Several high-profile state and local elections on Tuesday marked the first major litmus test of U.S. President Donald Trump’s second term—and Democrats won big. From gubernatorial races to mayoral elections, Democrats swept their Republican opponents by campaigning on an anti-Trump platform.
The results were stark. In the first round of elections since Trump took office in January, Democrats won nearly all seats up for grabs. Most notably, Democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani swept the New York City mayoral vote, becoming the Big Apple’s first Muslim mayor. His win delivers a major setback for Trump, who personally endorsed Mamdani’s main rival, independent candidate Andrew Cuomo, and had threatened to cut off federal funding to New York City if Mamdani won.
Among Democrats’ other major wins, Mikie Sherrill was elected governor of New Jersey, Abigail Spanberger won the race for governor of Virginia, and Pennsylvania voted to retain three liberal state Supreme Court justices. Even races further down the ballot turned blue. In Virginia, 13 seats in the state House of Delegates flipped in favor of Democrats, while Democratic candidates Ghazala Hashmi and Jay Jones were elected lieutenant governor and attorney general, respectively. Atlanta, Cincinnati, Detroit, and Pittsburgh all elected Democratic mayors. And Democrats ousted two Republicans in a statewide election for the Georgia Public Service Commission.
To cap things off, Californians also voted on Tuesday to approve Proposition 50, which will allow the Democratic-controlled state legislature to redistrict its congressional map for the 2026 midterm election.
Trump, however, attributed the GOP’s poor showing on two things: himself not being on the ballot and the U.S. government shutdown, calling the latter a “big factor, negative.”
Read more in today’s World Brief: Sweeping Democratic Wins Serve as a Referendum on Trump 2.0.
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