National
Republicans are projected to retain control of the U.S. House of Representatives, albeit by a razor-thin margin and one slightly less than the 227 seats The Messenger had forecasted.
The deciding seat appears to have come from CO-08, a district that was formed after the results of the 2020 Census, giving Colorado another congressional district and electoral vote. Yadira Caraveo (D, CO-08) had narrowly won the seat in 2022, despite polling headwinds, but failed to win a second term.
Congressman-elect Gabe Evans (R) is finishing his first term in the Colorado House of Representatives. Decision Desk HQ (DDHQ) has projected Evans to oust Caraveo by just over one point, or about 2,500 votes out of over 300,000 ballots cast.
Colorado will now have a split House delegation, with four seats each controlled by either party, but Evans starts as an underdog in the 2026 midterms, where Democrats are, based on conventional political wisdom, favorites to retake the lower chamber.
The GOP has also held important battleground districts, such as AZ-06, CA-41, and CA-22. Republicans have flipped seven seats, NC-06, NC-13, NC-14, PA-07, PA-08, MI-07, and CO-08, while Democrats have also flipped seven seats, NY-07, NY-19, NY-22, AL-02, LA-06, OR-05, and CA-27. As of now, no party is experiencing a net gain, but the GOP appears favored to have a net gain of just one seat after all votes are counted.
Currently, DDHQ has the GOP at 219 seats to 211 for the Democrats. DDHQ has not called CA-13 and AK-AL, where Republicans are leading, as well as CA-09 and CA-21, where Democrats are narrowly leading.
As it pertains to our forecast, we’re off by six seats in the raw count, but the GOP has won the majority, in line, more or less, with our forecast. We missed several races, but no seats have flipped that weren’t on our “Upset Alert” list.
The map above shows dark red/blue seats as having been held by the respective party, with medium red/blue seats showing flips for the respective party, and the light red/blue seats (just three in California and the sole seat in Alaska) show where the respective party currently leads the vote count.
Meanwhile, President-elect Donald Trump (R-FL) is assembling his Cabinet, choosing Long Island’s favorite son Lee Zeldin (R-Shirley) to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
In addition, Trump announced his first pick on election night: Susie Wiles for Chief of Staff. Wiles, one of his two campaign managers, will be the first female White House Chief of Staff.
Trump has selected Tom Homan as his “border czar,” who promises sweeping deportations of illegal immigrants and will serve as Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Congresswoman Elise Stefanik (R, NY-21) has been selected as the Ambassador to the United Nations. Stefanik took the post of House Republican Conference Chair in 2021, when then-Congresswoman Liz Cheney (R, WY-AL) was ousted in her primary.
Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) has been tapped as Trump’s Secretary of State. Should he be confirmed by the Senate, Rubio will be the first Latino to serve in the role. He will be the de facto leader of Trump’s foreign policy.
Pete Hegseth, a Fox News commentator and Veteran, if confirmed by the Senate, will serve as Secretary of Defense.
Congressman Mike Waltz (R, FL-06) is Trump’s pick for National Security Advisor. Waltz is a retired Army Green Beret who was elected to Congress in 2018.
In perhaps the most historic of the picks, Trump has selected 2022 presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy (R-OH) and CEO of SpaceX and X, the latter formerly known as Twitter, Elon Musk to lead the newly-created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). The two will “pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies,” according to Trump in a statement.
The Department’s acronym is a reference to a popular Internet meme and a dark-horse cryptocurrency that ballooned in value in 2021.
As his Ambassador to Israel, Trump is picking former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee (R), who briefly ran for president in 2016.
Governor Kristi Noem (R-SD) is set to serve as Homeland Security Secretary, while John Ratcliffe (R-TX) is set to make a comeback as CIA Director, after previously serving as the Director of National Intelligence during the latter half of Trump’s first term.
However, Trump is petitioning a former Democrat to enter the Cabinet as his Director of National Intelligence: former Congresswoman and 2020 presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard (R-HI). After representing Hawaii in Congress from 2013 to 2021 and after serving as Vice Chair of the Democratic National Conference from 2013 to 2016, Gabbard ran for president as a Democrat in 2020. She famously sat out the impeachment vote of Trump in 2019 and became perhaps one of his most startling surrogates on the campaign trail. The American Samoa-born Gabbard earned the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the Army and is still active in the branch.
