Democrats capture R.I., Pennsylvania, Ohio Senate seats, challenge GOP for control of Congress

WASHINGTON — Resurgent Democrats swept toward control of the House and gained ground in the Senate on Tuesday in elections shaped by an unpopular war in Iraq and scandal at home.

"Mr. President, we need a new direction in Iraq," said California Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi, in line to become the first woman speaker in history.

Aided by public dissatisfaction with President Bush, Democrats won gubernatorial races in New York, Ohio and Massachusetts for the first time in more than a decade, then put Colorado, Maryland and Arkansas in their column as well.

Bush monitored the returns from the White House as the voters picked a new Congress certain to complicate his final two years in office. He arranged to call Pelosi on Wednesday morning, then hold an afternoon news conference.

"They have not gone the way he would have liked," press secretary Tony Snow said of the election returns.

Charlie Crist was a rare bright spot for Republicans, winning the Florida governorship now held by the president's brother Jeb, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger won a new term in California, the nation's most populous state.

But that was cold comfort for the Republicans, who have controlled the White House and both houses of Congress for most of the time since Bush took office and used their majority to pass large tax cuts and back the war in Iraq.

By midnight in the East, Democrats had picked up more than 20 House seats now in Republican hands, in all regions of the country. They needed 15 to end a long turn in the minority, and a final result would depend on dozens of races yet uncalled.

If the outcome of the House battle seemed preordained, not so the struggle for Senate control.

Democrats won Republican Senate seats in Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Ohio but came up short in Tennessee as Republican Bob Corker won a hotly contested race, defeating Rep. Harold Ford. Jr., in a vote count that went past midnight.

That left three races — Virginia, Missouri and Montana — uncalled, and Democrats needed to win all of them to complete their sweep of Congress.

Indiana was particularly cruel to House Republicans. Reps. John Hostettler, Chris Chocola and Mike Sodrel all lost in a state where Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels' unpopularity compounded the dissatisfaction with Bush.

Republican Rep. Nancy Johnson lost in her bid for a 13th term in Connecticut; Anne Northup fell in Kentucky after 10 years in the House; and Rep. Charles Taylor was defeated in North Carolina.