Republicans face high hurdles as they defend their razor-thin control of Congress in the 2026 midterm elections, but the Senate GOP campaign chair says he remains «incredibly optimistic» his party can not only hold but expand its current 53–47 majority.

Republicans are battling stiff political headwinds as the party in power in the nation’s capital traditionally loses seats in the midterms, and a rough political climate fueled by economic concerns amid persistent inflation and President Donald Trump‘s underwater approval ratings.

«There’s no doubt the climate has gotten more and more difficult by the day, it seems like at times,» National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) Chair Sen. Tim Scott said in a recent Fox News Digital interview.

But he added, «The good news is we have a president who made promises, he’s been keeping those promises, and we have been able to recruit the highest quality candidates anyone could want in every single battleground state.»

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The NRSC chair told Fox News Digital in December 2025 that in the battle for the majority, «54 is clearly within our grasp right now, but with a little bit of luck, 55 is on our side.»

Asked again a week ago, Scott said, «I think we have a possibility of more than 53 seats.»

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Scott’s rival, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) Chair Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand told Fox News Digital in January that «President Trump is creating a toxic agenda that’s harming people.»

And Gillibrand emphasized she’s «optimistic that we have a shot to take back the majority.»

Here’s a look at the top 10 Senate seats that could flip in the midterms.

MAINE

Longtime Republican Sen. Susan Collins is the only Republican senator running for re-election this year in a state that then-Vice President Kamala Harris carried in her 2024 presidential election loss to Trump.

And Collins has seen a deterioration of her poll numbers among Mainers from her last re-election six years ago.

But Collins, who has long been a top target of the rival Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) has proven impossible to beat, to date.

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, departs the chamber at the Capitol in Washington, on July 24, 2025. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo)

Complicating the Democrats’ push to flip the seat is a competitive primary between two-term Democratic Gov. Janet Mills, who has the tacit backing of longtime Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and the DSCC, and veteran and oyster farmer Graham Platner, who is running to the left of the governor and who is backed by progressive champion Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.

NORTH CAROLINA

Republicans are defending an open seat in the southeastern battleground state, with GOP Sen. Thom Tillis retiring at the end of 2026. 

Democrats landed their top recruit when former two-term Gov. Roy Cooper launched a Senate campaign in summer 2025. Cooper enjoys tons of name ID in North Carolina and is 6–0 when running statewide races.

Republicans are rallying around former Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Michael Whatley, who has the president’s backing.

RNC Chair Michael Whatley announces his run for Senator for North Carolina on July 31st, 2025 in Gastonia, N.C. (Paul Steinhauser/Fox News)

The race is expected to be one of the most expensive and competitive Senate showdowns this year.

OHIO

Democrats scored another major recruiting victory when former longtime Sen. Sherrod Brown announced he would challenge Republican Sen. Jon Husted.

A former lieutenant governor, Husted was appointed to the Senate a year ago after then-Sen. JD Vance stepped down to serve as vice president.

Sen. Jon Husted, R-Ohio, who was appointed to fill now-Vice President JD Vance’s seat, is running in the midterms to serve the final two years of Vance’s term. (Getty Images)

Ohio, once a premiere general election battleground, has turned red over the past decade, and Democrats view Brown as their only competitive candidate in the race to serve the final two years of Vance’s term.

Brown lost re-election in 2024 by roughly four points while Trump carried Ohio by 11 points.

Similar to North Carolina, the showdown is expected to be very expensive and competitive.

ALASKA

Democrats were given a big boost in the red-leaning state when former Rep. Mary Peltola announced in February that she would challenge GOP incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan.

Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, is running for re-election in the 2026 midterms. (Allison Robbert/AFP via Getty Images)

Peltola lost re-election 15 months ago in the at-large district that covers the entire state by three points, while Trump carried Alaska by 11 points.

IOWA

Republicans are defending an open seat in Iowa, a onetime swing state that’s shifted to the right over the past decade.

But the GOP has rallied around Rep. Ashley Hinson, who is backed by Trump, in the race to succeed retiring Republican Sen. Joni Ernst.

Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson of Iowa, who is running in the 2026 race to succeed retiring GOP Sen. Joni Ernst, sits for a Fox News Digital interview on Sept. 4, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Paul Steinhauser – Fox News )

Hinson, a former local TV news anchor who flipped a Democratic-held seat in 2020, is seen as a rising star in the party.

Democrats have a contested primary that includes state Rep. Josh Turek, a Paralympian, state Sen. Zach Wahls and military veteran Nathan Sage.

TEXAS

Longtime Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas is in the middle of a competitive and combustible GOP nomination runoff battle against state Attorney Gen. Ken Paxton.

Trump, to date, has stayed neutral in the runoff, which will be held in late May.

Cornyn enjoys the backing of Senate Majority Leader John Thune and the NRSC, which worries that the seat would be vulnerable if Paxton, who has plenty of political baggage, wins the primary.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, right, and his bitter rival, Sen. John Cornyn, are facing off in a May runoff, further extending their bloody primary battle for the GOP Senate nomination.  (Photo by Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images; Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

The Democrats, who are eyeing the seat in the right-leaning state, nominated state Rep. James Talarico, a rising star in the party.

MICHIGAN

Republicans are optimistic they can flip a seat in the Great Lakes battleground, where Democratic Sen. Gary Peters is retiring.

The GOP, led by Trump, has coalesced around former Rep. Mike Rogers, who lost an extremely close Senate race in 2024 even as Trump won Michigan by one point.

Former Rep. Mike Rogers, who narrowly lost the 2024 Senate election in Michigan, is making a second straight run in the Great Lakes battleground state. (Paul Steinhauser – Fox News )

The Democratic primary is a three-way race between center-left Rep. Haley Stevens, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, a self-described «pragmatist,» and progressive physician Abdul El-Sayed, who is backed by Sanders.

The primary already has exposed divisions on the future of the state’s manufacturing sector and support for Israel, and the nominee won’t be decided until August.

GEORGIA

Republicans view first-term Sen. Jon Ossoff as the most vulnerable Democratic senator seeking re-election in the midterms.

The aim was to paint Ossoff, the only Senate Democrat running for re-election in a state Trump won in 2024, as a far-left progressive.

But ousting Ossoff won’t be easy, in part because the senator’s robust fundraising has built a massive war chest.

Senator Jon Ossoff is the only Democratic senator seeking re-election in 2026 in a state President Donald Trump carried in 2024. (Aaron Schwartz/Bloomberg/Getty Images)

And Republicans are in the middle of an ugly three-way among Reps. Mike Collins and Buddy Carter, and former University of Tennessee football coach Derek Dooley, who has the backing of term-limited popular, conservative Gov. Brian Kemp.

Trump has remained neutral, to date, ahead of the May primary. 

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Republicans are hoping to flip the long-held Democratic Senate seat in New England’s only swing state, thanks to the retirement of Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the first woman in the nation’s history to be elected governor and senator.

Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the first woman in the nation’s history elected governor and senator, is retiring at the end of the year. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

While most Democrats are rallying around four-term Rep. Chris Pappas, there’s a spirited primary on the Republican side between two former senators seeking a return to Capitol Hill. Former Sen. John E. Sununu, an older brother to former Gov. Chris Sununu, has the backing of the president. But Trump’s first-term ambassador to New Zealand, former Sen. Scott Brown, remains in the race.

Republicans are trying to break their 16-year losing streak in U.S. Senate elections in the Granite State.

MINNESOTA

The retirement of Democratic Sen. Tina Smith is giving the GOP hopes they can flip the seat in the blue-leaning state.

And the NRSC landed what they say is a top-tier recruit in former NBC sports reporter turned conservative pundit and activist Michele Tafoya.

Michele Tafoya is interviewed by Fox News Digital as she launches a Republican Senate campaign in Minnesota. (Paul Steinhauser/Fox News)

Tafoya is part of a crowded GOP field that also includes 2024 Senate nominee Royce White, a former NBA basketball player; retired U.S. Navy officer Tom Weiler, a 2022 GOP congressional nominee; former state Senator David Hann and former Navy SEAL Adam Schwarze.

