Donald Trump lashes out after Republicans lose House and Senate in crushing midterm election defeats

In a remarkable sweep, the Democrats won Senate seats in the former Republican strongholds of Texas, Kansas, South Carolina, Ohio, Maine and Iowa.

The Democrats have also regained control of the House of Representatives, which they last held in 2023, having flipped numerous seats in states including Kentucky, New Jersey and North Carolina.

The midterm elections determine which party controls Congress and were seen as a referendum on the controversial Republican president.

Democrats needed a net gain of four seats in the 100-member Senate to win a majority, while in the 435-member House, they needed three. It appears they will gain far more than this.

The devastating scale of the defeat led some commentators to say the results could mark the beginning of the end of the MAGA era.

Trump, who had previously urged people to pretend he was on the voting slip, delivered an angry response on his Truth Social platform.

He posted: “I wasn’t on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!”

In another post he said: “I’m going to become a Political Pundit, both good and bad, on the reasons these Candidates won and lost!”

He also lashed out at Fox News saying: “FoxNews Ratings are way down (27%!) because they’re spending too much time covering the Trump Deranged Dumocrats! All of those people who used to watch Fox, and no longer do, get it. It’s them, not me — My numbers are better than they have ever been.”

He also raged at the network when the first polls closed, writing on Truth Social that their exit poll questions were 'BULLS***.'

Speaking to Fox News after Republicans lost control of the US Senate, Mr Trump admitted the result surprised him.

“Well, I’m a little bit surprised. I thought they’d do better, we had tremendous rallies,” he said.

“I thought that I could transfer those people into candidates.”

He also congratulated the Democrats and said: “They did a good job. They worked very hard.”

But while offering to work with opponents, he had also posted a picture of a red baseball cap emblazoned with the word “Veto”, indicating he would block legislation they sought to take through Congress.

Democrat US senator Jon Ossoff, who won re-election in Georgia which had been a top Republican target, told supporters: “In sweeping and decisive victories the American people have rebuked the depravity, corruption, and incompetence of the failed lame duck president Donald J Trump.

“And if, at times these last two years, amidst the ceaseless onslaught of brutality and indecency, you doubted whether our republic would survive, let tonight’s results give you courage that the first light of dawn is on the horizon.”

The scale of the Democrat victory reflects the deep voter discontent over the cost of living, tariffs and high energy prices fuelled by the Iran war, which Mr Trump launched with Israel earlier this year.

In Kansas, church pastor Adam Hamilton, became the first Democrat to win a Senate seat in nearly a century.

He said: “I think the people in Kansas, Republicans, independents and Democrats are saying what’s happening in Washington is not OK.”

He added: “I got elected because Kansans were saying, ‘We’re tired of the bullies. We’re tired of the chaos’.”

James Talarico became the first Democrat to be elected a US senator for Texas in nearly four decades, defeating Republican Ken Paxton, who had been backed by Mr Trump.

Meanwhile, in Ohio, Democrat Sherrod Brown won a Senate seat in Ohio held by vice president JD Vance just two years ago.

Democrat Annie Andrews beat Mr Trump’s hand-picked candidate Darline Graham to take the South Carolina Senate seat.

Ms Graham was the sister of the late US senator Lindsey Graham, who had held the seat for more than 20 years, and was chosen by the president to fill his seat and contest it in the election.

Democrat Troy Jackson won election to the US Senate representing Maine, defeating Republican incumbent Susan Collins, who had held the seat for almost three decades.

The Democrats also flipped the Senate seat in North Carolina from Republicans when governor Roy Cooper defeated Michael Whatley, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, who was supported by Mr Trump.

Mr Cooper said: “I’m not going to Washington to be something, I’m going to Washington to do something.”

Democrats Keisha Lance Bottoms in Georgia, Amy Acton in Ohio, Rod Sand in Iowa, and Gina Hinojosa in Texas won races for governor, ousting Republicans from office.

In California, long-shot Republican candidate Steve Hilton, a former top aide to David Cameron, lost to former state attorney general Xavier Becerra.