U.S. Republican Senator Dan Sullivan of Alaska won re-election on Wednesday, leaving control of the Senate to be determined in January by two runoff elections in Georgia. Sullivan, 55, defeated Al Gross, an independent who ran as a Democrat. Earlier on Wednesday, Democrats clinched their hold on the U.S. House of Representatives, but with a slimmer majority.
Gross, a 58-year-old orthopedic surgeon, emphasized his knowledge of the healthcare system. Coming a day after Republican Senator Thom Tillis won re-election in North Carolina, Sullivan’s victory confirms that Democratic hopes of winning a majority of seats, and with it the power to support Democratic President-elect Joe Biden’s agenda, will come down to two Georgia elections scheduled for Jan. 5. Democrats won Republican seats in Arizona and Colorado in last week’s election. But they lost a seat in Alabama, reducing their net gain to a single seat.
In Georgia, Republican Senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler face challenges from Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, respectively.
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