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Minnesota Lt. Gov. Peggy Flannagan, a progressive, is facing off against more moderate Democratic Rep. Angie Craig, who appears to have the backing of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, in the race for their party’s nomination.

The ghost of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has struck again. This time, even though he died in 2019, his is still adding to the stress and criticism of the World Economic Forum.

On Feb. 26, WEF president and CEO Børge Brende resigned after revelations that he had three dinners, and some emails and SMS communications with Epstein. His ouster followed an independent investigation earlier in February. 

Brende said he wasn’t aware of Epstein’s sex crimes. 

«Had I known about his background, I would have declined the initial invitation to join Rod-Larsen and any subsequent dinner invitations or other communications,» he said.

That response hasn’t been well received by observers, given that Epstein’s conviction occurred in 2008 and would have been easy to uncover. As Norway’s foreign minister from 2013 to 2017, perhaps he should have been more cautious, some observers say.

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«If you are standing on a public stage, you have to know who you are standing with,» said Ben Habib, right-leaning leader of the British political party Advance UK, and an entrepreneur.

Founder of the U.K.-based Henry Jackson Society, Alan Mendoza, added, «The moral is that people in positions of authority should be very careful with whom they have dinner. Mendoza also wonders how many people with a criminal record have attended the WEF.

The news of Brende’s resignation comes hot on the heels of other scandals and bad publicity for the WEF, commonly known as Davos, after the Swiss village in the Alps where the annual meeting takes place. Last year, Klaus Schwab, the founder of the WEF, stepped down in July after accusations that he had misused WEF funds and treated employees inappropriately. 

Jeffrey Epstein is seen in Cambridge, Mass., on Sept. 8, 2004. The financier had ties to several prominent figures, including politicians, actors and academics, and was later convicted of soliciting sex from a minor. (Rick Friedman Photography/Corbis via Getty Images)

Both Schwab and his wife were both ultimately cleared by the WEF board for any material wrongdoing, though a board of trustees statement noted in part that, «Minor irregularities, stemming from blurred lines between personal contributions and Forum operations, reflect deep commitment rather than intent of misconduct.»

Others have a beef with the WEF. Two years ago, Argentina’s President Javier Milei spoke at Davos.

«The Western world is in danger,» Millei said. «It is in danger because those who are supposed to have to defend the values of the West are co-opted by a vision of the world that inexorably leads to socialism, and thereby to poverty.»

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File photograph of WEF Executive Chairman and founder Klaus Schwab addressing attendees during the official opening session of the Annual Meeting 2016 of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland January 20, 2016. REUTERS/Ruben Sprich (Ruben Sprich/ Reuters)

Milei also noted that many countries have ditched freedom for collectivism, a.k.a., socialism.

«We’re here to tell you that collectivist experiments are never the solution to the problems that afflict the citizens of the world; rather, they are the root cause,» he said at Davos in 2024.

Since 2023, when Milei took office as Argentina’s president, inflation has dropped from more than 200% to 32%, according to data from Trading Economics.

Likewise, others have a lot to tell the WEF, most of it not positive.

«Globalization has failed the West and the United States of America,» said U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick at this year’s Davos meeting. «It’s a failed policy. It is what the WEF has stood for.»

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The fact is, America has been left behind in the global economy as the WEF has encouraged offshoring manufacturing to places with cheap labor, Lutnick said. He also encouraged other countries to follow the «America First» model, which is that the workers come first.

Lutnick also attacked Europe’s alternative energy push, which includes solar and wind energy. «Why would Europe agree to be net zero in 2030 when they don’t make a battery? he said at Davos. Achieving net zero means countries aim to have no increase in overall carbon emissions by 2050.

Pedestrians walk past the USA House during the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in the Alpine resort of Davos on January 19, 2026. (Fabrice COFFRINI / AFP via Getty Images)

But if Europe does pursue Net zero, then the EU will be subservient to communist China, Lutnick says. China is by far the dominant producer, accounting for approximately one-third of global renewable energy, compared with 11% in the U.S.

