“Democrats grew increasingly optimistic on Thursday that they would hold on to their control of the Senate as votes were counted in Arizona and Nevada, after chalking up vital victories in New Hampshire and Pennsylvania and watching the race in Georgia head to a runoff election in December,” the New York Times reports.

“Republicans need to flip at least one seat to take control of the chamber, but their path appeared to be narrowing on Thursday, with Democrats holding a shrinking but durable lead in Arizona and picking up mail ballots in Nevada at a rate that seemed to give the party a slight edge.”

“The Republican nominee for Maryland attorney general said he will not concede the race despite trailing his Democratic opponent by more than 300,000 votes,” the Washington Post reports.

“Overlooked amid frantic punditry about the ‘red ripple’ in Congress: Democrats quietly won and defended majorities in state legislatures across the country, weakening GOP power on issues at the heart of the national political debate,” Axios reports.

“State legislative races are on pace to be the highlight of the Democratic ballot. If Democrats hold on to Nevada, this will be the first time the party in power hasn’t lost a single chamber in the midterms since 1934.”

“Mitch McConnell is tapping Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp to help Republican Senate candidate Herschel Walker over the finish line in his December runoff election — a contest that could decide control of the chamber next year,” Politico reports.

“Kemp is loaning his get-out-the-vote machine to the Senate GOP’s voter turnout efforts, giving the party entrée to a political team that is increasingly viewed as one of the GOP’s most formidable state operations.”

“The losers of this year’s midterm elections are winning praise for doing something that would be entirely unremarkable in another era — admitting defeat,” NBC News reports.

“From Maine to Michigan, Senate to state legislature, Republican to Democrat, most high-profile candidates who fell short in the 2022 midterm elections are offering quick concessions and gracious congratulations to their opponents. And that includes candidates who earned endorsements from former President Donald Trump by embracing his false claims that elections are rigged against Republicans.”

Well, except Kari Lake.

Tim Alberta: “For Republicans, a central charge against Democrats throughout 2022 has been that Biden and his party are out of touch with ordinary Americans. A distilled version of the argument went like this: Democrats, the party of social and cultural elites, can’t relate to the economic pain being felt by millions of working people. That message penetrated—to a point.”

“According to exit polls, 20 percent of voters said inflation has caused their families ‘severe hardship’ over the past year. Among those respondents, 71 percent supported Republicans, and 28 percent supported Democrats. This is broadly consistent with other findings in the exit polling, as well as public-opinion research we saw throughout the summer and fall, showing disapproval of Biden and his stewardship of the economy. This would seem damning for Democrats—that is, until you consider the numbers in reverse and ask the obvious question: Why did three in 10 people who said they’ve experienced ‘severe hardship’ decide to vote for the party that controls Congress and the White House?

“The simplest explanation is that although many of these voters think Democrats are out of touch, they also think Republicans are out of their minds. And it seems they prefer the former to the latter.”

New York Times: “Two days after the election, House Republicans, still stung by a disappointing midterm performance, had won or were leading in the races for 221 seats — just three more than needed to retake the 435-member chamber… Democrats had won or were in the lead for 214 seats.”

“More than 30 races were still uncalled as of midday Thursday, and could still shift. But Democrats were left with only a narrow chance of retaining control of the chamber — an outcome even party operatives privately saw as a longshot. And Republicans could expand their advantage, with G.O.P. strategists believing they could push their total into the mid-220s or slightly higher.”

Kevin Drum: “Say what you will about betting markets, but the bettors themselves are mostly just talking to their friends and reading the same stuff everyone else does. Even aggregating several thousand of them doesn’t average out their systemic bias toward whatever their favorite call-in show is saying.”

In his book, What’s the Matter With Kansas, Thomas Frank described Johnson County as one of the “most intensely Republican places in the nation.”

The Kansas City Star reports it “is now a Democratic stronghold.”

“The shift away from Republicans began more than a decade ago but has been speeding up in recent years, leading Johnson County to vote for President Joe Biden in 2020 after narrowly backing former President Donald Trump in 2016. The county’s blue shift culminated this week in a midterm election that delivered big wins for Democrats – including providing votes crucial to reelecting Gov. Laura Kelly.”

Susan Glasser: “The biggest immediate problem for Biden and the Democrats, however, is that a win for the Republicans, even if it’s not a wave, is still a win.”

“A one-vote margin in the House would still give subpoena power to Jim Jordan as the chair of the House Judiciary Committee. It would still mean the difference between Biden being able to advance his legislative agenda with a Democratic Speaker or the impossibility of doing so with a Republican one. A narrow Republican majority in the House might even further empower the crazies in the chamber, making a Speaker Kevin McCarthy beholden to the Trumpian extremists’ every whim if he does not want to be deposed by them—if, that is, McCarthy is even able to win the Speakership.”

True, but the second-best scenario isn’t so bad.

“Voters this fall were in the kind of sour mood that usually signals they are ready for change in Washington and state capitals. But in many cases, they were not looking for the change that Republican candidates were offering,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

Michael Grunwald: “If you count all 50 million votes Florida cast for president from 1992 to 2016, just 20,000 votes separate the two parties, or 0.04 percent. That includes the ultimate swing-state election of 2000, when George W. Bush nosed out Al Gore by a mere 537 votes in Florida—and, eventually, one vote on the Supreme Court. Florida was also a cliff-hanger in the 2012 and 2016 presidential races, both decided by 1 percent. And Rick Scott won statewide elections by 1 percent or less in 2010, 2014, and 2018, when Governor Ron DeSantis squeaked out his own 0.4 percent victory.”

“But DeSantis bludgeoned former Governor Charlie Crist by an astonishing 19 points on Tuesday, a pretty decent night for Democrats running almost everywhere except Florida. Senator Marco Rubio was also reelected in a huge blowout, while Republicans swept every state office and claimed unprecedented supermajorities in both houses of the state legislature.”

Said Manny Diaz, Florida Democratic Party chair: “My God, we’ve hit rock bottom.”