Now that the dust has (mostly) settled from Tuesday’s midterm elections, we’re taking stock of where we are — our victories and our defeats.

First, the good news: We’re going to have a new Democratic congressman! Greg Landsman defeated Steve Chabot to claim victory. We also won another key race locally, electing Katie Hofmann to the state school board.

Nationwide, the “red wave” the Republicans thought was going to sweep them into power didn’t materialize, as so many Americans rejected their divisive messaging and their attacks on our freedoms.

Our neighbors to the north in Michigan had a particularly great night: sweeping all statewide races, passing amendments for voting rights and to guarantee reproductive choice, and taking back both houses of the state legislature! What they did in Michigan, we can do here in Ohio… if we keep working harder and smarter to take back our state.

At the moment, it looks like Republicans may end up narrowly controlling the U.S. House thanks to gerrymanders in key states, including Ohio, and Democrats will narrowly control the Senate even before (stop us if you’ve heard this one before) a runoff in Georgia.

But now the bad news: In Ohio statewide races and our local races here in Warren County, we fell short of our goals. We’re going to have a right-wing-dominated state supreme court and statehouse. We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us to take back our county and our state, and things may get harder here in Ohio before they get easier. But we’re in this fight for the long haul.

A huge THANK YOU to everyone who knocked on doors, made phone calls, wrote postcards, staffed our headquarters, contributed money, or did any of the hundred other things that are absolutely essential to a successful political party! The successes we had couldn’t have come without you. We should be proud of the work we did.

We have much to be proud of and will continue the work of building a more functional and sustainable party infrastructure, campaign operation, and investigating and investment in new tactics. Our Party continues to play the long game; we need you to be a part of our team as we move forward. Please consider bringing your skills to the table to help us build the best county party we can be.