Control of the US House of Representatives is at stake, which has huge implications for Trump's agenda

WASHINGTON (AP) — The majority of the U.S. House of Representatives hung in limbo Wednesday, vacillating between Republican control, which would usher in a new era of unified GOP government in Washington, or a switch to Democrats as the last line of resistance against one Trump's agenda for the second term of the White House.

A few individual seats or even just a single seat are sufficient determine the result. The final counts will take a while, likely pushing the decision into next week – or beyond.

After the Republicans swept into the majority in the U.S. Senate, winning seats in West Virginia, Ohio and Montana, Speaker of the House of Representatives Mike Johnson predicted his chamber would be next in line.

“Republicans are ready to have a unified government in the White House, the Senate and the House of Representatives,” Johnson said Wednesday.

President-elect Donald TrumpWHO won the Electoral College and the popular vote against the Democratic vice president Kamala Harrishas consolidated the growing power surrounding his MAGA movement, supported newcomers to Washington and set the stage for his own return to the White House.

Johnson said Republicans in Congress are preparing one “ambitious” 100-day agenda with Trump, who he said is “thinking big about his legacy.”

Tax cuts, securing the southern border and the “blowtorch” on federal regulations are high on the agenda as Republicans take the White House and Congress. Trump himself has promised mass deportations and retaliation against his perceived enemies. And Republicans want to push federal agencies out of Washington and reshuffle government staff with the help of outside think tanks, Johnson said, to bring the federal government “into obedience.”

But Johnson struggled to govern the House after just a year in office, and the new Congress would be no different. Hardliners led by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Rep. Matt Gaetz and others have often confronted and upended their own GOP leadership most chaotic meetings in modern times.

If Johnson's slim majority of four seats shrinks even further, governing could come to a standstill.

Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said the House “remains very much in play.”

After Democrats defeated two Republicans in the House of Representatives in Jeffries' home state of New York, he said the path to the majority now lies in catch-up opportunities in Arizona, Oregon, Iowa and California that are too early to see.

“We have to count every vote,” Jeffries said.

The elections in the House of Representatives remained a tough fight until the end, with neither party having a dominant path to the majority. Rarely, if ever, have the two chambers of Congress moved in opposite directions.

Each side gains and loses a few seats, including through the redistricting process, which is the routine redrawing of House seat boundaries. The process reset seats in North Carolina, Louisiana and Alabama.

Much of the outcome depends on the West, particularly in California, where a handful of House seats are closely contested and mail-in ballots received a week after the election continue to be counted. Among other things, there are hard-fought races around the “blue dot” in Omaha, Nebraska and as far away as Alaska.

Trump spoke at his home early Wednesday Election night party in Florida said the results gave Republicans an “unprecedented and powerful mandate.”

He called the Senate defeat “unbelievable,” praised Johnson and said he was doing “a great job.”

From the US Capitol, Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnellPrivately, a harsh Trump critic, called it a “damn good day.”

Senate Republicans marched across the map alongside Trump, flipping the three Democratic-held seats and holding their own against Democratic challengers who failed to unseat Sen. Ted Cruz in Texas and Sen. Rick Scott in Florida.

In West Virginia, Jim Justice, The state's wealthy governor flipped the seat of outgoing Senator Joe Manchin. In Ohio, Republicans toppled Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown with a Republican luxury car dealer and blockchain entrepreneur Bernie Moreno. And Republican Tim Sheehy defeated Democratic Sen. Jon Tester in Montana.

By saving seats in the blue wall states, Democrats were able to avoid a total wipeout. Rep. Elissa Slotkin won an open Senate seat in Michigan and Sen. Tammy Baldwin was re-elected in Wisconsin. The race in Pennsylvania between Democratic Senator Bob Casey and Republican challenger Dave McCormick was still undecided.

In other developments, Democrats made history by sending two black women, Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware and Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland, to the Senate. Only three Black women, including Harris, have served in the Senate, but never two at the same time.

All in all, Senate Republicans have the potential to achieve their strongest majority in years – proof of that McConnellwho made a career of charting a path to power, this time on the side of Trump, whom he privately described as “despicable” in the lead-up to the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.

During a news conference on Wednesday, McConnell declined to answer questions about his previous harsh criticism of Trump and said he viewed the election results as a referendum on the Biden administration.

He told reporters at the Capitol that a Senate under Republican control would “control the guardrails” and prevent changes to Senate rules that would end the filibuster.

“People just weren’t happy with this administration and the Democratic nominee was part of that,” McConnell said.

It is still unclear who will lead the new Republican Senate as McConnell prepares to step down.

South Dakota Sen. John Thune, the No. 2 Republican, and Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who previously held that post, are the leading candidates to succeed McConnell in a secret ballot that will be held next week upon the arrival of the Senators will take place in Washington.

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Associated Press writers Stephen Groves, Kevin Freking and Farnoush Amiri contributed to this report.