Midterm Election Results 2026 Live: House, Senate, Bitcoin

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Americans voted on Tuesday, 3 November 2026, for all 435 members of the House of Representatives and 35 of the 100 senators. At 00:50 CET on Wednesday, the first polls have closed in Indiana and Kentucky, votes are being counted, and neither chamber has been called yet. Democrats need a net gain of three seats for the House and four for the Senate, according to MS NOW. Prediction markets put a Democratic sweep at 85.5 percent on Polymarket (00:50 CET). For Bitcoin and crypto, the midterm election results decide who writes the next market structure law after the CLARITY Act failed in the Senate in September.

Midterm election results 2026: the key facts

Status (00:50 CET): counting has begun, no chamber called; 65 Senate seats are not up for election (34 Democrats and allied independents, 31 Republicans).
Majority: 218 of 435 seats in the House, 51 of 100 in the Senate; at 50 to 50 Vice President JD Vance casts the deciding vote for the Republicans.
Before the vote: Republicans held the Senate 53 to 47 and the House 218 to 212, with vacancies, according to WHYY and NBC.
Exit poll: Trump approval 38 percent, the economy is the top issue at 39 percent (preliminary, NBC News).
Crypto law: the CLARITY Act failed 49 to 50 on 15 September; it needed 60 votes and expires on 3 January if the Senate does not act.
Bitcoin: $77,671 at 00:50 CET (CoinMarketCap).

Midterm election results live: the latest updates

All times are Central European Time (CET); US Eastern Time is six hours earlier. Race calls come from AP and the NBC News Decision Desk. Newest entry first.

00:40: Exit poll: 75 percent rate the economy as not so good or poor; in 2018 only 32 percent did (NBC News).
00:31: Trump's approval stands at 38 percent in the preliminary exit poll, 62 percent disapprove (NBC News).
00:11: Alaska reports a state record of 105,423 early and absentee votes (NBC News).
00:00: First polls close in parts of Indiana and Kentucky, the first signals of the night.
Earlier: Technical delays in several North Carolina counties; three Pennsylvania precincts extend voting to 20:30 Eastern Time (MS NOW).

Senate results 2026: the races that decide the majority

Republicans can lose three seats and still control the Senate. MS NOW rates Alaska, Maine, Michigan, Ohio and Texas as toss-ups and sees Iowa, Kansas and South Carolina leaning Republican. Democrats have to defend Georgia, Michigan, New Hampshire and Minnesota and flip four seats elsewhere, so North Carolina and Ohio, which report early in the night, are the first real signal.

Candidates and status: NBC News, based on AP data. Close races can stay open for days: Alaska and Maine use ranked-choice voting, and Georgia goes to a runoff if nobody reaches 50 percent.

What the midterm results mean for crypto: four constellations

A Democratic House is close to priced in; the open question is the Senate. For the CLARITY Act, the deciding number is 60, because the bill needs 60 votes to get past a Senate filibuster, and in September it reached 49. So no outcome tonight passes the law on its own. The odds below are from Polymarket's balance of power market at 00:50 CET.

The sharpest reading comes from TD Cowen. Its Washington analyst Jaret Seiberg wrote on election day that a Congress under Democratic control would likely investigate Trump and his crypto ties, "which is why we do not expect the Clarity Act to pass over the next two years", as Bitcoin Magazine reports. Elizabeth Warren would then lead the Senate Banking Committee and Maxine Waters the House Financial Services Committee.

That leaves two paths. The first is the lame-duck session until 3 January: Senator Angela Alsobrooks, one of the negotiators, still considers a deal possible before the new Congress starts. The second is rulemaking at the SEC and CFTC, which works without Congress as long as the agencies stay staffed. Everything on the bill's history and content is in our explainer CLARITY Act explained.

How Bitcoin, oil and gold react to the midterm results

With a sweep priced this high, a Democratic win alone is no surprise. The market reaction to watch is a Republican Senate hold or a late shift in Texas and Ohio. Bitcoin went into the night 3.5 percent lower on the week, under pressure from the Binance hack and the sell-off on Wall Street.

History gives no reliable template: after the last six US elections, Bitcoin moved between minus 45 and plus 44 percent within 30 days, as our midterm analysis shows. Five concrete paths for Bitcoin, XRP and Solana are in our midterm scenarios. If you hold coins through a night like this, use platforms from our comparison of regulated crypto exchanges or your own wallet; for a broader market view, see our crypto broker comparison.

Exit polls 2026: prices, Latino voters and the egg test

The preliminary exit poll for NBC News shows a tense mood: 75 percent rate the economy as not so good or poor, 79 percent say inflation has caused them hardship, and 62 percent blame higher prices on Trump's policies. Latino voters backed Democrats by 61 to 35 percent and Black voters by 88 to 9. These are survey figures, not counted votes, and they can shift overnight.

The symbol of the 2024 campaign no longer fits, though. A dozen eggs cost $3.37 in October 2024 and $2.27 in September 2026, 33 percent less, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Gasoline went the other way, from $3.28 to $4.48 a gallon, up 37 percent, as the Iran war pushed up oil. Coffee costs 40 percent more and ground beef 22 percent more. Wages rose 6.6 percent and consumer prices 6.7 percent over the same period, so the average paycheck has only kept pace.

Trump, Iran and the days after the midterms

The vote also closes a political window. Trump said on 8 October that he would not order new strikes on Iran before the election, CNBC reported, and CNN reported that the Pentagon is weighing the GBU-43/B, the "mother of all bombs", if strikes resume; CNBC could not confirm that independently. On the eve of the vote, the Wall Street Journal reported a US strike on Iran's Qeshm Island, which officials described as defensive, and Brent traded at $105, according to CNBC.

When will the final midterm results be known?

A House majority can be clear on Wednesday morning European time if Democrats win the early battlegrounds in the East. California and other Western states count for days, and the last polls close in Alaska at 07:00 CET. Senate control may have to wait for Alaska, Maine or a Georgia runoff. Next on the calendar: the US jobs report on Friday, 6 November, then the lame-duck session, and on 3 January 2027 the new Congress. This article is not investment advice.

FAQ: midterm election results 2026

The count is running through the night and neither chamber has been called yet. The ticker in this article shows the latest race calls from AP and NBC News.

Democrats need a net gain of three seats for the 218 needed in the House and four seats for 51 in the Senate. At 50 to 50, Vice President JD Vance breaks the tie for the Republicans.

It stays open until the current Congress ends on 3 January 2027 and then expires. TD Cowen expects no passage in the next two years if Democrats win both chambers. A new bill would still need 60 votes in the Senate.

The House can be clear on Wednesday. Senate control may take longer because Alaska and Maine use ranked-choice voting and Georgia holds a runoff if nobody reaches 50 percent.

There is no reliable pattern. After the last six US elections, Bitcoin moved between minus 45 and plus 44 percent within 30 days, and prediction markets had a Democratic win largely priced in before the count.

Transparency note: This article was produced with the assistance of artificial intelligence and reviewed by our editorial team before publication. All figures and claims were checked against the primary sources linked in the text. The feature image was generated with AI.

Which topics should we dive deeper into?

Select what genuinely interests you. Your picks feed directly into our editorial planning.

Crypto news that's actually worth your time.

Weekly. 60 seconds. Carefully curated by our editors: no hype, no promo flood, no spam.

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