Though Democrats look increasingly like the favorites to take the House of Representatives in November, the midterm math in the Senate gets much dicier. The politics forecaster Decision Desk HQ recently rated the battle for Senate control a “pure tossup.”
Yet with the Iran war devolving into a quagmire; gas and grocery prices soaring; and the cost of borrowing on the rise, Americans are getting angrier. Nearly two-thirds of Americans see the country going in the “wrong direction.” Donald Trump’s popularity is in the toilet. And voters might just show rubber-stamping Republicans the exit from both chambers of Congress come November.
In the current Congress, Democrats hold 47 Senate seats. That means the party must flip at least four seats to take control of the chamber. (As a 50-50 split would make Vice President J.D. Vance the decider.) The good news for Democrats: There are seven clear pickup opportunities. A tougher pill to swallow: There are at least four seats in the Democratic column that have to be defended from credible GOP challengers.
Below are the key contests that will likely determine control of the Senate:
TO HOLD
Democrats winning the Senate begins by holding onto key seats currently held by the party.
Georgia
Democratic incumbent Sen. Jon Ossoff — thirty-nine years old and a rising star on the national stage — is facing off against far-right GOP Rep. Mike Collins in Georgia. Ossoff has rare gifts and has proven he can move news cycles; his barb at Trump for wanting to “travel with Natalie” provoked a multi-week MAGA meltdown. Ossoff has also ably tied Collins to extremists in the GOP candidate’s orbit — including a son-in-law who reportedly posted white-nationalist, antisemitic, and sexist comments online, and a former staffer who reportedly posted KKK and Nazi content. The Trump-endorsed Collins bills himself as a “conservative workhorse.” Ideologue is more like it. He has opposed abortion, without exception, calls climate change a “hoax,” and has a lifetime 1% score from the League of Conservation Voters.
Outlook (via Cook Political Report): Lean D
Michigan
With incumbent Sen. Gary Peters retiring, progressive Abdul El-Sayed is defending this Democratic seat. A Rhodes Scholar who earned both an MD and a PhD, El-Sayed has taught at Columbia and led public health departments in Detroit and Wayne County. El-Sayed overcame a $10 million blitz from AIPAC to win the Democratic primary, running on a simple slogan: “Money Out of Politics. Money in Your Pocket. Medicare for All.” El-Sayed is facing off against former Rep. Mike Rogers, an ex-FBI agent who previously ran for Senate, losing narrowly to Democratic Sen. Elisa Slotkin in 2024. Rogers seems to live at least part-time in Florida (he was registered to vote there into 2024) and has been cast as a carpetbagging “Florida Man.” He also is a defender of the extremist mega-donor Elon Musk, who doomed millions to death and disease by sending USAID to the “woodchipper” during his stint in the Trump White House. El-Sayed, for his part, has been dogged by an association with the hard-left streaming star Hasan Piker.
Outlook: Toss Up
Minnesota
Democratic incumbent Sen. Tina Smith is retiring — creating an open seat that will be contested by Peggy Flanagan, a progressive Democrat who currently serves as the state’s lieutenant governor, and Republican Michele Tafoya, a former sportscaster best known as an NFL sideline reporter. Flanagan is Ojibwe and one of the highest-ranking Native American officeholders in the country; she promotes Medicare for All, among a suite of progressive policies. Tafoya, by contrast, is running on a pro-cop, pro-deportation agenda that also appeals to transphobes with a vow to “get men out of women’s sports.”
Outlook: Likely D
New Hampshire
The Granite State could put Democrats in a hard place. Incumbent Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen is retiring. Rep. Chris Pappas is the newly minted Democratic nominee. He is a moderate who has held a purple district — and even defeated Karloline Leavitt to hold the seat in 2022, freeing her up to become Trump’s spinmeister. But Pappas is matched against New Hampshire political royalty in Republican nominee John E. Sununu. Sununu served in the U.S. Senate from 2002 to 2008; he is also the son and brother of former governors John H. and Chris Sununu, respectively. Sununu has been endorsed by Trump, and the family name is synonymous with a brand of old-school Republicanism that still plays in New England.
Cook rating: Lean D
TO FLIP
If Democrats can hold states currently in their column — a significant if — the party’s path to Senate control will still likely require winning a majority of the following six seats, currently held by Republicans.
