Undecided races of the 2024 election: Live results and analysis

Late last night, Alaska reported updated tallies of its vote count, and the news was good for Republicans — at least when it came to the race for the state's lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. With 90% of the expected vote reporting, Republican Nick Begich III leads Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola by a little more than 3 percentage points, 49.1% to 45.8%. Although this represents a slight improvement for Peltola relative to where she stood right after Election Day (about a 4-point deficit), there simply aren't many votes left to be counted.

Now, Alaska uses ranked-choice voting if no candidate has a majority of first-choice votes, so it's worth mentioning the third- and fourth-place contenders: In third with 3.9% is John Wayne Howe of the secessionist and conservative Alaskan Independence Party, and in fourth with 1.0% is Democrat Eric Hafner, a perennial candidate.

At this point, Begich is so close to the magic 50%-plus-1-vote mark that it's difficult to imagine him losing. In fact, a 538 analysis of Alaska's Cast Vote Record suggests Begich's edge could expand once ranked-choice voting is taken into account. The CVR contains the votes and ranking of all scanned ballots, and while the state still needs to tally some votes, the math of incomplete CVR data is as follows: Once the secondary choices of voters who initially picked Hafner or Howe are added to the first-choice votes for Begich and Peltola, Begich leads about 52% to 48%. Assuming it works out this way, Peltola's defeat would mark the fourth for a Democratic House incumbent this cycle, and would put the GOP on course to likely win at least 221 seats (the party's total entering the election) based on where the other undecided races stand.

ABC News reports that Republicans are projected to have at least 218 seats in the next U.S. House of Representatives. Projections for GOP victories in Arizona's 6th District and California's 41st District have ensured that Republicans will have an edge — at least before Trump's initial Cabinet selections create openings in the House that will have to be filled by special elections in 2025. Overall, we have projections in 426 of 435 seats, with Republicans holding a 218-to-208 edge. As things stand, Democrats lead in five of the remaining nine unprojected contests, so it's possible that a 222-to-213 Republican majority — the same one they won in the 2022 midterms — is the most likely outcome at this point.

The 2024 election was big not just for control of the federal government, but also various state governments. Before the election, Cooper identified 10 state legislative chambers that were in danger of flipping control. How did those elections turn out?

Generally speaking, pretty well for Republicans. The GOP expanded their majorities in the New Hampshire state Senate and state House, giving them a workable trifecta when paired with Republican Gov.-elect Kelly Ayotte. (Republicans technically had a trifecta in New Hampshire before too, but their majority in the state House was so narrow they had trouble getting things done.) They also expanded their majorities in the Arizona state Senate and House and kept control of the Wisconsin Assembly under a newly un-gerrymandered map, although Democrats whittled the GOP majority down to 54-45. But their biggest win was flipping control of the Michigan state House, breaking the Democratic trifecta there.

Democrats had some victories too, though. They retained their uber-narrow 102-101 majority in the Pennsylvania state House, even as Trump was carrying the state. They won the special election that determined control of the Minnesota state Senate, albeit by a too-close-for-comfort margin of 52% to 48%. And a group of Democrats, independents and moderate Republicans announced they would form a coalition to govern the Alaska state House, replacing a Republican-dominated coalition.

One state legislative chamber remains unresolved: the Minnesota state House. According to the AP, Republicans have won 67 seats, Democrats have won 65 seats and two seats (House Districts 14B and 54A) are heading for recounts. Currently, Democrats lead in House District 14B by 191 votes, and in House District 54A by just 14 votes. If Democrats hold onto both leads, the chamber would be tied, and the two parties would have to hammer out a power-sharing agreement. If Republicans win just one, they would obviously win a majority. Either way, though, Democrats will lose full control over Minnesota state government.

California Republican Rep. David Valadao has ground out another tough victory in the Central Valley's 22nd District, where ABC News reports he is projected to win another term. Valadao faced a rematch with former state Assemblyman Rudy Salas, whom he beat by 3 points in 2022.

Big political shifts in the heavily Hispanic district likely helped Valadao exceed that mark this time: He currently leads by about 6 points, 53% to 47%, and while Biden would have carried this district by double digits in 2020, Trump probably came close to winning it this year (or won it outright!). With this victory, Valadao is one of just two of the 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Trump to remain in the House. The other is Dan Newhouse of Washington.