The US elections are not just about the next president

There's a timely article in the Globe about the OTHER elections going on in the USA. The presidential election takes up so much media oxygen, and it's so hard to look away, that it's easy to forget that there are also elections for Senate and House of Representatives going on this Tuesday, and these are also really important for the US, for Canada, and for the rest of the world.

One third of Senate Seats (34 out of 100) are up for grabs, as are all 435 House seats. Whoever becomes President, will either be constrained or aided by the make-up of the new Congress. Yes, there is still the possibility of executive orders (effectively presidential decrees, not requiring a vote by Congress), an expedient of which Donald Trump was particularly fond (he used them 220 times in his four years, compared to just 143 by Joe Biden in his), but Congress will still be critical for the passage of major legislation.

The Democrats currently have a slim majority in the Senate, but 19 of the 34 seats being contested are Democratic holdings, with only 11 being Republican, so the Dems face a large potential risk. 14 of the 34 seats in play are considered solidly Democrat and 11 solidly Republican. So, 9 could go either way and, in particular, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are considered too close to call.

In the House of Representatives, where the Republicans currently have a three-seat majority, no less than 25 seats are seen as toss-ups, 14 of which have a Republican incumbent and 8 a Democrat incumbent (3 seats are currently vacant). It is almost impossible to predict where this will go.

So, as with the presidential election, things sit on a knife-edge both in the Senate and in the House of Representatives, and a few votes here or there in a handful of swing states could make a huge difference in how the next four years go. Scary stuff, but fascinating.