«The WEF is the embodiment of power and wealth,» Habib said. «Big money is diverting policy. It’s fascism.» He says the world may have been tricked into believing the economic promises made by globalist organizations. «The shine is now off. It is failing and not gaining traction.»

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The WEF isn’t the only organization that is running roughshod over multiple countries. The European Union is also doing similar work with the countries in its bloc through a multitude of regulations, Habib said.

THE Associated Press contributed to this report.

The Obama Foundation is looking for 100 unpaid volunteers to work alongside the former president’s highly paid cronies at the $850 million Obama Presidential Center in Chicago when it opens in June.

Officials are pitching the no-paycheck gigs as rooted in former President Barack Obama’s legacy of civic engagement. The recruitment campaign comes after Fox News Digital reported that the organization’s CEO, former top Obama aide Valerie Jarrett, earned $740,000 in 2024.

Foundation officials told Fox News Digital the volunteers will complement about 300 full- and part-time employees at the long-delayed center, which the organization is promoting as a $3.1 billion economic catalyst for the Windy City’s South Side.

The new program will see 75 to 100 volunteers, known as «ambassadors,» greet and direct visitors around the campus and share information about exhibits at the 22-story museum tower, athletic center and Chicago Public Library branch, among other amenities. It is expected to expand in the future. 

The foundation describes the volunteer program as a key component of its mission, saying volunteers represent its values both onsite and in the community.

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It is unclear what the salary range for those paid workers will be. However, the foundation’s most recent tax filings provide insight into compensation at the organization’s senior levels.

Federal filings viewed by Fox News Digital show Jarrett earned $740,000 in 2024, 2023 and 2022, while several former Obama White House officials have collected six-figure salaries as foundation executives.

Total salaries and benefits at the foundation climbed from $18.5 million in 2018 to $43.7 million in 2024 as staffing expanded to 337 employees and annual revenue reached nearly $210 million, according to the filings. The foundation’s main office is located in Chicago’s Hyde Park, where it runs leadership and community programs in the U.S. and abroad.

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Obama Foundation CEO Valerie Jarrett, left, and the Obama Presidential Center under construction in Chicago’s Jackson Park, right. The Foundation reported nearly $210 million in total revenue in 2024, according to federal filings. (Fox 32; Steven Ferdman/Getty)

Still, the foundation is looking to have a cohort of unpaid volunteers help out at the new presidential center. It’s common for presidential libraries, museums and nonprofit cultural institutions to employ unpaid volunteers.

«Volunteerism has been central to President Obama’s vision of civic life since his earliest days as a community organizer on Chicago’s South Side,» the foundation said in a press release.

Jarrett, one of the Obamas’ closest advisors, said in a statement that the center will be «a place where the world meets the best of the city of Chicago, and our volunteers will help bring that vision to life every day.»

She became CEO in 2021 and is overseeing development of the 19.3-acre campus in Jackson Park.

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The foundation has promoted the center as a catalyst for economic revitalization on Chicago’s South Side, citing $3.1 billion in projected economic activity over 10 years and 5,000 construction jobs tied to the $850 million campus. Those figures come from an economic assessment conducted by Deloitte Consulting LLP.

According to the foundation, more than 50% of construction contracts have been awarded to diverse firms, 33% of the construction workforce has come from South and West Side communities, and 798 residents have enrolled in construction pre-apprenticeship programs.

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The main tower of the Obama Presidential Center rises above Jackson Park in Chicago as construction continues on the privately run campus. (Fox 32 Chicago)

The center is scheduled to open on Juneteenth, the federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.

Other former Obama administration officials have also earned substantial compensation at the foundation in past years, including former White House political director David Simas, who earned more than $600,000 annually while leading the organization from 2017 to 2020, and Adewale Adeyemo, who later became Biden’s deputy Treasury secretary and earned roughly $540,000 during his tenure. 

Several other senior leaders with Obama administration ties have earned between roughly $300,000 and $400,000 annually, according to tax filings.