One bright spot for Democrats in Tuesday's elections was in the US state legislatures, where the party's gains left the chambers almost evenly divided with Republicans, according to preliminary results.
Democrats now control 19 legislatures, Republicans hold the majority in 20 and 10 legislatures have split control, according to a National Conference of State Legislatures' analysis of unofficial election data on Wednesday.
Before the vote, Republicans controlled 21 state legislatures, Democrats controlled 17, and 11 legislatures were split. Nebraska's single-chamber legislature is nonpartisan.
"Going into the election, Republicans had about a 60-seat majority and definitely the Democrats are going to close that gap," said Tim Storey, an elections analyst for the bipartisan group.
The emerging trend for state legislatures bucked the national picture, which showed Republicans tightening their control of Congress.
Storey said coattails in the presidential race were factors, with Republican President Bush helping legislative candidates in the South, and Democratic challenger John Kerry helping his party's candidates in states like Vermont and Oregon.
Democrats won control of the North Carolina and Vermont houses and the Washington and Oregon senates and both chambers of the Colorado Legislature, Storey said.
Senates in Iowa and Montana, which had been controlled by Republicans, were now tied, he added.
Republicans, meanwhile, won house chambers in Georgia, Oklahoma and Indiana, and the Tennessee Senate, according to the NCSL.
State legislatures had headed into Tuesday's election with party control of half the chambers hinging on the outcome of just a few races in each state.
Nearly 80 percent of the country's 7,382 legislative seats were on the ballot, although about a third of those were uncontested, according to the NCSL.
Two years ago, Republicans won a majority of legislative seats for the first time since 1952.