Many of the highest-profile elections on Tuesday night went just as expected. But across the country and down the ballot in four states, there were some surprises.
In a onetime battleground state that has shifted firmly to the right, Florida Democrats took dueling approaches to win statewide for the first time since 2018. They picked a democratic socialist to run for Senate and a former Republican to run for governor.
As GOP voters picked one House incumbent to succeed Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) as governor, they ousted another mired in scandal whom DeSantis declined to support.
A Democrat is locked in a tight race for a special election for a heavily Republican Pennsylvania state House district, and President Donald Trump’s pick for Wyoming governor lost to a state lawmaker.
Here’s a rundown from Tuesday’s elections.
Scandal in Washington topples a GOP incumbent in Florida
Of eight Florida House incumbents who faced primary challenges, only one lost: Cory Mills (R).
Mills, a two-term lawmaker from the Daytona Beach area, faces mounting allegations of sexual misconduct, domestic abuse and campaign finance violations. The House Ethics Committee said it authorized more than 20 subpoenas as it investigates him.
As DeSantis stayed out of the race, Trump stopped publicly backing Mills and some of Mills’s House GOP colleagues endorsed a challenger. Primary voters in his district followed suit: They picked former news anchor Ryan Elijah by a margin of 13 percentage points, signaling voter distaste for incumbents’ scandals.
Democrats pick a former Republican and a new DSA member
Democrats haven’t won statewide in Florida since 2018, and they face long odds this year. A pair of wild cards who won over primary voters will try to reverse the party’s losing streak.
David Jolly, a Republican turned independent Trump critic turned Democrat, beat challengers from the left to take on Rep. Byron Donalds (R) in the governor’s race.
He’ll be on the ballot alongside Angie Nixon, a progressive state lawmaker from Jacksonville who recently joined the Democratic Socialists of America but had not been endorsed by the group or any of its chapters. Facing Alexander Vindman, a key witness in Trump’s first impeachment trial, she overcame a massive disadvantage in fundraising and spending. She will face Sen. Ashley Moody (R), who is in her second year in Congress after being appointed to fill the seat left open when Marco Rubio became secretary of state.
Donalds and Moody will be heavily favored. Although this election will herald the end of DeSantis’s ironfisted leadership in Florida, he has managed to turn the former swing state into a conservative bastion.
Florida House Democrats hold on for now
DeSantis’s move to redraw the state’s congressional map and give the GOP a boost scrambled the field for many House races.
But some of the incumbents whose districts were splintered managed to hang on: Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D), who faced criticism for shifting to run in a predominantly Black seat, beat four Black candidates.
Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D), a moderate, ran in a new district, a battleground where he defeated a democratic socialist. He will now face a self-described “America First” mayor.
As in that race, Democrats are expected to fight for other seats that were redrawn to favor Republicans: In Tampa, Rep. Kathy Castor (D) is facing former state lawmaker Mike Beltran, while an empty seat in southern Florida pits restaurant franchisee Casey Askar (R) against Pia Dandiya (D), a tech executive and former teacher.
The GOP’s best flip opportunity is likely to come in the Orlando area, where the Republican primary to take on Rep. Darren Soto (D) was too close to call early Wednesday.
Another loss for Trump in a governor’s race
The power of Trump’s endorsement took another blow after his preferred candidate in Wyoming’s gubernatorial primary, Megan Degenfelder, lost to state Sen. Eric Barlow.
Degenfelder, the state’s superintendent of public instruction, secured Trump’s endorsement before she even announced her campaign. But Barlow had years of experience in party leadership in the state legislature, as well as the cash advantage.
Gubernatorial candidates in Iowa, Minnesota, South Carolina and Georgia also lost GOP primaries despite Trump’s backing.
Mixed results for Wyoming’s right wing
In a deep red state like Wyoming, political fights are usually about how far right Republicans should go.
State Rep. Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, chair of the ultraconservative Wyoming Freedom Caucus, accused Barlow of being insufficiently conservative during his time as House speaker and opposed his gubernatorial run. Others in Wyoming’s right flank did well on Tuesday.
Rep. Harriet Hageman, Trump’s pick for the open Senate seat vacated by the retiring Sen. Cynthia Lummis, won her race handily. Secretary of State Chuck Gray, aligned with the Freedom Caucus, won the crowded primary for the state’s sole House seat, vacated by Hageman, a conservative who unseated the fierce Republican Trump critic Liz Cheney in 2022.
A surprising showing for Democrats in Pennsylvania
In a Pennsylvania special election, Democrat Brandon Dukes held a narrow lead over Republican Scott Timko in a state House district that Trump carried by 18 percentage points in 2024. The race remained uncalled early Wednesday morning.
The district includes parts of Butler County close to the site where Trump was shot at during a campaign rally two years ago. Tuesday’s winner will complete the months left in the term of a lawmaker who stepped down. Dukes and Timko are also competing in November for a full term.
While special elections generally have low turnout, Tuesday’s contest could be an early sign of shifting political sentiments in the swing state. Pennsylvania is home to several battleground congressional districts in the fight for control of the U.S. House.
Democrats have won or overperformed expectations in special elections in the past year, including an upset in a Florida state legislative district that includes the president’s Mar-a-Lago estate.
AIPAC makes a difference
The force of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee was on display in a California special election where the pro-Israel lobby’s last-minute intervention may have thinned the margin between two Democrats competing for the seat vacated by Eric Swalwell (D).
AIPAC’s super PAC, the United Democracy Project, swooped in and spent millions of dollars on advertising in the final two weeks of the race. The election was too close to call Tuesday despite state Sen. Aisha Wahab, a critic of Israel, finishing with a double-digit lead over her opponent Melissa Hernandez in the primary.
AIPAC’s involvement in races has become controversial, including in Michigan, where Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed turned its super PAC’s massive spending against him into a rallying cry for his supporters. Tuesday’s outcome showed that despite its polarizing brand, AIPAC still wields power in congressional races.
Alaska sets up competitive Senate showdown
Sen. Dan Sullivan (R) and former representative Mary Peltola (D) advanced to the general election in Alaska’s Senate race. The state’s unusual primary system meant the two were widely anticipated to make it, but they will also contend against two other candidates in a ranked-choice system.
Sullivan is one of Democrats’ biggest targets this year in their bid to retake control of the Senate. Peltola, who was previously the state’s sole House member, was recruited by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (New York) and has been an adept fundraiser.
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