, where Democrats rarely compete statewide, the Democratic Senate challenger led the Republican incumbent by a few dozen votes as of publication on Wednesday.
The gains reached down the ballot. Democrats won at least 21 U.S. House districts that President Donald Trump carried by double digits, according to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and appeared on track to flip the Georgia House. In Tennessee, a Democrat led an eight-term Republican congressman by 280 votes in a district Trump won easily two years ago.
The results hand Democrats new footholds in regions Republicans have dominated for a generation, as the party took control of both chambers of Congress and heads toward a 2028 presidential primary that South Carolina is set to open.
Former Rep. Joe Cunningham (D-S.C.), who flipped his state’s First Congressional District in 2018, told The Epoch Times in a call the morning after the election that the wins came even though the national party has long underinvested in Southern states like his own and comes in mainly during presidential primary season.
“The national party will come into South Carolina every four years when it’s primary season,” Cunningham said. “But aside from that, if you’re a Democrat in the South in the past, you’ve inherited all the liabilities with none of the assets.”
He credited the candidates rather than the national party, which, under Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin, has focused on sending more money directly to state parties. He said “it takes an exceptional candidate to win in the South.”
“A lot of focus is placed on Michigan or Texas. But seeing the Democratic Party being brought back to life in the Deep South brings me a lot of great joy,” the former congressman said. “It goes to show what happens when the Republican Party simply just falls in line with President Trump.”
In South Carolina, Annie Andrews, a pediatrician, defeated Sen. Darline Graham (R-S.C.). She is the first Democrat elected to the Senate from the state since 1998 and the first woman South Carolina voters have sent to the chamber. Graham was appointed to the seat after the death of her brother, longtime Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, in July.
Cunningham said Democrats need a very weak opponent, a great candidate, and a strong environment to pull off upsets in the Deep South.
“And all those three things came together in South Carolina,” he said. “Dr. Annie Andrews ran just an impeccable race.”
In Texas, state Rep. James Talarico defeated Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton, giving Democrats their first statewide win in more than 30 years in a state Trump carried by double digits two years ago. State Rep. Gina Hinojosa also defeated Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in the gubernatorial race.
Samantha Karlin, a political commentator and host of SamanthroPolitics who volunteered for Democrats in Virginia on Election Day, said the party picked candidates who matched their states, pointing to Hinojosa, a Latina former school board member. She said some Latino voters who backed Trump in 2024 expected deportations to focus on violent criminals.
“I don’t think they realize the extent of what the Trump administration was going to do with immigration,” she said.
In Georgia, former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms defeated Republican businessman Rick Jackson to become the first Black woman elected governor in the United States.
Jackson said in his concession that Bottoms “deserves our congratulations and our prayers as she prepares to take office.”
Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) won reelection over Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.). Democrats also appeared on track to win the Georgia House for the first time in more than two decades, based on unofficial results.
Ashleigh Ewald, a 24-year-old Democratic strategist in Georgia who attended a watch party Tuesday night, said many Democrats were shocked by Bottoms’s win.
“The Democratic gains are not about everyone likes Democrats now,” Ewald said in a text message the day after the election. She said voters are exhausted by high gas prices and the cost of living, and that Republicans and Democrats alike tell her they’re concerned about the Iran war.
In North Carolina, former Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, defeated former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley for the open seat of retiring Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.). Cooper is the state’s first Democratic senator-elect since 2008.
Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.), chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said black voters in the South drove a backlash against Republican redistricting.
“We warned Republicans their attacks on black voters would backfire, and we saw it last night in places like Alabama and North Carolina, where they overwhelmingly turned out to elect Democrats,” she said at a press conference Wednesday.
In Tennessee, Democrat Victoria Broderick led Rep. Scott DesJarlais (R-Tenn.) by 280 votes in final unofficial results from the secretary of state. DesJarlais has held that district since 2011. The AP had not called the race, and DesJarlais had not conceded as of Wednesday afternoon.
Broderick lost to DesJarlais by more than 40 points in 2024, before Republican state lawmakers redrew the district to stretch from rural Middle Tennessee to Nashville and Murfreesboro.
The redraw worked as Republicans intended in West Tennessee, where lawmakers split Memphis among three districts. In the new Ninth District, Republican state Sen. Brent Taylor defeated Democratic state Rep. Justin J. Pearson by about 2,500 votes for the seat held by retiring Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), the state’s only Democrat in Congress.
“District 4 rose to the occasion, at a time when rising costs, the war in Iran, and political chaos affects the lives of everyday Americans,” Broderick said in a statement Wednesday to local outlet WKRN, declaring victory.
DesJarlais and Broderick’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment from The Epoch Times before publication.
Rachel Bruning, social media chair for the Democratic Party in Bledsoe County, a rural county in Tennessee’s Fourth Congressional District, said in a statement that the result shows “you cannot count rural Tennessee or the South out.”
She said volunteers won over neighbors who don’t always vote the same way by focusing on worries they share, like putting food on the table, paying bills, and keeping gas in their cars.
“Those aren’t Republican or Democratic problems,” Bruning said.
She added, “Rural Tennessee isn’t a lost cause.”
She said she hopes the result reminds people “that organizing in rural communities matters, that every conversation matters, and that no community should ever be counted out.”
Cunningham said Republicans in heavily Republican districts could have held on had they shown a “smidgen of dissent” with Trump on the war in Iran, which he said has driven up fuel prices.
Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin called the results “a blue tsunami” in a CNN interview Wednesday morning.
Mike Davis, an adjunct professor of history at Lees-McRae College in North Carolina and a Democratic voter, noted the state’s Fifth Congressional District, where Democrat Chuck Hubbard led longtime Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) by 99 votes in unofficial results. He said the worst mistake Democrats could make is assuming they will “just win automatically.”
Trump wrote on Truth Social on Tuesday night, “I wasn’t on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!”
Paxton congratulated Talarico in his concession speech in Dallas on Tuesday night.
“We’ve had a difficult night tonight across the country, but it’s not over,” he said.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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