The Democrats have taken control of the Senate and the House of Representatives. These charts and maps reveal the key trends and races behind this result

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The Republicans have lost seven Senators, 25 House districts and five governor races.

As of 9.25am Eastern Time (ET) on Wednesday, more than 1,900 of nearly 2,500 counties with Senate elections had returned more than 90% of their votes. Americans did not turn out in significant numbers for the Republicans amid high fuel prices and dissatisfaction with the president.

Millions will vote to decide which party controls Congress – which will have a huge impact on Trump’s final years in office

US voters will soon deliver a national verdict on the second presidency of Donald Trump. On 3 November, millions of Americans will vote in midterm elections to decide control of the House of Representatives and Senate, as well as the governorships in 36 states and state legislatures across the country. The results could have a huge impact on Trump’s final two years in office.

Our reporters have interviewed nine voters across the country and the political spectrum about extremism in US politics, their confidence in the US voting system, what they hope Congress will tackle first and their views of the president’s secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth.

The tech mogul’s midterm donations backing Republicans have made him the largest single-cycle political donor in modern US history

Elon Musk has poured so much money into US politics this midterms election cycle that his donations could fund half a dozen SpaceX rocket launches or buy thousands of Tesla Cybertrucks. At the Tesla Diner in Los Angeles, Musk could order more than 31.9m cheeseburgers with the money he has spent on the midterms.

Musk, the world’s richest person, has funnelled at least $445.77m into Republican-aligned political action committees (Pacs) and groups since last year, according to US Federal Election Commission data as of 29 October. The contributions have made him the Republicans’ most prominent financial backer and the largest single-cycle political donor in modern US history.

At the midpoint of the last century the region had 1,450 glaciers and a new study reveals the extent of losses

These graphics explain what the Democrats would need to do to flip the Senate and House of Representatives

A turning point in Donald Trump’s second term will soon arrive. On 3 November, voters across the US will decide whether to keep the president’s Republican allies in control of Congress, or return Democrats to the majority.

Many indicators of voter sentiment suggest the Democrats are favored to take back control of the House of Representatives, and potentially the Senate. Winning either would be a significant victory for the party and give it the power to block Trump’s legislative agenda and more aggressively investigate his administration.

After public backlash, the Trump administration changed its tactics from ‘siege’ to ‘soft feet’. Now, ICE is everywhere

Whether in favor of or against the US-Israel war on Iran, people across the country are left holding the bill and wondering on its purpose

Five months after the United States and Israel started a historically unpopular war against Iran that was going to supposedly last weeks, the fighting has refused to resolve in victory, defeat or peace. Iran’s supreme leader had been killed in the opening strikes, ceasefires broke down, and the strait of Hormuz has been closed and reopened.

For voters interviewed across the country, while the damage may be distant, the residual effects have shown up at the pump, on the grocery bill and in a phone call telling a spouse they have a day to report for deployment. And for a country still absorbing the aftermath of Israel’s war on Gaza – funded to the tune of billions of dollars by the United States – the war in Iran lands on top of an already raw argument about what American power is for.

Top Democrat says findings show public ‘way ahead of the politicians’ as Trump dismisses global heating as ‘hoax’

Amid a summer of dangerous heat, drought and floods, a majority of Americans are connecting increasingly severe weather to the climate crisis, new polling shows, despite efforts by Donald Trump to dismiss global heating as a “con job” and a “hoax”.

It’s a sign that attempts to suppress and polarize climate concerns may not be seeing full success, said Grace Adcox, senior climate strategist at Data for Progress.

After a recent study found New Orleans is at a ‘point of no return’ amid the climate crisis, some locals say they will ‘only leave if forced to’. But what would it take to stay?

When a study in May concluded that New Orleans had hit a “point of no return” due to the climate crisis that would require people to eventually retreat from their storied yet ultimately doomed city, the local reaction was swift and fiery.

The onward march of rising seas around a sinking city was unsettling, but the study was “more focused on generating publicity and clickbait headlines” than coming up with solutions, said Helena Moreno, New Orleans’s mayor. There was flooding in Miami, and wildfires and earthquakes near San Fransisco, Moreno pointed out, “yet no serious movement exists to declare those cities lost causes”.

