The United States woke up to a radically altered political landscape on Wednesday after Donald Trump was dealt a devastating blow in the midterm elections, in which his Republican party was stripped of control of the Senate and the House as his handpicked “Maga” candidates were swept away by a blue tsunami.

With counting still going on in a couple of Senate races, and with 68 House seats as yet undeclared, Democrats were assured of a congressional majority far more comfortable than most pundits had predicted. They had flipped at least seven Senate seats, in such deep-red states as Texas and Kansas, which hasn’t sent a Democrat to the upper chamber for 94 years, along with more than two dozen House districts.

Having closed out his appeal to voters with a bizarre speech focusing on algae and grass from Washington’s Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool, Trump resurfaced on Wednesday afternoon to deliver his first remarks since the election from the construction site of his controversial White House ballroom.

Sidestepping the catastrophic blow to his political standing, and what it means to his party and the country’s future, the president focused instead on his self-aggrandizing building projects in the US capital. “I grew up on construction sites,” he told the crowd.

Within hours of polls closing, the political fallout began to descend on Trump and the Republican leadership. The White House put out an Instagram post saying, “PSA: TRUMP IS STILL YOUR PRESIDENT”, without adding that his power was now vastly diminished.

Vice-president JD Vance, whose old Ohio Senate seat was one of those that fell to the Democrats, began his long and no doubt fraught journey to distance himself from Trump before the 2028 presidential election. He instantly blamed the Republican rout on Trump’s war with Iran.

“The reason we lost is the war,” he said on X. “If you’d like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next 6 years was worth it, then do so. Argue it was a worthwhile cost to pay. Agree or disagree, that’s at least honest.”

Pressed by reporters on whether he agreed with Vance’s assessment, Trump replied: “I think it’s largely true because it drove the gasoline up a little bit, but at the same time, if I had to do it again, I’d have to do it again.”

Joining the raft of Republican senators and representatives swept away by the blue tide, one of the early casualties of the election was House speaker Mike Johnson, who indicated he will not seek re-election as leader of the Republican group when Democrats take over in January.

As Vance made clear in his statement, the election channelled the anger of a seething electorate, Republican voters and Democrats alike. In addition to Trump’s war, they were furious about the soaring coast of living and inflation, aggravated by the president’s tariffs and foreign exploits.

The president spent weeks before the election pleading with the American people to pretend he was on the ballot. He may now rue that tactic: the American people took him at his word, and delivered him a bloody nose of historic proportions, flinging his presidency into lame duck status.

He appeared last night to have changed his mind, declaring on social media: “I wasn’t on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!”

As the night progressed, one shock followed another as the rout extended into parts of the US once considered safe Republican strongholds. Top of the list was Texas, the state that has come to epitomise the iron fist of modern Republican rule.

In a seismic shift, James Talarico became the first Democrat to be sent by Texas to the US Senate since 1988. A Democratic dream of flipping the state that has been frustrated in countless previous cycles finally came to pass.

In a double whammy, out too went Greg Abbott, a titan of Texas Republican politics. He was ousted by Gina Hinojosa, who becomes the first Democratic governor of Texas in 36 years.

Her elevation to the state’s highest office as its first Latina governor stands in itself as a repudiation of the Trump administration. The brutal mass deportation campaign unleashed by ICE against Hispanics in Texas was one of Trump’s most resounding own goals, as it pushed away droves of voters who had backed him only two years ago.

In Michigan, Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, a doctor and progressive insurgent, made history in winning the closely watched Senate race, defeating the Republican Mike Rogers and becoming the US’s first Muslim senator.

His opponent and detractors, including Trump, led a largely Islamophobic campaign against him, often pointing to his name and faith, including the president alleging he was a “jihadist” and that he would need to walk through a metal detector to get into the Senate.

“They want an America that is too small for some of us,” El-Sayed said. “We know that America is big enough for all of us.”

