The 2020 election was bad for Republicans, full stop. For the first time since 1932, a president came into office with both chambers of Congress under his party’s control, and lost both of them and reelection. Democrats also have unified control of all three levers of power for the first time in a decade.
That said, post-election analysis often overstates just how dire the situation is for a political party. And that’s certainly the case for Republicans and 2020, as they confront their post-Trump reality.
The reality, though, is far from that. In fact, Republicans came, at most, 43,000 votes from winning each of the three levers of power. And that will surely temper any move toward drastic corrective action vis-a-vis former president Donald Trump.
We got the final results from the last outstanding House race on Monday, with former congresswoman Claudia Tenney (R) returning to Congress after defeating Rep. Anthony Brindisi (D) in New York by 109 votes. The result means the House stands at 222 to 213 in favor of the Democrats. (These numbers include three vacancies for which the seats are very unlikely to change hands.)
