By Grace Lewis || Staff Writer
It’s election night, and I sit in my common room, attempting to do my Italian homework. However, I cannot focus and I’m constantly pulled towards my laptop to check and re-check CNN, MSNBC, and ABC every thirty seconds. The live coverage of the election is anxiety inducing. The numbers of Republicans and Democrats scrapping it out for the House of Representatives and the Senate is constantly fluctuating. With total unsettlement happening in the race, I kept following the tight and important elections across our country.
Eventually, two very significant things occurred. First of all, the Senate was kept in control by the Republican party. Before the Election, the Republicans held fifty one seats in the senate opposed to the forty nine held by the Democratic party. As of now, the Democrats have suffered an overall loss of seats, with the current numbers being fifty one Republican (the minimum needed to control the Senate), and forty six going to the Democrats (CNN). This loss is disappointing and a difficult pill to swallow, but in truth the ability for the Democratic party to regain control of the Senate would have been incredibly difficult when considering the states that would have needed to flip parties, including Texas, Florida, and Missouri, which are typically red-leaning states. The loss of the Senate is heartbreaking in many cases as Republican control continues to allow for President Trumps antics in making lives difficult for so many different groups across our country and others.
As I stated already, the Senate is a tough loss, however the House of Representatives is a different story. The House of Representatives has been under control of the Republican party for 8 years. To put that in perspective, the Republicans have been in power since Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2 hit theaters and Kim Kardashian filed for divorce after her seventy two day marriage to Kris Humphries. So long story short — a fairly long time. However, this changed on Tuesday as the Democratic party has now taken control of the House, with two hundred and twenty five seats going towards the Democrats and two hundred even towards the Republicans (CNN). This victory provides a halt to Trumps total control of the American government. Winning the House protects and provides health care all across the country for millions of Americans, as well as many other victories.
The win of the House also comes with another victory in representation of diversity and gender. A record breaking number of women were elected into the House of Representatives. As rest of the votes are counted up, the number of women elected into the House is at least one hundred. Thirty five of them being new members, and sixty five were re-elected. This many women have never been elected into the House before, with the previous record being eighty five women as a total (CNN). In addition to these grand amounts of women, there were historic amounts of women of color. This includes two Muslim women and two Native American women ever elected into congress. There are many, many others and all these victories are huge for diversity and for womankind.
The final point that I want to make, is that whatever you voted for, if you did vote, I am proud of you. The turnout rate for young voters is still being calculated but those numbers are projected to be the highest they have ever been. We will not know for potentially months the demographic breakdown of the 2018 elections, but according to The New York Times, in some counties across the country, more people voted in this election than in the 2016 presidential election. So whatever you believe in and whatever happened in your party, your vote matters and counted towards a future decided by us.
First-year Grace Lewis a Staff Writer. Her email is glewis@fandm.edu.