Researchers warn of a ‘real risk’ of unsafe conditions, with matches in Miami most likely to be affected, but the picture is mixed across the 16 stadiums

It’s set to be hot in North America this summer. The “seasonal temperature outlook” for the US, compiled by the National Weather Service, suggests every part of the country will experience temperatures above the historical average in June and July. It’s into this environment that 48 men’s national teams will arrive, all competing to win the World Cup in the US, Canada and Mexico.

As the tournament approaches, the Guardian has taken an in-depth look at the meteorological conditions players could face, how they have changed since the last time the World Cup was held in North America in 1994 (when the US was the sole host nation), and the locations most likely to expose players to stressful levels of heat.

War with Iran has brought 15 American sites across the UK countryside firmly into the spotlight

They are dotted across the UK countryside, often obscured from public view behind highly secured perimeter fences. Technically, they are on British soil, and misleadingly most have “Royal Air Force” in their name.

But in many respects, these military outposts are under the control of the US president and commander-in-chief.

Now, the total is likely to have exceeded $18bn and counting. Where are America’s war dollars going, in a war that was never declared in the first place?

Exclusive survey finds negative economic impacts felt across party lines as White House doubles down on tariffs

Seven in 10 Americans say Donald Trump’s tariffs have led to them paying higher prices, according to an exclusive new poll for the Guardian.

The Harris Poll survey presents Republicans with a major problem in the battle for the upcoming midterm elections. The majority of all voters (72%) believe Trump’s tariffs have had a negative rather than a positive impact and 67% said tariffs aren’t the right solution for improving the economy.

64% of Republicans agreed that Trump’s tariffs had led to higher prices compared with 77% of Democrats and 67% of independents who believed the same.

60% of Republicans also said that tariffs had had more of a negative impact on consumers than a positive one, compared with 81% of Democrats and 75% of independents.

Projects in development expected to grow global capacity by nearly 50% amid growing concern over impact on planet

The US is leading a huge global surge in new gas-fired power generation that will cause a major leap in planet-heating emissions, with this record boom driven by the expansion of energy-hungry datacenters to service artificial intelligence, according to a new forecast.

This year is set to shatter the annual record for new gas power additions around the world, with projects in development expected to grow existing global gas capacity by nearly 50%, a report by Global Energy Monitor (GEM) found.

Tracking data from a chaotic year, from ICE detention and job growth to inflation and the president’s popularity

The Trump administration has had an unprecedented first year. The Guardian has been hard at work tracking the social and political ramifications of Donald Trump’s second term through words and pictures. But sometimes the story is best told through charts and graphs. Here are some of the vital data points that the Guardian has been tracking on immigration, the economy and public opinion.

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These are the agencies detaining people across the US – mostly, but not all, under the umbrella of the Department of Homeland Security

When the Trump administration ordered a surge of armed federal immigration enforcement personnel on to the streets of Minneapolis, the Department of Homeland Security declared it the largest operation in its history and the liberal midwestern city became Donald Trump’s latest chosen hotspot.

Such escalations mark the US president’s agenda of mass arrests and deportations from the US interior. The highest-profile efforts involve officers from multiple agencies rushing to prominent Democratic-led US cities, against local leaders’ wishes. But coast to coast, federal officers have been raiding homes, businesses, commercial parking lots – even schools, hospitals and courthouses. The efforts have delighted the president’s hardcore Make America Great Again voter base, but are also tearing families apart and spreading fear and even death on the streets and in detention.

Most Americans have yet to see this boom – but they’ve certainly heard a lot about it from the president

Moments into his second term, opening his inaugural address, Donald Trump was unequivocal. “The golden age of America begins right now,” he declared.

At a White House reception last weekend, a little over 10 months later, the US president appeared to acknowledge just how far his timeline had shifted.

A Guardian study of past ticket prices for the men’s World Cup, compared with current 2026 figures, shows how the barrier for entry has been raised for most fans

In the past, a fan’s ability to attend a World Cup hosted in their nation hinged more on bid books than their checkbooks. For 2026 in the US, Mexico and Canada, even the least expensive tickets are a luxury commodity by comparison.

An analysis by the Guardian of men’s World Cup ticket pricing shows that amid the general rise in ticket prices for the 2026 World Cup, the most extreme of those hikes have often applied to the cheapest tickets. The analysis is based on official Fifa pricing dating back to 1994, with more robust data available starting in 2006. Prices for 2026 games are accurate as of 16 December 2025, and do not include the 1.6% of sellable tickets for each game that Fifa recently made available for a fixed $60 price.