Midterm Elections Stakes and Learjet Crash Near Palm Beach

Sam Tomorrow is Election Day, and this is a midterm, the national vote halfway through a president's term. It decides who controls Congress for the back half of Trump's second term. For a listener trying to keep up, it's worth knowing what's on the ballot and why it matters. Maya, what is Americans' vote on Tuesday going to settle?

Maya Voting is Tuesday, November 3, 2026. All 435 voting seats in the House of Representatives are on the ballot. So are 35 of the 100 Senate seats, plus governorships in 36 states and three US territories. Thousands of state legislative seats, local offices and ballot measures on taxes, abortion and voting rules are up too. Control of Congress is the headline.

Sam Thirty-five Senate seats is an odd number, since senators serve six-year terms and I'd expect a tidier split. Why 35, and who is defending more of them? I'm trying to work out whether the map favors one party before anyone votes.

Maya Thirty-three of them are the regularly scheduled seats for this cycle, called Class II. The other two are special elections, meaning votes to fill the rest of a term someone left early. Florida's seat opened when Marco Rubio became secretary of state in 2025, and the Republican appointee Ashley Moody is seeking to keep it. Ohio's opened when JD Vance became vice president. The Republican appointee Jon Husted is running against former Democratic senator Sherrod Brown. Republicans defend 22 of the 35 seats and Democrats 13.

Sam So Republicans have more to lose. Right now they hold the Senate, so how many seats would Democrats need to flip to take it? I'd guess a simple majority of 51.

Maya Republicans hold 53 seats and Democrats hold 47, counting the independents who caucus with them. Democrats need a net gain of four. At 50-50, Vice President Vance casts the tie-breaking vote. The House is closer. Before the election it stood at 218 Republicans, 214 Democrats, one independent and two vacancies.

Sam That House math sounds odd to me. Some reports say Democrats need three seats, and others say four. If both can't be true, which one is it, and why the difference?

Maya It turns on counting. A majority in a full House is 218 of 435. The independent caucuses with Republicans, and two seats are vacant. Ballotpedia, in mid-October, said Democrats needed a net gain of three and that Republicans could lose no more than two and keep their majority. The Guardian, on November 2, described the Democratic target as four. Same House, different treatment of the independent and the vacancies.

Sam That's a thin margin, and with polls showing Democrats ahead I'd assume it's close to settled. But I'm guessing the national numbers don't translate neatly into seats.

Maya They don't, and that's the key caution. A Reuters/Ipsos poll released November 2 put Trump's approval at 32 percent. Among likely voters, 52 percent leaned toward the Democrat in their district and 44 percent toward the Republican, an eight-point edge. NBC News had preferred control of Congress at 52 to 45 for Democrats. But the House is decided district by district. After years of redistricting, only about 40 to 50 races are truly competitive, according to The Guardian citing Reuters.

Sam Say it plainly for me: a national lead can be real, yet only a few dozen races decide who wins?

Maya Yes. Take the Cook Political Report, a nonpartisan forecaster. As of October 30 it had shifted 12 more House races toward Democrats and projected a Democratic gain of 12 to 25 seats. That would put the party between 227 and 240, above the 218 needed. For comparison, the Democratic House after 2008 had 257 seats.

Sam Early voting is already underway, so is any of that visible in the turnout so far? I'd think it hints at which way things lean, though I doubt it settles anything.

Maya Reuters reported on November 2 that more than 57 million people had voted, per the University of Florida Election Lab. In the 2022 midterms, 46 million voted early. Where party registration is published, early ballots favored registered Democrats. But Republicans have historically voted more on Election Day itself, so early voting isn't the final electorate. A PBS News/NPR/Marist poll found about one in five likely voters had voted and favored Democrats 68 to 31, while those still planning to vote were evenly split.

Sam Switching to individual Senate races, there's one in Michigan that I've seen described as upended at the last minute. Before anyone votes, what actually happened there, and who is involved?

Maya Michigan's seat is open because Democratic Senator Gary Peters did not seek re-election. Progressive Democrat Abdul El-Sayed won the August primary and faces Republican Mike Rogers, a former congressman. On Sunday, November 1, Representative Haley Stevens, whom El-Sayed beat in that primary and who had initially endorsed him, endorsed Rogers instead. She appeared with Rogers at Perfecting Church in Detroit.

Sam That's a jarring turn for someone who had backed the party's nominee. Did she say why she changed course, or did it come with some kind of explanation on the day?

Maya She posted a social-media video that day. In it she said, quote, "Our Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, Abdul, said that I was no longer welcome in his campaign and that I should stay away, and he's right," and then she endorsed Rogers. The Detroit News reported on November 2 that she tied the break to an outside group's ad linking grocery prices to US aid to Israel. She called the ad antisemitic and said El-Sayed refused her demand that he disavow it.

Sam An outside group made the ad, not his campaign, which makes me wonder what he said back. Did El-Sayed respond to the charge, and did anyone else in the party weigh in on Stevens?

Maya El-Sayed said the ad was not his campaign's and that he disagreed with it. Asked by reporters on November 1, he said, quote, "I actually don't think about Haley Stevens." The state party chair, Curtis Hertel, wrote that Stevens was not a current member of the state party and would not be in the future. Representatives Debbie Dingell and Jamie Raskin said she had assured them Saturday evening that she would vote for El-Sayed.

