Americans are heading to the polls today, Tuesday 3 November 2026, in midterm elections that will decide who controls the United States Congress for the final two years of Donald Trump’s second term in the White House. With all 435 seats in the House of Representatives, 35 seats in the Senate and governorships in 36 states on the ballot, this is the first nationwide test of voter sentiment since Trump returned to office in January 2025 — and forecasters, betting markets and both parties are treating it as the defining political event of the year.
No results are expected before evening in the United States. The first polls close at 6pm Eastern Time, and voting continues in waves across the country’s time zones until late at night. Officials have cautioned that in close races, the final outcome may not be clear for days.
What’s on the ballot today
The scale of today’s vote is enormous. Every one of the 435 voting seats in the House of Representatives is being contested, alongside 35 of the 100 Senate seats — 33 regular Class II seats plus two special elections in Florida and Ohio for the seats vacated by Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Voters are also choosing governors in 36 states and three US territories, and thousands of state and local offices are being decided at the same time.
Republicans enter the day defending razor-thin majorities in both chambers: 218 to 214 in the House, with two vacancies and one independent who votes with the Republican caucus, and 53 to 47 in the Senate. The arithmetic of the US system is unforgiving — because a 50-50 Senate tie would be broken by Vice President JD Vance, Democrats need a net gain of four seats in each chamber to take control. Winning one chamber does not guarantee the other.
Ballot measures in several states are drawing national attention of their own, covering issues from redistricting to abortion rights to a proposed billionaire tax in California — a sign that today’s vote is about far more than who sits in Washington.
The referendum question: Trump’s second term on trial
The midterms are not a presidential election — Trump’s name is not on the ballot — but the president himself has framed the vote as a judgment on his return to power. In the closing days of the campaign he urged his supporters to vote as though he were on the ballot, calling the elections a verdict on the direction he has taken the country since his inauguration.
The White House has bet heavily on that framing. The administration’s sweeping immigration crackdown, its aggressive trade and tariff policies, and its confrontational posture toward parts of the federal bureaucracy have defined the first two years of Donald Trump’s second term. His opponents, meanwhile, have sought to turn the election into a check on presidential power, arguing that a Democratic Congress is needed to restrain the administration’s most controversial moves.
The battle over the rules of voting itself reached the Supreme Court on the eve of the election. On Monday, the court rejected an emergency bid by the Justice Department to force California to set aside roughly 20,000 mail-in ballots that the administration claimed were sent to likely noncitizens. The ruling came within hours, without even asking California officials to respond — the latest flashpoint in the administration’s election-integrity campaign, which has also included new federal voter-fraud charges in California.
Money, polls and forecasts: by the numbers
By one measure, this is already a historic election. OpenSecrets has estimated total spending at $11.9 billion, which would make the 2026 midterms the costliest election in American history — a figure that captures just how much is riding on the outcome for donors, parties and interest groups.
The polling picture going into Election Day looks difficult for the president’s party. RealClearPolling’s average of the generic congressional ballot put Democrats 8.3 points ahead nationally, while Reuters/Ipsos polling placed Trump’s approval rating at just 32 per cent, near a record low. Reuters has reported that rising consumer prices and cost-of-living pressures are weighing heavily on voters’ mood.
Forecasters agree on the direction of travel but differ on how confident anyone should be. Decision Desk HQ’s model gave Democrats an 80 per cent chance of taking the House — projecting around 238 seats — and a 60 per cent chance in the Senate. Prediction markets were pricing Democratic control even higher on the morning of the vote, at 92 to 93 per cent for the House and 68 per cent for the Senate. The Cook Political Report, a more cautious forecaster, projected Democratic gains of 12 to 22 seats in the House and two to six in the Senate. All of these are probabilities, not predictions — and as forecasters keep reminding voters, a 92 per cent chance still leaves room for a surprise.
When do we know the results — and why it matters for Pakistan
The new Congress will take office on 3 January 2027, but Americans may not know who controls it on election night. Close races, late-arriving mail ballots and ranked-choice counts in states such as Alaska and Maine could leave the balance of power uncertain for days, and official certification in most states follows weeks after the vote.
For Pakistan, the stakes are real even if the ballots are American. A shift in Congress would reshape Washington’s posture on trade, tariffs, immigration and foreign policy in the middle of Trump’s term — areas that directly touch Pakistani exporters, the Pakistani-American community and the broader US-Pakistan relationship. Immigration policy in particular has already had a direct footprint: the administration’s deportation drive has included charter flights routed through Pakistan, a reminder that decisions made in Washington land quickly in Islamabad.
Global markets are watching the vote too. Bitcoin slipped to around $76,500 as midterm voting approached, with traders bracing for the political and regulatory signals the results will send. By tomorrow morning in Pakistan, the first projections will be in — and the world will know whether the last two years of Trump’s second term are about to get much harder for the president.
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