Where things stand in the 2024 election

A look at where things stand with the election results as of 7:20 p.m. ET on Wednesday:

It was determined overnight that Donald Trump will again take the White House, according to calls by the Associated Press in key states, and he is also increasingly likely to do so with full control of the political levers in Washington.

Republicans have flipped enough seats to take control of the U.S. Senate. They will have at least 52 seats in the next Senate and are leading in two others at this hour.

In the House, in the early morning hours overnight, Democrats seemed to have a chance of taking the majority, but that has shifted. Republicans are currently leading in enough seats to retain control of the lower chamber, but there are many close races that have not yet been called and the AP stresses that control of the House will take days, if not longer, to correctly determine.

The presidency

Trump: 296 electoral votes
Harris: 226

What’s left: Nevada and Arizona.

Trump leads in both Nevada and Arizona by 5 points. Winning them would get Trump to a final electoral vote tally of 313.

The Senate

Republicans: 52 seats
Democrats: 44 (includes Bernie Sanders, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats)

Republicans have picked up the Senate, flipping West Virginia, Ohio and Montana so far.

What’s left: Arizona, Maine, Nevada and Pennsylvania.

Republicans lead in Nevada and Pennsylvania. Winning both would bring their total in the next Congress to 54 senators.

• Nevada, though, is a margin of almost 4,000 votes out of more than 1.2 million, so that is unlikely to be called any time soon with 85% of the vote in. 
• Pennsylvania is within 30,000 with 95% of the vote in.
• Maine is likely to go for Angus King, the incumbent independent who caucuses with the Democrats. He is ahead by 18 points with 92% of the vote in.

Latest calls: Democrats got good news this afternoon when incumbents Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and Elissa Slotkin of Michigan both won their races, according to the AP.

What about ticket-splitters? Democratic Senate candidates outperformed Harris at the top of the ticket in each of the Senate races that Republicans were looking to flip. The lone exception was Maryland, where Harris won by 23 points, but Democrat Angela Alsobrooks defeated popular former Gov. Larry Hogan by 7.

But they didn’t do so by enough in Montana, West Virginia, Ohio and possibly Nevada and Pennsylvania. In the hotly contested Blue Wall states, the Democratic candidates were only able to outrun Harris by less than 2 points:

• +13 in Montana
• +11 in West Virginia
• +7 in Ohio
• +7 in Arizona
• +4.8 in Nevada
• +1.8 in Wisconsin
• +1.1 in Michigan
• +0.7 in Pennsylvania

The House (218 needed for majority)

Republicans: 204 (Republicans need 14 more)
Democrats: 187 (Democrats need 31 more)
Not yet called: 44

The AP notes that the House is not expected to be called this week. Here’s why:

Democrats need a net gain of 4 seats to win the majority. As it stands now:

• Democrats have flipped 3 seats and are leading in 2 others of the 15 remaining Republican-held competitive seats.
• Republicans have flipped 1 and are leading in 3 of the 16 remaining Democratic-held competitive seats.

If that all holds, Democrats would be +5, Republicans +4 for just a Democratic net pick up of +1. That would give Republicans a 3-seat majority.

But this will change. There is a lot of vote left to count, mostly in the West and particularly in California, where there remain eight competitive seats to be called.

What we know from the early exit polls so far

Exit polls will change as the night goes on because they are matched toward actual results at the end of the night. But the early exit polls, as reported by NBC and CNN so far, tell us a few things:

The most important issues for voters in the election mirror what has been reported in pre-election polls like the NPR/PBS News/Marist poll. For more than a third of voters, democracy was the top issue, followed by the economy (about 3 in 10 voters), abortion rights (1 in 7) and immigration (1 in 10). Foreign policy was in low single digits — less than 10% — as a top issue.

A majority of Harris voters said democracy was their top issue. Second for them was abortion rights.

For Trump voters, the economy was most important, followed by immigration (1 in 5) and democracy (1 in 10). Nothing else was in double-digits.

Harris voters said it was most important to have a leader with good judgment and someone who cares about people. Trump voters prefer someone who has the ability to lead or can bring about needed change. Good judgment and someone who cares were in single digits for Trump voters.

Americans overall are in a bad mood. Three-quarters said they’re either dissatisfied or angry about the direction of the country. That’s not surprising, because in every month for the past 15 years, Americans have said the country is off on the wrong track.

Almost 6 in 10 said they disapprove of the job President Biden is doing. And that may be because of the economy. Two-thirds said the economy is either not so good or poor and more than 8 in 10 said inflation has caused them either moderate hardship (53%) or severe hardship (21%). Almost half of voters said their family’s financial situation is worse than four years ago.

But there was also considerable optimism from voters as 6 in 10 said America’s best days are ahead of it; just a third said they’re in the past.

Note: Exit polls are conducted by Edison Research and paid for by TV networks like CNN, NBC and others. NPR does not pay for either Edison’s exit polls or the Associated Press’ VoteCast, which are not exit polls but very large entrance polls, or pre-election polls taken up to when polls close. Fox News’ post-election analysis about the shape of the electorate and most important issues and the like will be based on AP’s VoteCast.