Inside the Republican Party, initial shock at the stunning election results on Tuesday night quickly gave way to anger with US President Donald Trump.
After Democrats won upset after upset in deep-red states like Texas, Kansas and South Carolina, some Republicans focused their ire on Trump, arguing that his focus on his legacy and indifference to voter concerns cost the party control of Congress.
"It's on him. It's not on anybody else. It's a total, complete rejection of President Trump," Bill Miller, a top Republican lobbyist in Texas, told the BBC. "This is a disaster of the first magnitude. Nobody saw it coming like this."
Most Republicans expected to lose control of the House and were clear-eyed about the challenge of holding onto the Senate in a tough election cycle that favoured the party out of power.
But some said in interviews that Trump dragged them down with unpopular policies, a low job approval rating and obsession over construction projects in Washington.
"It was just one mistake after another," said Gregg Peppin, a Republican strategist in Minnesota. "Clearly, in state after state, people did not like the president's policies."
A White House ally said public disapproval with Trump over the Iran war, tariffs and the administration's immigration crackdown created a "perfect storm" in November.
"There's palpable frustration [within] the party about how this has all played out," the person said, and much of it is directed at Trump. Anger with Trump "is extremely high".
Trump and Republicans had a lot riding on the outcome on Tuesday night. A stronger showing by the president's party - as happened in 2022, when Democrats under then-President Joe Biden lost just nine seats in the House, and gained one in the Senate - would have given Republicans some momentum heading into 2028.
But Trump will instead face a motivated Democratic majority in Congress that is eager to investigate the administration, block his judicial nominees and stymie the rest of his agenda.
The midterms have ushered in an uncertain new phase in Trump's second term and may force Republicans to start grappling with their post-Trump future.
"I don't think his influence is slipping," said Steve Scheffler, the Republican National Committeeman in Iowa, speaking on the eve of the election. Still, he said, when it came to the midterms, "there were things you wish he said differently".
Trump was silent for much of the night before posting a message on Truth Social after the House and Senate were called for Democrats.
"I wasn't on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE! Thank you for your attention to this matter," Trump wrote.
He said in later interviews with the New York Times and Fox News that he would accept the election results. Trump told Fox he was a "little bit surprised" by the election results, but noted that the president's party typically fared poorly in midterm elections.
Since 1934, the party in the White House has only gained seats in three midterm elections. While the Democratic gains in 2026 did not set a record, the party did win dozens of House races, state governor contests and Senate seats, including in states where the party had not been competitive for decades.
Before Tuesday, Democrats had not won a Senate seat in Kansas since 1932, and had not won a statewide race in Texas in more than three decades. The party also notched surprise upsets in other reliably red states like South Carolina that were thought to be safe seats for Republicans just weeks before Election Day.
Trump and Vice-President JD Vance held dozens of campaign rallies in the run-up to the midterms. The principal Trump-aligned Super PAC, MAGA Inc., spent hundreds of millions backing Republican candidates.
Trump allies said it was unfair to hold him responsible for the party's election losses. They pointed to the history of midterm elections, and said the party was saddled with weak Republican candidates in battleground states like Georgia, Michigan and Texas.
Ken Paxton, the Republican Senate nominee in Texas, ran "the worst Senate campaign in the country from either side of the aisle," said another Texas Republican operative, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "If Ken's campaign knocked on 100,000 doors I'd be shocked," the source said. The person added that Paxton's victorious Democratic opponent, James Talarico, ran "a really good and smart campaign."
Others defended Trump's autumn campaign schedule, noting that he had to balance his day job of running the country with midterm travel.
"He's the president. He's not going to spend his time campaigning 24/7," said Krish Mathrani, the Michigan Republican Party's youth chair. Mathrani said Trump's campaign rallies helped drive up enthusiasm among Republican voters. "President Trump is a turnout machine," he said.
That's true in presidential elections. But Trump's vaunted turnout operation has failed to deliver in elections when he's not on the ballot, and 2026 proved no different.
Voters rejected Trump's argument that the economy was better on his watch and that he was achieving his aims in the war with Iran. The effort by Trump to portray Democrats as extreme socialists also fell flat, as voters handed victories to moderates like Roy Cooper in North Carolina.
"That just didn't work with Cooper," said a Cooper campaign official. "Trying to tag him as some socialist liberal, that wasn't going to fly."
Trump often seemed disinterested in the midterms over the summer, the period of time when Republicans in Congress shifted their focus to the election.
Trump was consumed by the war with Iran abroad and his construction overhaul of Washington at home. The projects included the under-construction ballroom and a helipad on the South Lawn of the White House, renovations to a local golf course, a proposed memorial arch near Arlington Cemetery and renovations to the Kennedy Center.
Events like a UFC match at the White House on Trump's 80th birthday in June created the impression that the president was more interested in feting himself than winning the midterms, several sources said. Trump also repeatedly downplayed the rising costs of gas and often cast the affordability issue as a Democratic hoax.
Trump turned his full attention to the election in September at the Republican Party's midterm convention. The event was a gamble: Republicans hadn't held a midterm convention in decades, and it was an open question whether voters would tune in.
Trump dominated the convention in Dallas, frustrating Republicans who told the BBC they wanted to highlight the party's midterm candidates.
In his rambling keynote speech, Trump pledged to give $5,000 (£3,700) to Americans if Republicans retained control of Congress and raised eyebrows with an endorsement of Paxton which included a lengthy criticism of the candidate's lack of charisma and physical appearance.
"Obviously, that's never helpful," Robin Armstrong, Texas' Republican National Committeeman, said of Trump's critique of Paxton. "You're not going to stop what President Trump says. We just have to kind of live with that."
The convention failed to attract a large television audience, and Democrats were quick to call it a failure. "It backfired for Republicans because nobody paid any attention to it," said Terri Burke, the Texas Democratic Party's executive director.
Trump's penchant for straying off-message continued when he hit the campaign trail in the final weeks before Election Day. He made headlines for praising Ohio Republican Senator John Husted's physique, and drew criticism for calling Abdul El-Sayed a "jihadist" in the Michigan Senate race.
As Trump criss-crossed the country stumping for Republican candidates, the White House contended with controversies in Washington. Katie Zacharia was ousted after just five days as White House press secretary, and Kimberly Guilfoyle resigned as the US ambassador to Greece after reports surfaced that she asked a donor to pay her credit card debt.
Trump also faced a backlash in October for striking a deal to buy Russian diesel. The agreement, which blindsided members of Congress and drew condemnation from some Republicans, came just weeks after Trump signed a sanctions bill aimed at cutting off Russian oil and gas revenue.
Democrats used the deal and other scandals swirling around the White House to make the case for retaking control of Congress. The messaging resonated in the end, as Democrats flipped both chambers of Congress in convincing fashion.
A second White House ally said that the president's political aides projected optimism until the final days of the election, even as it became clear the party was headed to defeat.
Now, as Republicans take stock of the loss, several said they were ready to look ahead to the 2028 election.
"Whether that's JD Vance, or Marco Rubio, or Ted Cruz, we've got a pretty big bench," said Scheffler, the state's RNC member. "It'll be a wide open race."
Peppin, the Republican strategist, said the midterms results demonstrated the party needed a new direction. "I sincerely hope that we've turned the page from the Trump era, and that we'll have new players, new issues and a new focus moving forward."
