Chapter 1
Thirty-five Senate seats are on the ballot on 3 November 2026
Thirty-five Senate seats are on the ballot on 3 November 2026. Thirty-three are the regular Class II seats, whose six-year terms end in January 2027. Two are special elections: in Florida, for the last two years of the term Marco Rubio won before he resigned to become secretary of state, and in Ohio, for the last two years of the term J.D. Vance won before he became vice president. Those seats are now held by Ashley Moody and Jon Husted.
Chapter 2
The map favours the party defending less
The map favours the party defending less. Republicans hold 22 of the 35 seats and Democrats 13. Republicans hold the chamber 53–47, counting the two independents who sit with the Democrats, so Democrats need a net gain of four seats for a majority and Republicans can afford to lose two. Democrats are defending two seats in states Donald Trump carried in 2024, Georgia and Michigan. Republicans are defending one in a state Kamala Harris carried, Maine.
Chapter 3
An unusual number of seats have no incumbent on the ballot
An unusual number of seats have no incumbent on the ballot. Eleven senators are not seeking re-election: Democrats Dick Durbin, Jeanne Shaheen, Tina Smith and Gary Peters, and Republicans Joni Ernst, Thom Tillis, Mitch McConnell, Steve Daines, Cynthia Lummis, Alan Armstrong and Tommy Tuberville, who is running for governor of Alabama. Two more lost their own party’s nomination in May: Bill Cassidy finished third in Louisiana’s Republican primary, and John Cornyn lost the Texas runoff to Ken Paxton. In South Carolina, Lindsey Graham died in July and his sister, Darline Graham, was appointed to the seat. And in Maine the Democratic nominee changed after the primary: Graham Platner won it in June and withdrew in July, and the party chose Troy Jackson to face Susan Collins.
Chapter 4
What is not settled is how many of the competitive seats are genuinely…
What is not settled is how many of the competitive seats are genuinely in play. The forecasters who publish ratings disagree at the margin: Inside Elections counts four toss-ups and the Cook Political Report, as the Guardian reports it, seven. Public polling of individual states is thin. The largest recent set, from the New York Times and Siena, interviewed about 600 voters a state, which leaves a margin of error of around five points on each candidate’s share.
And now
The forecasters ended the campaign with Democrats close to a Senate majority but not past it. Inside Elections projects a gain of three to five seats, four being needed; Sabato’s Crystal Ball’s editors wrote of a narrow majority of 51 or 52, as The Hill reported. Fox News rates neither side at 50, with six seats undecided.
The ratings kept moving toward Democrats. South Carolina, where Sen. Darline Graham faces Annie Andrews, went to Toss-up at Fox on 29 October after a Times/Siena poll found it tied at 48. Fox moved Ohio to Lean Democratic, and the Crystal Ball moved Florida off Safe Republican.
CNN polls released 29 October had Democrats ahead by 7 in Michigan and 6 in Texas, and by 4 in Maine and Kansas. Suffolk had Sherrod Brown 3 ahead in Ohio.
In Alaska, the New York Times reported that Mary Peltola’s campaign helped recruit a second candidate named Dan Sullivan; the campaign denies it, and Gov. Mike Dunleavy ordered a state investigation. The ballot is unchanged.
Where it stands today →