The week in 5 charts | US midterm elections, assembly bypolls, and more

Here are 5 charts that will help you understand some of the key stories from this week

(1) US midterm elections

President Joe Biden’s Democrats retained control of the U.S. Senate on November 12, a remarkable midterms election result that defied predictions of a Republican win over both houses of Congress. Midterms traditionally deliver a rejection of the party in power, and with inflation surging and Mr. Biden’s popularity in the doldrums, Republicans had been expecting to ride a mighty “red wave” and capture the Senate and the House of Representatives. But the wave never got much beyond a ripple and on Saturday U.S. networks called the key Senate race in Nevada for Democrat incumbent Catherine Cortez Masto, giving the party the 50 seats (including 2 independent seats) it needs for an effective majority.

The win clinches Democratic control in the Senate as Vice President Kamala Harris can cast the tie-breaking vote if the upper chamber is evenly split 50-50. One Senate race remains up in the air - a runoff in Georgia. If Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock were to win the Dec. 6 Georgia runoff election against Republican challenger Herschel Walker, that would expand Democrats’ majority to 51-49.  The newly elected Senate will be sworn in on Jan. 3. That, in turn, would give Democrats an additional edge in passing a limited number of controversial bills that are allowed to advance with a simple majority of votes, instead of the 60 needed for most legislation.

Meanwhile, the result in the House of Representatives is hanging in the balance, and while Republicans are slightly favoured to take control, it would be with a far smaller majority than they had envisaged going into Tuesday’s election. It could take several days or more before the outcome of enough House races are known to determine party control of that 435-seat chamber.

Also read | Explained | Will U.S. mid-term elections be a game changer?

(2) BJP wins four out of seven assembly bypolls across 6 states

The BJP won four out of seven Assembly bypolls held across six states, for which results were declared on November 6. It also registered its presence in Telangana’s Munugode Assembly seat, where it lost to the Telangana Rashtra Samithi but still managed to get over 39 percent of votes, pushing the Congress to the third position. Elections were held on November 3 for seven Assembly constituencies: Mokama and Gopalganj in Bihar, Andheri East in Maharashtra, Adampur in Haryana, Munugode in Telangana, Gola Gokarannath in Uttar Pradesh, and Dhamnagar in Odisha. The results are encouraging for the BJP, while all its opponents have reasons to worry.  The signals are not reassuring for the Congress, JD(U), RJD, SP and BJD that were the opponents of the BJP in these byelections. The defeat in Telangana puts the Congress in a spot — it finished a distant third behind the BJP. In Maharashtra’s Andheri East Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena won as expected. However, the election result is now part of the record books as 12,806 voters chose the None Of The Above (NOTA) option.