President Trump, in what could be a historic repeat of his 2016 victory, is on the verge of winning 270 electoral votes that would deliver him the White House once again. Rural turnout has so far overpowered suburban and urban voters, which is not only driving Trump’s lead, but Republicans’ victories that have resulted in their retaking the Senate, according to the Associated Press. 

By early Wednesday morning, Trump had a healthy lead both in the Electoral College with 230 votes to Vice President Harris’s 205. He captured the critical swing states of North Carolina and Georgia, according to the Associated Press, and has held healthy leads in the swing states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Nevada and Arizona, the remaining two swing states, reported their first numbers late on Tuesday, and while it was just tens of thousands of ballots, Trump took the lead in those states as well. 

In the most critical battleground state of Pennsylvania, Ms. Harris was trailing Trump by more than 150,000 votes, or three percent, statewide. If that margin holds, it would far outpace the 45,000 vote margin by which he beat Senator Clinton in the state in 2016. The state’s Democratic senator who is running for reelection, Senator Casey, was similarly trailing his Republican challenger, Dave McCormick. Mr. McCormick was leading Mr. Casey by just over one point on Wednesday morning. 

Ms. Harris’s biggest hurdle in potentially making up any kind of margin with Trump is that the counties that supported her had already reported the vast majority of their votes by the end of Tuesday. 

Even though Mr. Casey still trails his GOP challenger, Republicans have little about which to worry with respect to the Senate. On Tuesday night, Republicans flipped seats in West Virginia and Ohio, giving them 51 Senate seats come January, which guarantees them a majority regardless of who is sworn in as president. Senator Tester and Senator Baldwin, two Democrats running for reelection, were also trailing in their races in Montana and Wisconsin. Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin — the Democratic nominee for the Senate in Michigan — also trailed her GOP opponent as of Wednesday morning. 

It is a remarkable turn of events for Democrats who had led their Republican challengers at both the presidential and Senate levels headed into Tuesday. Several election models had Ms. Harris winning the presidency thanks to high urban and suburban turnout, but it appears to not be enough to get her over the finish line in the face of Trump’s strong rural results. 

The first red flag for Democrats on Tuesday night was the Florida result, where Republicans ran up the score in traditionally red areas and flipping counties that were once reliably blue. As of Wednesday morning, Trump led Ms. Harris in the state by 14 points, which would be the largest victory in Florida for a Republican presidential candidate since 1988. 

Latino voters, particularly men, shifted hard toward Trump in 2024, according to exit polls, which likely helped drive his Florida turnout and his strength in some urban areas across the swing states. According to NBC News, Trump won Latino men nationally, a remarkable shift from 2020 when he lost the Latino vote by 21 points. Trump’s strength in states like Georgia and North Carolina was also likely driven, in part, by his support among Black men. According to that same NBC exit poll, Trump more than doubled his support from Black men to 20 percent this year from eight percent four years ago. 

It is so far unclear if Trump’s coattails are long enough for Republicans to make meaningful gains in the House, if they can hold it at all. Speaker Johnson has just a four-seat majority in the House, and at least one of his swing district members — Congressman Brandon Williams from the Syracuse area — is already projected to have lost his seat, according to the Associated Press. 

Other must-win seats for the Republicans are currently up for grabs, as of Wednesday morning. Congresswoman Susan Wild and Congressman Matt Cartwright — two Democrats who represent neighboring districts in northeastern Pennsylvania — are narrowly trailing their Republican opponents, though there are tens of thousands of votes left to count. In New York, where five Republicans flipped districts to their party in the 2022 midterms, two of those members are trailing their Democratic opponents.