Trump admits Iran war hurt Republicans in midterms but says ‘Iran thing’ had to be done

US President Donald Trump has conceded that the Iran war hurt Republicans in the midterm elections, but he insisted it was something the US “had to do”, a day after Democrats swept both the House and the Senate in their strongest Senate showing since 2008.

Responding to Vice President JD Vance’s charge that the war cost Republicans the 2026 midterms, Trump said the claim was “largely true” because the war “drove the gasoline up a little bit for a short term”. But he made clear he would do it again.

Also read: US midterm election results: What Trump & Republicans' loss means for


“You can’t let Iran have a nuclear weapon. You have no choice,” he told reporters in Washington on Wednesday. He said he had expected oil prices to rise much more and went ahead on that basis. Without action, he warned, “everything that you see here, someday might not exist”.

“The Iran thing we had to do, and we continue to do it,” he said.

On the new Democratic majority in Congress, Trump struck a mixed note. He said he would “get along” with the Democrats “unless they want to be destructive”, and pointed to the power of the veto if he did not like what they were doing. He said they had already called and wanted to talk about things.

JD Vance had gone further in a post on X earlier on Wednesday. “The reason we lost is the war. The president himself said so last night,” he wrote. He challenged those who back the war to argue that losing the Senate for six years was worth it. Vance said many voters who backed Trump and him in 2024 had switched to Democrats. He listed ending the war, the cost of living, putting America first and changing ties with Israel as their demands.

Trump had called the war only “part of it” on Tuesday night, not the whole reason. At the start of the war, he had said Vance was “maybe less enthusiastic about going”.

Democrats won back the House, with at least 228 of the 435 seats declared and leads in several dozen more. That puts them on course for a margin well above the 218 needed for control. In the Senate they flipped seven Republican-held seats, in Texas, Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, North Carolina and South Carolina. That takes them to at least 54 of the 100 seats, up from 47, with a couple of races still uncalled. The Senate was 53-47 in Republicans’ favour before the vote.

It is the first time in two decades that a Republican president has lost both chambers of Congress. The last was George W Bush in 2006. The cycle was also the most expensive midterm on record. Early exit polls put Trump’s approval rating at 38 per cent.

Several of the upsets came in states Trump won comfortably in 2024. In Texas, Democrat James Talarico beat state Attorney General Ken Paxton to become the state’s first Democratic senator since 1988. In Kansas, Adam Hamilton ousted Republican Senator Roger Marshall, the first Democrat to win a Kansas Senate seat since 1932.

In Maine, Troy Jackson defeated veteran Republican Senator Susan Collins, and in North Carolina, former governor Roy Cooper beat Michael Whatley, Trump’s chosen candidate. In South Carolina, Annie Andrews defeated Trump-backed Darline Graham in a state that last elected a Democratic senator in 1998. Sherrod Brown won back an Ohio seat for the party. Democrats also held Georgia, where Jon Ossoff won re-election, and New Hampshire, where Chris Pappas won.

Governors’ races and historic firsts

Democrats now hold 28 of the 50 governorships to the Republicans’ 20, with two races yet to be called. In Texas, Gina Hinojosa unseated three-term Republican Governor Greg Abbott. She becomes the first Democratic governor of the state in more than 30 years and its first Latina governor. In Ohio, Democrat Amy Acton defeated Republican Vivek Ramaswamy to become the state’s first woman governor.

The night also produced a string of firsts. In Georgia, former Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms became the first Black woman elected governor in US history, beating billionaire Rick Jackson, who spent more than $200 million of his own money. In New Mexico, Deb Haaland became the first Native American woman elected governor of a US state. In Michigan, Abdul El-Sayed beat Republican Mike Rogers to become the first Muslim elected to the US Senate.

Pappas is the first openly gay man elected to the Senate, while Minnesota Lieutenant Governor Peggy Flanagan is the first Native American woman elected to it. Illinois’s Juliana Stratton means three Black women will sit in the Senate together. Xavier Becerra becomes California’s first Latino elected governor, and Republican Byron Donalds became Florida’s first Black governor.

Costas Panagopoulos, a political scientist at Northeastern University, called the result “a full-blown repudiation” of Trump and the Republican agenda. In South Carolina, counties Trump won swung about 21 points to the left on average.

Trump said he was “a little bit surprised” by the scale of the defeat. He accepted the results, unlike after his 2020 loss, and said he would work with the Democrats. He said he would veto legislation he opposed, and he ruled out any Cabinet changes. He also claimed Republicans would have won in a landslide had he been on the ballot.