Former Obama administration official and CNN commentator Van Jones said Tuesday the 2018 midterm results thus far have been "heartbreaking" as hopes of a Democratic "blue wave" appear unlikely.
Early results showed good chances of Democrats winning the House but a near impossibility for them to recapture the Senate, and Republicans could potentially expand their majority. President Donald Trump has cast the midterm elections as a referendum on his first two years in office.
"This is not over. People need to stay out there and continue to fight. This is heartbreaking, though. It's heartbreaking," Jones said. "The hope has been that the antibodies would kick in, that this sort of infestation of hatred and division would draw a response from the American people, really embolden them to say no and no more. That does not seem to be happening tonight."
Jones said it was not a "blue wave" but it was a "blue war."
"We've got to continue to fight forward, but I think that sense of helplessness that has really fueled a lot of this outrage and outpouring from Democrats may still be there tomorrow, even if we have the House," Jones said.
Democrats have staked their hopes on winning back the House and hoped to perhaps pull off the upset of recapturing the U.S. Senate. However, Republicans have already picked up a Senate seat in Indiana with Mike Braun defeating Sen. Joe Donnelly (D., Ind.), and Marsha Blackburn (R., Tenn.) has defeated Phil Bredesen in a key race in Tennessee.
There are also razor-thin races in Florida for Sen. Bill Nelson (D., Fla.) against Republican Rick Scott, Florida gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum against Republican Ron DeSantis, and Texas progressive superstar Beto O'Rourke against Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas). The races have not been decided as of publication.
Fox News projected a little after 9:30 p.m. ET that Democrats would gain control of the House of Representatives, while other outlets showed solid probabilities of that occurring but weren't calling it yet.
Jones' crestfallen commentary in 2016 went viral when, as Donald Trump's victory became increasingly apparent, he said it was a "whitelash" against Barack Obama, the country's first African American president.