Results are still coming in and will be for a few more days, but many of the topline takeaways from Tuesday’s election are becoming clear as the uncalled races dwindle.
Donald Trump won the Presidency in a convincing fashion, likely winning the popular vote for the first time in three tries. Republicans retook control of the Senate with what’s likely to be a fairly slim majority. They will probably also hold onto control of the House, with even slimmer margins than the Senate.
As of Thursday afternoon, the Associated Press, which has been fastest to call the upper chamber races, has Republicans on track to land between 53 and 55 Senate seats–with Democrat Ruben Gallego currently ahead in Arizona and Jacky Rosen up in Nevada. Thus far, Democrats have been unable to hold their Senate seats in Red states, but Republicans have seen only limited success in the major swing states despite Trump sweeping them. Decision Desk HQ, which has been fastest to call lower chamber races, still has 22 House races up for grabs but projects Republicans will add a single seat to their current paper-thin majority.
The major gun groups that spent big money in those federal races faired very differently, with the National Rifle Association (NRA) outperforming the gun-control groups despite being outraised and outspent.
The NRA’s biggest bets almost all paid off. It went eight for ten in the races where its Political Action Committee spent the most money, with Michigan Republican Mike Rogers losing his Senate race and Arizona’s Kari Lake currently behind in her Senate bid. However, the group’s success rate dropped to nine for 18 with two uncalled contests in races where the NRA spent more than $50,000–including NRA-backed Gabe Evans, who currently trails Democrat Yadira Caraveo in Colorado’s only remaining uncalled House race.
“NRA members and gun owners across the country made their voices heard this election cycle by delivering a pro-gun majority in the U.S. Senate,” the NRA posted on Thursday. “Our votes matter!”
Everytown for Gun Safety’s Super PAC performed noticeably worse in its top ten races, but with more uncalled contests that could still go either way. Four of the races it spent most in have gone it’s way so far, three have gone against it, and the other three are all California House races that no outlet has called yet. Everytown’s success rate jumps a bit, adding two wins and the uncalled race in California’s 45th District, when looking at races where it spent more than $50,000.
“Tuesday night was devastating,” Angela Ferrell-Zabala, Everytown’s Senior Vice President of Movement Building, told supporters in a Thursday fundraising message vowing to continue fighting Trump. “Make no mistake: Trump’s extremist agenda is a danger to our nation. The next four years will not only bring significant challenges for our gun safety movement, but will undoubtedly put the freedoms of our communities—particularly Black and brown people, women, and LGBTQ+ folks—directly at risk.”
Giffords PAC spending is more straightforward than the rest. It only made outside expenditures in eight races, all of them over $235,000, and ended up on the wrong side of six of them so far. It hasn’t notched a single win yet, but it has spent a combined $2,234,654 trying to flip two Republican House seats that are still uncalled.
“It’s been a difficult few days, and we want to encourage you to take some time to care for yourself,” the Giffords PAC wrote in a fundraising email to supporters. “We understand the emotions you may be feeling: sadness, anger, confusion, frustration, disappointment. These feelings are all incredibly valid, and all of us here at GIFFORDS—including Gabby—are experiencing those feelings right along with you. But we’re also gearing up to take on the challenges that the new administration will bring.”
While gun policy wasn’t a top issue in the Presidential or major Senate races, and Republicans even backed off some previous gun-rights policy promises, gun-rights advocates remain a significant constituency in the party that is much more likely to see their preferences reflected in the Federal Government’s new makeup. Exactly how much gun-rights advocates benefit from the Republican win may turn on what the election’s final results are and how far the next Trump Administration is willing to go to push pro-gun reforms, but it is undoubtedly going to be more favorable to their policy views than a Harris Administration would have been.
Still, though the topline races clearly cut in favor of gun-rights advocates by virtue of cutting in favor of their preferred party, the handful of notable races that actually featured guns as a top issue actually went against them.
For instance, the only ballot initiative dealing with gun policy was a tax on gun and ammo sales in Colorado. It passed. Then there’s the race between Incumbent Democrat Jared Golden and challenger Republican Austin Theriault in Maine’s Second District. That was one of the only close races in the country where gun policy was among the top issues due to Golden’s embrace of a ban on “assault weapons” after the Lewiston shooting took place in his district last year. Several outlets, including Decision Desk HQ, have called the race for Golden, and he has declared victory in what was indeed a close race–though Theriault has already requested a recount.
Of course, Colorado is one of the few states that have trended blue this year, and Golden’s victory–if it stands–will be slimmer than his 2022 win. So, the takeaways are limited by both the number of races where gun policy was key and the relative lean in those areas.
So, the topline outcomes of the race and the success rate of the gun groups paint a picture gun-rights advocates will very much like. Still, gun-control advocates might take some solace in how they performed in the small number of contests that revolved primarily around gun policy.
