Republicans scurry in last days before midterm election to save Senate while Democrats eye taking the House

Swamped by a tidal wave of Democratic cash, Republicans entered the final 72 hours of the midterm campaign scrambling to preserve their slim Senate majority as a bulwark against the increasing prospect of a Democrat-run House.

Needing to gain 23 House seats for control, Democrats were burrowing deep into once-safe Republican territory, from the suburbs of Philadelphia, Minneapolis and Houston to California's historically conservative bastions of Orange County and the Central Valley. The most optimistic GOP scenarios had the party hanging on to its majority in the 435-member chamber by a whisper-thin margin.

In the battle for the Senate, it was Democrats who were on the defensive, fighting to protect besieged incumbents in half a dozen states - Florida, Indiana, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota and West Virginia - that Donald Trump carried