Sam Those two are saying she told them one thing on Saturday and did another on Sunday. With polls opening Tuesday, I'd guess nobody knows yet whether any of this moves voters in Michigan.

Maya Nobody does. The practical effect on Tuesday's vote was unknown as polls opened. Recent Michigan polls had El-Sayed ahead, in some cases inside the margin of error, meaning the lead was small enough that polling noise could erase it, and in at least one by about nine points. A five-poll average from 270toWin had him near 51 percent and Rogers near 45 percent.

Sam Michigan is one race, and I'd imagine other Senate contests are drawing more attention or money. Which one has pulled in the most, and why is it so closely watched?

Maya Texas has drawn the most money of any Senate race. Democrat James Talarico, a state representative and former teacher, faces Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton. A Talarico win would be a historic flip: no Democrat has won statewide in Texas since 1994, and Trump carried the state by nearly 14 points in 2024, The Guardian reported. Advertising there had reached $593.5 million as of Monday morning, per AdImpact.

Sam That's a lot of ads, but I can't judge the number without something to set it against. How does it compare, and how close are the polls in Texas?

Maya It is the largest advertising contest in the country since the start of 2025, and Republicans are outspending Democrats. The Guardian reported about $210 million spent specifically to help Paxton. On polls, a New York Times/Siena survey of 1,215 likely voters had Talarico at 50 and Paxton at 43, while a mid-October Fox News poll had them tied at 49. Averages showed Talarico up by low single digits.

Sam One more story before we go, and it's a grave one. A private jet crashed on Sunday, November 1, in Florida, and the video of it spread within hours. Maya, what do we know about where it happened and what the plane was doing?

Maya The jet was a 2004 Learjet 60, a medium business jet. It left Austin, Texas, at about 10:37 a.m. Eastern, headed for North Eleuthera in the Bahamas, on a paid charter flight. It crashed at about 12:50 p.m. on Military Trail, in the Greenacres area, roughly seven miles southwest of West Palm Beach. All nine people aboard were killed, as Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy confirmed.

Sam I keep picturing the video, and it sounds like it was a lot to watch. I'd guess the plane just fell out of the sky, and that people on the radio must have known something was wrong well before the end.

Maya They did. The crew reported trouble at about 35,000 feet: light, clear ice the pilot called manageable, moderate turbulence, and precipitation. The pilot asked to climb to 37,000 feet. Less than 30 seconds later the crew declared mayday and said the jet was descending 10,000 feet per minute, then 20,000, in an overspeed condition. Tracking data showed about 27,000 feet lost in roughly one minute.

Sam Ice described as manageable and then a mayday within half a minute is a very fast turn. So is there any answer yet on why the plane lost control? I'd think investigators at least have a leading theory by now.

Maya The cause has not been determined, and the NTSB, the lead agency, says it will not speculate. NTSB member Tom Chapman said at Monday's briefing that investigators have some indication the aircraft was breaking up before impact. He did not say which parts, when, or why. Weather is a major focus, but conditions at 35,000 feet still have to be established.

Sam Switching to the people involved: have the names been released, and who was on that flight? Families must have said something, since nine people is a lot of loss to leave unnamed.

Maya Authorities had not officially released names as of Monday. A joint family statement named the seven passengers: Adam Robinson, 45, an Austin technology entrepreneur; his wife, Helen Sharp, 40; their children Emma, 4, and Charlie, 2; friends Rachael Reed and Charmi Fehr; and the nanny, Anita Maria Cetina. Media identified the captain as Jeffrey Gregory, 55, and the co-pilot as Nathalia Filgueiras, 20.

Sam A 20-year-old co-pilot sounds very young to me for a charter jet, and I'd assume that raises questions about her qualifications. I'd want to know what she was actually licensed to do.

Maya The Associated Press reported she held a rating to fly the Learjet 60 but not to be in command. She grew up in Palm Beach County and earned her pilot's license in 2023 at 17, as a high school senior, before she had a driver's license.

Sam And on the ground, people live right there along that road. I'm wondering what happened to the neighborhood and how many people had to leave their homes.

Maya The crash closed Military Trail and displaced residents of a mobile-home community whose entrance was blocked by debris. The county commissioner, Joel Flores, gave different estimates: a shelter for almost 80 mobile homes on Monday, and earlier figures of 400 to 600 people and about 100 homes. They are preliminary, in different units, so they shouldn't be added together. Nobody could say when residents could return.

Sam Maya, I'd like the one thing to keep from each story today, the midterms and then this crash, so I walk away with something for each.

Maya On the midterms: the national polls favor Democrats, but only about 40 to 50 House races are truly competitive, so a forecast is not a result until Tuesday's votes are counted. On the crash: nine people died on November 1 near Greenacres, and why the crew lost control within half a minute of that ice report is still unknown.

Sam That's our show for today. Thanks, Maya. A quick note: this show is AI-generated, the voices are synthetic, and the facts come from the sources named in the closing note, whose authors aren't affiliated with us. The next episode arrives tomorrow.

Maya Thank you, Sam, and thanks to everyone listening; take care of yourselves, vote if you're able on Tuesday, and we'll be back with you tomorrow with the next two stories worth keeping up with.

Sam Everything today came from reporting by The Guardian, Reuters, NPR, PBS News, Ballotpedia, the Associated Press, CNN, the BBC, CBS Miami, Fox News, the Palm Beach Post, the Detroit News, PolitiFact, NBC affiliate WTVJ, the New York Times, the New York Post, and the NTSB.