GOP likely to win House majority as slow counts put final result in question

Days after the midterm elections, control of the U.S. House appears to be on a knife’s edge as vote tallying continues.

Republicans need to win a net of only five seats to capture the House majority.

Many of the remaining races have slim margins as more votes are counted to determine a winner but delays were expected in many of these districts because of state rules and hold ups associated with vote by mail balloting.

Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Maine, New Mexico, New York and Oregon are among those states with outstanding election results.

Alaska uses ranked choice voting, so results will take longer.

In Arizona, one suburban Phoenix district is held by a Republican but appears to be heading for a Democratic victory while an open seat in the southeastern part of the state is held by a retiring Democrat and has a Republican in the lead while about as evenly divided as it can get between the parties.

Thirteen California districts have races that are too close to call with as few as 53 percent to as many as 98 percent of the votes counted so far.

Republicans appear to have won 215 seats in the House so far and they are expected to prevail in six of the races with unfinished counts, so the next two years are likely to see unprecedented inaction in Washington, despite myriad problems confronting the nation and the world.