The pattern of stunning Republican defeats was repeated across the country, from the East Coast through the plains, and even deep into the American South. It amounted to a withering rebuke of Trump’s broken promises, economic follies, and war with Iran at a time when many American families are struggling to put food on the table and gas in their tanks.

The list of astounding results extended to Kansas, a state that until recent days lay well beyond even the most optimistic Democrats’ wildest fantasies. Adam Hamilton, a mega-church pastor, becomes the first Democrat to win a US Senate seat in almost a century.

He throws out Roger Marshall, the incumbent, who became a poster boy for Republican callousness when it was revealed he had sued 700 of his own patients for failing to pay him their medical bills when practising as a doctor.

Even in deeply conservative Mississippi, the Democrat candidate for Senate, Scott Colom, was slightly ahead of the Republican incumbent, Cindy Hyde-Smith. The race remained too close to call.

Among the most jaw-dropping results of the night was the victory of Annie Andrews, a Democratic pediatrician, in the deeply conservative southern state of South Carolina. She defeated Darline Graham, the sister of the late Trump loyalist Lindsey Graham, marking the first time South Carolina has sent any Democrat to the Senate since 1998.

Trump had personally persuaded Graham to stand for election in her brother’s seat. She had her misgivings.

In Maine there was another shock when just before 1am Susan Collins conceded to Democrat Troy Jackson, letting go of a Senate seat she had held for almost 30 years.

Trump spent the night watching his party’s disaster unfold on a White House TV set. He was reportedly fuming.

The emphatic outcome of the election could have enormous implications for Trump’s final two years in office, and with it the immediate future of the US and the world.

Hakeem Jeffries is now poised to become the first Black speaker of the House in US history. “America is back,” he said on Tuesday night. “Today begins the great American comeback. The American people have spoken all across the land, from sea to shining sea, and made clear they have had enough of the extremism and corruption.”

The incoming Democratic majority is promising to move swiftly from January on a 100-day plan prioritising affordability. They are also focusing on reversing cuts to healthcare costs and Medicaid as they seek to show voters that they have their personal livelihoods at the center of their agenda.

With such a large cushion in both chambers, the Democrats will also be emboldened to use their newly acquired oversight and subpoena powers aggressively to investigate the most egregious of Trump’s excesses.

That includes the president’s financial enrichment of himself and his family, which Democratic leaders have said amounts to corruption.

The top Democrat on the House oversight committee, Robert Garcia of California, had a stern warning for the administration: “Lawyer up.”

The incoming Democratic majority is also likely to hit the White House with a blizzard of war powers resolutions designed to pressure Trump to end his war with Iran. Democratic leaders are preparing to challenge his tariffs regime, work to rein in ICE and its mass deportation efforts, and move to reinstate cuts to Medicaid, healthcare subsidies and other welfare benefits.

Pete Hegseth, the combative defense secretary, is also in Democratic crosshairs.

With the Senate also under their control, Democrats will have the power to block many of Trump’s judicial and cabinet appointments.

The Democratic Senate leader, Chuck Schumer, said Americans want Washington to bring down the cost of living, and clean up corruption.

Alarm bells for the Republicans began ringing early in the night, with Jon Ossoff winning re-election to his Georgia senate seat shortly before 8pm on the east coast. That the Democrat swatted away his Trump-endorsed challenger Mike Collins so comfortably, in a state the president won two years ago, set the compass needle for what was to come.

Less than half an hour later, still chillingly early in the evening for Trump and his party, Democrats picked up the first of four senate seats they needed to retake the upper chamber. The former governor Roy Cooper defeated another Trump chosen one, the former national Republican party chair, Michael Whatley.

Such a convincing win is likely further to elevate Ossoff in the hearts of Democrats as a potential 2028 presidential candidate. He proved himself during the campaign to be a fearsome debater, fundraising juggernaut, and savvy social media operator – three skills that Democrats will be desperately seeking in two years’ time as they look to prevent a Trump successor in the White House.