As the associated press calls more and more congressional elections, one thing has become clear: Democrats will control the house, but by a much smaller margin than expected. 

With so much news coverage focused on President Trump’s refusal to concede the election, there has been less attention to the surprising electoral gains by Republicans in the House. As of now, the Associated Press has called 427 of the 435 congressional races. Democrats have secured the majority but currently have a slim 4 seat margin. In total, Republicans have gained a net 7 seats back from democrats and took 1 from a third party incumbent, totaling a net gain of 8 seats. 

While other congressional election cycles have yielded more drastic gains and losses, it is rare to have results differ from projections on the scale that the 2020 House election did. Most major news corporations projected Democrats holding or increasing their majority. FiveThirtyEight projected that Republicans had a 17% chance of flipping more than 6 seats. In actuality, they currently have a gross gain of 11 seats and are expected to pick up a few more as races are called. Considering the gap in fundraising, this result is especially surprising. 

Of Cook Political Report’s 25 toss-up races, only 3 Democrats did not out fundraise their conservative opponents, a traditional metric used to predict electoral performance. By October, all 25 Democratic candidates in these elections raised more than 2 million dollars, to the just 16 Republicans that reached the same mark. Additionally, 21 Republican representatives retired from office, which was thought to further weaken their chances at good election results. 

In general, incumbents have a strong advantage in elections at all levels. Incumbents have name recognition from their previous work and can point to things that they have accomplished in office. Because of this, voters are more likely to feel comfortable electing them to another term. In the congressional election, not only did the GOP lose 21 potential incumbents, but they also lost the incumbent advantage that these representatives would have had if they ran for re-election. Despite this seeming disadvantage, the GOP lost few of these seats. 

 Another notable takeaway from the election was the number of conservative women who were elected to the house. The 117th congress will contain 26 female GOP representatives, breaking the previous record of 25 set by the House in the 109th congress. In part, their successes were powered by tight elections, in which conservative women ended up winning.

Although all races have not been called, it is obvious that there will be a clear path for Republicans to take the House in 2022. Historically, the party which does not control the white house generally has a stronger showing in midterm congressional elections. While there are certainly deviations from this pattern, the slim margin that Democrats have gives the GOP leaders something to be excited about. 

That said, it was not all bad news for Democrats. Despite losing 10 seats, they still managed to flip 3 and keep the majority. With that victory, there will be at least a divided congress and the Biden presidency give Democrats control of two of the three elected institutions of government, with a chance of total control following the runoff elections in January. Senate or not, Democrats will certainly have more leverage in the government than they have had in the last 4 years. For the first time since the Obama administration, liberals will have an opportunity to overhaul recent conservative policy and further their agenda. However, only time will tell whether this victory will be short-lived.