Election day marked another major victory for the Democrat Party in the Senate. Their candidates took key Senate seats in tight races around the country.
The Democrats secured Republican seats in Indiana and Massachusetts, along with a victory in the high-profile race in Missouri between incumbent Claire McCaskill and Tea Party Republican challenger Todd Akin. They also took home victories in Virginia, Indiana, Wisconsin, Ohio, Montana and Connecticut – all of which were close races.
However, in North Dakota the Democrat has a secure but contestable lead. The Republican Dean Heller won a narrow victory in Nevada.
It wasn’t just a major win for Democrats, it was also a historic night for women as female candidates won many of these races bringing the United States Senate to its highest level of female Senators ever.
Jay Newton-Small is the congressional correspondent for Time Magazine. She says this election is a big gain for women, “we’ve got, I think by my count 20 women now in the senate. Which is the highest number ever. There are currently 17 women and we’re adding three more so almost a quarter of the senate now is approaching women one day hopefully we’ll get somewhere near parody.”
She says, “The problem for the senate republicans is that they have had a really hard time connecting with their primary bases. This goes back to the 2010 cycle where they endorsed Charlie Crist, former governor of Florida over Marco Rubio and then Marco Rubio ended up winning the primary much to their embarrassment. So this time around they’ve been trying to sort of get around on the other side of the primaries and pick candidates that way.”
Ms. Newton-Small also stated, “Frankly the Democrats have been better at picking and empowering really bad candidates for Republicans and rather than Republicans picking their own candidates. I mean Claire McCaskilll was running ads for Todd Akin in that primary because she wanted to run against Todd Akin, she knew he would be too extreme.”