A newly coined “Blue Wave” flooded the United States this past week after the midterm elections turned the country’s political situation completely on its head. Both the House of Representatives and Senate are set to be under control of the Democratic party, with 54 out of 100 seats held in the Senate and 254 out of 435 in the house.
Before the elections, the Republican party seemed to be sitting pretty with a 53-47 majority held in the Senate. However, after seven major flips in Maine, Ohio, North Carolina, Iowa, South Carolina, Kansas and Texas, the outlook for the Trump administration has now completely shifted, seeing that all legislation must pass through the opposing party.
Although the election is decidedly blue, both Mississippi and Alaska are still contested states with each of their Democratic Senate candidates leading by less than 1%.
Alaskan results are typically counted slowly due to their overseas absentee policy, which allows ballots to arrive up to 15 days after the election.
Mississippi should have all of their votes counted by Nov. 13 in order to receive certification.
Ultimately, Democrats hope their newfound power will be able to help them slow some of the legislative decisions made by the Trump administration.
Across the country people are beginning to understand the immense scale of this political shift. AAU and Verto Education students are also keeping up with the elections regardless of being overseas.
Alina Lubyanyy, a first-year student in Prague, is very pleased with the midterm results.
“It gives me hope for my future,” she said. “A lot more women got elected, and I think people are opening their eyes much more now.”
Lubyanayy isn’t the only hopeful student. Bayden Tjalsma, a business major at AAU, is also happy to see the political scale shift in the states.
“Seeing how much more progressive we are getting as a country is really awesome. I love to see the possibility of change coming,” Tjalsma said.
Many study-abroad students also reiterate this anticipation for change, waiting in anticipation for the Trump administration to lose its power.
Andrew Bryan, attending Verto Education this semester, is slightly more skeptical of just how drastic this political shift will be.
“I don’t think anything is going to get done for the next two years,” he said“Everything is going to take twice as long and Trump will just veto everything.”
This is a concern that many Democrats share, although the party hopes that with the investigative power of Congress they will be able to look into alleged conflicts of interest and other political decisions made by the president, forcing Trump to consider more moderate stances and lose some veto power.
Trump did post an image of a red hat with the word “VETO” onto TruthSocial shortly after the midterm election results became known.
As blue washes over the states, U.S. citizens regardless of political stance expect a completely altered climate within their country. For many, the midterms serve as the long awaited beginning of the end for the Trump administration, but ultimately only time will tell how these new senators and representatives will act.
