Trump, conceding stunning midterm loss, admits Iran war and gas prices hurt Republicans

US President Donald Trump acknowledged that the war in Iran played a role in Republicans’ losses in the midterms, saying in a Tuesday night interview with Fox News that the public was unwilling to tolerate high gas prices.

“People agree with what I am doing on Iran but they probably weren’t willing to do the short-term consequence of paying more for gasoline. I understand that; I don’t agree with that,” he told Fox News.

On Iran, he added, “We have to do something large.”

Trump admitted he wasn’t expecting the extent of the losses: “Well, I’m a little bit surprised. I thought they’d do better. We had tremendous rallies.”

Offers rare praise to Democrats

The 80-year-old also offered rare praise for rival Democrats after their stunning US midterm election victory but refused to take any personal responsibility for the result, which upends the final two years of his presidency, instead trying to shift the blame to his fellow Republicans.

“Well, I say this: Congratulations to the Democrats. They did a good job,” Trump said in the telephone interview.

Trump on Fox News: "Well, I'm a little bit surprised. I thought they'd do better. We had tremendous rallies." pic.twitter.com/ludvmwqMbL

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 4, 2026

“They’ve been looking for this one for 11 years, and they finally got it. But I don’t view it as a hit on me,” he added.

The complimentary comments were unusual for Trump, who during the campaign branded Democrats as everything from communists to Islamists.

Trump also reiterated that, unlike after his 2020 presidential defeat, he accepted the midterm results and was willing to work with Democrats now that they had taken control of Congress.

“We’ll work with the Democrats, and we’ll, you know, look forward to working with them. We’ll probably work something out,” Trump was quoted as saying by The New York Times.

At the same time, Trump warned that Democratic control of Congress would not prevent him from blocking legislation. “They can send over, you know, 50 different great bills that they’re all excited about, and I send them back with a nice stamp — ‘veto.’”

Democrats seized control of both houses of Congress in the midterm elections, in a rout of Trump’s Republicans, TV networks and the Associated Press projected.

After earlier seizing the House of Representatives, Democrats flipped Senate seats in at least six states, including traditional Republican strongholds Texas, Kansas and South Carolina.

Trump-backed candidates fall

Trump had sought to make the elections a test of his own political strength. In the closing days of campaigning, he explicitly urged supporters to behave as though he himself were running, telling a Kansas rally: “I really want you to pretend I’m on the ballot.”

He had also intervened heavily in Republican primaries and endorsed candidates in some of the most important Senate contests, but several of those picks went on to lose Tuesday.

In South Carolina, Trump-backed interim Sen. Darline Graham was narrowly defeated by Democrat Annie Andrews, giving Democrats their first Senate victory in the state in 28 years. Graham had been appointed to fill the seat of her late brother, longtime senator and prominent Israel supporter Lindsey Graham.

In Texas, Democrat James Talarico defeated Trump-backed Attorney General Ken Paxton, ending a decades-long Democratic drought in statewide races. Trump had intervened in the Republican primary to support Paxton over incumbent Sen. John Cornyn, whom some Republicans had viewed as the safer general-election candidate.

In Michigan, Democrat Abdul El-Sayed claimed victory over Trump-backed former Republican lawmaker Mike Rogers, a result that would make him the first Muslim elected to the US Senate. In his victory speech, El-Sayed took an apparent swipe at Israel, declaring, “We don’t want our money sent to do apartheid, or genocide, or war.”

El-Sayed’s candidacy had alarmed many pro-Israel Jewish voters over his rhetoric on Israel, making the race a test of Jewish voters’ longstanding ties to the Democratic Party.

As the scale of the losses became apparent Tuesday night, Trump insisted that his absence from the ballot explained the outcome. “I wasn’t on the Ballot and if I was, we would have won IN A LANDSLIDE!” he wrote on social media.

Trump posted later that he was going to “become a political pundit” and give the reasons why Republicans lost.

He first targeted Greg Abbott, the loyal Texas governor unseated by Democrat Gina Hinojosa. Trump said that if Abbott hadn’t become a “RINO” (Republican In Name Only) “he wouldn’t have lost.”

Many of them Trump had handpicked and traveled across the country to rally support for — even lavishing praise, in one case, on the “ass” of Republican Ohio Senate candidate Jon Husted.

One White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Trump “did a better job promoting many of the candidates on the ballot than the candidates did themselves.”

The White House had not been entirely caught off guard. A senior White House official, also speaking anonymously, told Reuters the administration had polling data as far back as six weeks ago showing Republicans would lose both the House of Representatives and Senate.

Trump signals combative path ahead

The question now is how Trump will react to being a lame duck president for the last two years of his second term, with Democrats in control of both the House and Senate.

The White House indicated that Trump is unlikely to go quietly.

Iran is on his mind, and there is widespread speculation that the president will resume large-scale military action in that arena, doubling down on a war that it is now clear voters loathed.

“Anyone who voted Democrat today is going to have a serious case of buyer’s remorse when gas prices come down quickly when the Iran conflict is solved but they’re still stuck with a list of liberal extremist Democrats,” the White House official said.

The White House also gave a dark hint of retribution against Trump’s political enemies.

“A final note here: Regardless of how today plays out, President Trump’s resolve to stop the Radical Left is only going to become stronger. Buckle up.”