Virginia Democrats may be on the cusp of winning full control of the General Assembly, the state legislature. In the Senate, Democrats have won 19 seats, per projections made by the Associated Press, compared with 15 for the GOP. Of the remaining six seats in the 40-seat chamber, Democrats are ahead by about 6 points in the still-unprojected 31st District in the Northern Virginia suburbs, and are likely to win in the 22nd District in Virginia Beach, which has a clear Democratic lean. That would give them 21 seats and a majority. That may be all they get, though, as the 24th and 27th districts are both very close but may lean ever-so-slightly toward the GOP.

The House of Delegates has more races with a large number of votes outstanding, but the election night forecast built by analysts at CNalysis gives the Democrats better odds to win a slight majority of 51-to-52 seats in the 100-seat chamber. The GOP could still pull out a draw or a slight edge there, though, so we'll have to see.

—Geoffrey Skelley, 538

There was little to no suspense when it came to the Mississippi state House and Senate, as Democrats didn't even field candidates in a majority of races. But nevertheless, the AP has called both the state House and state Senate for Republicans. The only remaining question will be whether the GOP can pick up the seats they need to get a supermajority in the lower chamber.

—Jacob Rubashkin, Inside Elections

With around 60 percent of the expected vote reporting, results from the Pennsylvania state Supreme Court race show Democrat Dan McCaffery in the lead with around 56 percent of the vote. As expected given the high number of heavily Democratic mail-in votes counted early tonight, Carluccio has been steadily catching up to McCaffery’s early lead. Per the secretary of state, McCaffery has won nearly 80 percent of the mail-in votes, while Carluccio has won just under 60 percent of Election Day votes. That said, less than half the expected vote is reporting in Philadelphia and most of its suburbs, which will deliver a much higher percentage of Election Day votes for McCaffery.

There are also some promising signs for McCaffery in smaller counties with most of the expected vote reporting — for example, with over 95 percent of the vote reporting, he's leading by 18 points in Lackawanna county (home of Scranton), where Sen. John Fetterman won by 16 points in 2022.

—Tia Yang, 538

Allegheny County, home of Pittsburgh, PA, has had a journey in the election for District Attorney this year — the Democratic incumbent, Steve Zappala, was eliminated in the primary by Matt Dugan, a progressive challenger endorsed by the Allegheny County Democratic Party. However, Zappala won the Republican primary as a write-in, and the general election is a rematch of the Democratic primary, with a much different electorate. While Dugan led the early vote by 21 percentage points, that was the worst performance of any Democrat countywide, and Zappala is leading Election Day votes by 12 percentage points. With 70 percent of expected Election Day vote reported, the race stands at less than 1000 vote margin.

A similar dynamic is playing out in the hotly contested race for the County Executive. Progressive Democrat Sara Innamorato led the early vote by 35 percentage points, but moderate Republican Joe Rockey is leading the Election Day vote by 11 percentage points. However, given the stronger early vote performance, Innamorato looks to be in a more comfortable lead, and the AP has called the race for Innamorato.

—Mary Radcliffe, 538

Brandon Presley is trying to pull off an upset in Mississippi, which hasn’t elected a Democratic governor since 1999. To do that, he’ll need strong support from Black voters, who are the bedrock of the Democratic Party in the South. Mississippi has the highest proportion of Black residents of any state in the nation at 38 percent, but they are underrepresented in the electorate, usually coming in at around 30 percent of voters. In 2020, Black voters made up 29 percent of the electorate according to the A.P. VoteCast. To win, Presley probably needs Black voters to make up around 35 percent of the electorate. But turnout has only approached that level in elections where Democrats have had a Black candidate at the top of the ticket, specifically Barack Obama in 2012, when Black voters were 36 percent of the electorate, and Mike Espy in 2018’s Senate special election, when Black voters were 32.5 percent of the electorate. (And this wasn’t enough to boost either candidate to victory — Presley, who is white, would also need far greater support from white voters than Obama and Espy received.)

While the Presley campaign has invested significantly in Black voter turnout and worked to court Black voters in a way that 2019 Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jim Hood did not, he’s up against some serious structural hurdles. Mississippi has one of the most restrictive felony disenfranchisement laws in the nation owing to provisions of its 1890 constitution, which was written in large part to restrict Black residents from exercising their recently obtained right to vote. A 2020 study found that one in six Black Mississippians are ineligible to vote under state law because of felony convictions. While a federal appeals court panel this summer ordered the state to stop enforcing the disenfranchisement law, that decision has been vacated pending an en banc appeal to the full 5th Circuit, so residents who would have regained their rights are back in limbo.

—Jacob Rubashkin, Inside Elections