Trump has also nominated Congressman Matt Gaetz (R, FL-01) as his Attorney General, a move that will likely see a contentious Senate hearing and nominating process. Trump has also flirted with the idea of Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) serving in that position as well.
Kash Patel is also on Trump’s shortlist for a national security post, while Linda McMahon (R-CT) is on deck as his Commerce Secretary. McMahon is the co-founder and former CEO of WWE, who, along with her husband, Vince, have been longtime friends of Trump. McMahon served in his Cabinet as the Director of the Small Business Administration and ran twice for U.S. Senate in Connecticut in 2010 and 2012.
State
Election results are still coming in, but two Long Island seats have changed party hands, while two still hang in the balance.
The two seats that have changed hands are in Nassau County. In the Twenty-First Assembly District, Assemblyman Brian Curran (R-Lynbrook) has lost his seat in yet another rematch with former Assemblywoman Judy Griffin (D-Rockville Centre). Griffin ousted Curran in 2018, only for Curran to oust her in 2022. Now, Griffin has won another rematch, taking 52% of the vote to Curran’s 48%.
Also in Nassau County, Assemblywoman Gina Sillitti (D-Manorhaven) has lost to Daniel Norber (R-Great Neck), a dual citizen of the U.S. and Israel, becoming the first Republican to represent this district in over fifty years. The seat was once represented by now-State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli (D-Great Neck Plaza). Trump carried the historically-blue district by 2,000 votes, sweeping Norber into office. The district includes a large Jewish population, concentrated in areas like Manhasset, Merrick, Port Washington, Roslyn, Searingtown, Williston Park, New Hyde Park, and Garden City.
Meanwhile, residents of the two Suffolk seats, the Fourth and Eleventh Assembly districts, are still awaiting returns.
In the Fourth District, one-term Assemblyman Ed Flood (R-Port Jefferson) is narrowly trailing former Port Jefferson Trustee and Deputy Mayor Rebecca Kassay (D-Port Jefferson). Kassay leads by just 50.2% to Flood’s 49.8%. The race has not yet been called. The district includes the Three Village area, as well as Poquott, Port Jefferson, Port Jefferson Station, Terryville, Belle Terre, and parts of Centereach, Selden, Coram, and Gordon Heights.
In the Eleventh District, a razor-thin margin of just one vote continues to separate Joe Cardinale (R-Amityville) and Kwani O’Pharrow (D-West Babylon) in the race to succeed retiring Assemblywoman Kimberly Jean-Pierre (D-Wheatley Heights). However, O’Pharrow leads by about two hundred votes in the few neighborhoods of Massapequa Park the district contains.
Cardinale’s campaign team told The Messenger that no call has been made.
Local
Suffolk County and New York State have requested a moratorium on burning until the end of the month, citing dry conditions and a near-forty-five-day-absence of rain, only interrupted by a half-inch of rain on Sunday night.
The dry conditions have sparked fires in Orange County, to which Suffolk County has lent the services and equipment of ten fire departments to aid in controlling the blaze. The first round of firefighters returned Tuesday night and there might be another round going Upstate late this week and over the weekend, according to our conversations with Fire, Rescue, and Emergency Services (FRES) and the Office of Emergency Management (OEM).
Firefighters and trucks from Central Islip, Eastport, Amagansett, Dix Hills, Huntington, West Islip, East Marion, and Orient have all aided in the Orange County fires.
Meanwhile, back home in Suffolk, officials are investigating an alleged arson case started by none other than a firefighter.
Jonathan Quiles, 20, was arrested on Tuesday night after camera footage linked him to a brush fire that broke out in Medford. It took firefighters six hours to put out the fires near Mount Vernon Avenue. The fires damaged a 2004 Chevrolet parked nearby, but no injuries or extensive property damage were reported.
“It’s unfortunate that this turned out to be a volunteer firefighter, but no one is above the law and his regrettable actions imperiled his brother and sister firefighters,” said Brookhaven Town Supervisor Dan Panico (R-Center Moriches). “I hope that this arrest will serve as a warning and a cautionary tale against those who may want to repeat these regrettable actions.”
Quiles is charged with five misdemeanor counts of arson and one felony count of arson, according to Suffolk County Police Commissioner Robert Waring. No motive has been identified; the investigation is still active.
New York continues to see its driest period in nearly 160 years.