Alaska
The incumbent is Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan, a reliable rubber stamp for the MAGA agenda, whom Trump has vowed to campaign for. The Democratic challenger is former Rep. Mary Peltola, who held the statewide Alaska House seat from 2022 to 2025. Peltola is an Alaska Native who is running on a simple platform of: “Fish. Family. Freedom.”
Alaska has an unusual general election — with four candidates facing off on a ranked-choice ballot. The other two candidates are both Republicans and include a second Dan Sullivan — a retired school teacher whose candidacy seems designed to troll the incumbent Sullivan. The fourth candidate is named Gerald Heikes. Confusion over the Sullivan dupe (derided as “Decoy Dan” by the incumbent’s defenders) could create a small drain on the current senator’s support. The challenger Sullivan drew 2.5 percent in the state’s nonpartisan primary, where Peltola won first place by a comfortable margin.
Outlook: Toss Up
Iowa
Incumbent Republican Sen. Joni Ernst is stepping down, creating an open seat. The Democratic nominee is Josh Turek, a two-time Paralympic gold medalist in basketball who has served two terms in the Iowa House. Turek pitches himself as a “prairie populist” willing to work across the aisle. (Watch his Contrarian interview with Jen Rubin here; see his campaign video with Barack Obama here.) He is running against Rep. Ashley Hinson, a former TV journalist turned career politician, on the Republican side. A Trump loyalist, Hinson voted for the president’s “Big Beautiful Bill” and against resolutions to limit the failed Iran war.
Outlook: Toss Up
Maine
Incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins — a faux moderate whose schtick is to express “concern” about Trump’s agenda while not doing anything substantive to halt it — is facing off against Democrat Troy Jackson, a longtime logger and former state senate president. Jackson replaced Graham Platner on the ballot after the populist oysterman was forced to withdraw in the face of a (disputed) claim of sexual assault. Jackson is campaigning for Medicare for All and against the influence of Big Tech billionaires. (Watch Jackson’s interview with The Contrarian here.) The Collins campaign is now being boosted by Elon Musk, whose AI company recently lost its legal fight to non-consensually “nudify” images of women and children in Minnesota.
Outlook: Toss Up
North Carolina
Republican incumbent (and Epstein survivors double-crosser) Sen. Thom Tillis is retiring from the Senate. This has created a path for the state’s Democratic heavyweight, Gov. Roy Cooper, to vie for the open seat. Cooper is making affordability the centerpiece of his campaign, vowing simply to “Make Stuff Cost Less.” The GOP nominee is Michael Whatley, a longtime GOP apparatchik with a foot in both the establishment and MAGA world. Whatley served as a chief of staff to the late Sen. Elizabeth Dole. He went on to run the North Carolina GOP before chairing the Republican National Committee in 2024 and 2025. Whatley has Trump’s endorsement and is explicitly running as a rubber stamp: His top issue priority is to “Enact the Trump Agenda in the U.S. Senate.”
Outlook: Lean D
Ohio
The race in Ohio is a comeback opportunity for one of the Democratic Party’s most likeable populists, former Sen. Sherrod Brown, who is campaigning against a system “rigged” in favor of giant corporations. Brown is challenging Sen. John Husted — appointed by the state’s governor to replace J.D. Vance when Vance became Trump’s Vice President. Brown is hitting Husted on the campaign trail for voting to slash Medicaid and failing to rein in Trump’s disastrous, price-hiking war in Iran. Husted’s campaign is preaching the three F’s: “Family. Faith. Freedom.” He recently fired his political director for posting Nazi and pro-Rhodesia content.
Outlook: Toss Up
Texas
Prodigious political talent James Talarico, a member of the Texas House, has put the Texas race into play against the state’s notorious attorney general, Ken Paxton. Talarico is literally a Christian seminarian who is campaigning on the biblical notion of “flipping tables.” Paxton was subject to an impeachment vote by members of his own party and has a long timeline of scandals, including (since-settled) charges of securities fraud. Trump endorsed Paxton, helping him win the primary over incumbent Sen. John Cornyn. Musk, whose own child is trans, is plowing money into the Lone Star state for ads centered on gender panic. Texas hasn’t elected a Democrat statewide since 1994.
Outlook: Toss Up
Tim Dickinson is the Senior Political Writer for The Contrarian