United States Senate elections

The 2022 United States Senate elections will be held on November 8, 2022, with 34 of the 100 seats in the Senate being contested in regular elections, the winners of which will serve six-year terms in the United States Congress from January 3, 2023, to January 3, 2029. Senators are divided into three groups, or classes, whose terms are staggered so that a different class is elected every two years. Class 3 senators, who were last elected in 2016, will be up for election again in 2022.

All 34 Class 3 Senate seats are up for election in 2022; Class 3 currently consists of 14 Democrats and 20 Republicans. Two special elections will also be held—in California, to fill the final weeks of Kamala Harris’ term,[1] and in Oklahoma, to serve the four remaining years of Jim Inhofe’s term.

Six Republican senators, Richard Shelby (Alabama), Roy Blunt (Missouri), Richard Burr (North Carolina), Rob Portman (Ohio), Jim Inhofe (Oklahoma), Pat Toomey (Pennsylvania), as well as one Democratic senator, Patrick Leahy (Vermont), have announced that they are not seeking re-election; 15 Republicans and 13 Democrats are running for re-election.

Numerous other federal, state, and local elections, including the 2022 House elections, will also be held on this date. The winners of this election will serve beginning in the 118th United States Congress. Democrats have held a majority in the Senate since January 20, 2021, following the party’s twin victories in the runoffs for Georgia’s regularly scheduled and special 2020 Senate elections, and the inauguration of Democrat Kamala Harris as vice president. There are 48 Democratic senators and two independent senators who caucus with them; with Harris’ tie-breaking vote, the Democrats hold an effective 51-seat majority in the chamber.