Democrats will control the Senate after a late Saturday call in the Nevada Senate race went to Democratic incumbent Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto. Her opponent, Republican Adam Laxalt, had held the lead in the race for several days, but as late ballots came in, Masto managed to narrow the gap and then finally overtake Laxalt Saturday evening.
Masto was up by about 5,000 votes as of Saturday night. With most of the outstanding ballots coming from Clark County, home to Las Vegas, Masto is expected to maintain and even grow her lead over the coming days. The AP called the race for Masto on Saturday.
Laxalt seemed to be trying to temper expectations on Saturday morning. In a tweet he said, “we are up only 862 votes. Multiple days in a row, the mostly mail in ballots counted continue to break in higher DEM margins than we calculated. This has narrowed our victory window.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer took a victory lap Saturday night, telling the AP: “We got a lot done and we’ll do a lot more for the American people. The American people rejected — soundly rejected — the anti-democratic, authoritarian, nasty and divisive direction the MAGA Republicans wanted to take our country.”
Masto’s win takes some of the pressure off the race in Georgia, where Republican Herschel Walker is trying to unseat incumbent Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock. Their race will be decided by a runoff election officially set for Dec. 6.
The AP called the Arizona Senate race for incumbent Democrat Sen. Mark Kelly on Friday night. Kelly defeated Republican candidate Blake Masters, a venture capitalist and political newcomer.