Democrats caress control of the Senate without waiting for the Georgia tiebreaker | International

Democrats caress control of the Senate with their fingertips. They already have 48 senators, they are clearly ahead in Arizona and this Friday afternoon they have made an important leap in Nevada with which Catherine Cortez Masto has suddenly neutralized practically all the advantage that Republican Adam Laxalt had. If Democrats win Arizona and Nevada they won't even have to wait for the Georgia runoff to retain control of the Senate.

Laxalt had an advantage of approximately one point over Cortez Masto with the count of the in-person votes, but the votes by mail have begun to be processed and, as expected, they have favored the Democrat. After the data published this Friday, equality is maximum, from 48.5% to 48.4%. The Republican is still ahead, with 459,494 votes, but the Democrat already has 458,696, that is, a difference of just 800 votes.

Most of the votes by mail correspond to Clark County, where Las Vegas is located and where the Democrats have cemented their victories in the State of Nevada. In the face-to-face vote, Cortez Masto was winning in that county by 51%-46%, but in the count of votes by mail that was published this Friday, his advantage has been much greater, from 63% to 33%.

In general, Democratic voters tend to prefer voting by mail more than Republicans. There are still some 68,000 ballots to be processed and they correspond to voting by mail. It would be enough for the Democrat to achieve 51% to proclaim herself the winner. Experts right now see it as very likely, but until the votes are counted, any conclusion is hasty.

Nevada was seen as the weakest link in the Democratic chain. That is why it was so important for Joe Biden's party to win the position for senator from Pennsylvania, which he has achieved thanks to the victory of leftist John Fetterman against Mehmet Oz, the famous television doctor known as Doctor Oz. The American press has published that Donald Trump is furious with his wife, Melania Trump, for having recommended it to him, but the former president has denied it. Oz won the Republican primary by a slim margin thanks to Trump's support, eliminating from the race a candidate who probably would have had more options on November 8, but who did not buy the hoax that Trump was robbed of the 2020 election. Doctor Oz himself backed away from that lie, which Trump considers to be "his mistake."

In Arizona, the Democrats were favorites, according to the polls, but by a narrow margin that, combined with the slow count, has increased the suspense. In the State there are around half a million votes left to count, many more than in Nevada and it is possible that the scrutiny will extend throughout the next week, but there the advantage of Democrat Mark Kelly is relatively wide. He has 51.7% of the votes, an advantage of 5.6 points (about 115,000 votes) over Republican Blake Masters, another of the controversial candidates promoted by Donald Trump who have disappointed in these elections.

the magic 50

If the Democrats manage to sign up those two senators, they will reach the magic number of 50, half of the 100 senators. For Joe Biden's party that is enough, because in case of equality in the voting, the tie is broken by the vice president, Kamala Harris.

With 50 senators, the second round of Georgia, where no candidate has passed 50% goes to a runoff, would lose importance. Democrat Raphael Warnock and Republican Herschel Walker will meet again at the polls on December 6, but without the expected drama. Still, that seat would still be important. One more senator than he had until now would not only put Biden in the small group of presidents who have managed to improve his result in the upper house in mid-term elections, but would also give him a more comfortable majority in which he could afford to dispense with the vote of his most fractious senator, Joe Manchin, in the votes in which he wants to distance himself from the group.

From the beginning, everything pointed to the fact that whoever achieved victory in two of the three key states (Pennsylvania, Nevada and Georgia) would retain control of the Senate and that seems to be confirmed. Democrats in New Hampshire and Arizona were only in jeopardy if Trump's forecast of a "giant red wave" came true, because of the color of the Republican Party, which has not happened.

What seems complicated for the Democrats is to maintain the majority in the House of Representatives, but four days after the vote it is still not impossible, it is already quite an achievement. The best result in mid-term elections since those of 2002 with George W. Bush, very marked by the hangover from the national trauma caused by the September 11 attacks, is confirmed.

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