Zohran Mamdani has won the New York City mayoral race, capping a meteoric rise from a little-known state politician to one of the country's most visible Democratic figures.
Mr Mamdani will become the first Muslim mayor of the largest US city.
He defeated Democratic former Governor Andrew Cuomo, 67, who ran as an independent after losing the nomination to Mr Mamdani in the primary election.
The campaign served as an ideological and generational contest that could have national implications for the Democratic Party.
In Virginia, Democrat Abigail Spanberger easily won the election for governor, becoming the first woman elected to serve in that role.
Meanwhile, in New Jersey's contest, Decision Desk HQ, a nonpartisan forecaster, projected that Democrat Mikie Sherrill would defeat Republican Jack Ciattarelli.
The trio of races offered the Democratic Party a test of differing campaign playbooks a year ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, when control of Congress will be at stake.
Since President Donald Trump's win last year, Democrats have found themselves locked out of power in Washington and struggling to find the best path out of the political wilderness.
All three candidates emphasised economic issues, particularly affordability.
But both Ms Spanberger and Ms Sherrill hail from the party's moderate wing, while Mr Mamdani campaigned as an unabashed progressive and a new generational voice.
Ms Spanberger, who beat Republican Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears, will take over for outgoing Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin.
Both Ms Sherrill and Ms Spanberger had sought to tie their opponents to Mr Trump in an effort to harness frustration among Democratic and independent voters over his chaotic nine months in office.
"We sent a message to the world that in 2025 Virginia chose pragmatism over partisanship," Ms Spanberger said in her victory speech.
"We chose our Commonwealth over chaos," she added.
Read more: Trump threatens to restrict federal funds for New York City if Mamdani wins
Mr Trump gave both candidates some late-stage grist during the ongoing government shutdown.
His administration threatened to fire federal workers - a move with an outsized impact on Virginia, a state adjacent to Washington and home to many government employees.
He also froze billions in funding for a new Hudson River train tunnel, a critical project for New Jersey's large commuter population.
In interviews at Virginia polling stations yesterday, some voters said Mr Trump's most contentious policies were on their minds, including his efforts to deport immigrants who entered the US illegally and to impose costly tariffs on imports of foreign goods, the legality of which is being weighed by the US Supreme Court this week.
Juan Benitez, a self-described independent, was voting for the first time. The 25-year-old restaurant manager backed all of Virginia's Democratic candidates because of his opposition to Mr Trump's immigration policies and the federal government shutdown, for which he blamed Mr Trump.
Voter turnout high
In California, voters were deciding whether to give Democratic politicians the power to redraw the state's congressional map, expanding a national battle over redistricting that could determine which party controls the US House of Representatives after next year's midterm elections.
Mr Trump on social media called the vote a scam, suggesting the vote was rigged without providing evidence.
Turnout appeared high across the board.
In New York City, more than 2 million ballots including early voting were cast, according to the board of elections, the most in a mayoral race since 1969.
Early vote totals in Virginia and New Jersey also outpaced the previous elections in 2021.
In New York, Mr Mamdani has proposed ambitious left-wing policies, including freezing rents for nearly a million apartments and making the city's buses free.
While yesterday's results will offer some insight into the mood of American voters, the midterm elections are a year away, an eternity in politics.
"There's nothing that's going to happen in Virginia or New Jersey that's going to tell us much about what will happen in a congressional district in Missouri or a Senate race in Maine," said Douglas Heye, a Republican strategist.
For Republicans, yesterday’s elections were a test of whether the voters who powered Mr Trump's victory in 2024 will still show up when he is not on the ballot.
But Mr Ciattarelli and Ms Earle-Sears, each running in Democratic-leaning states, faced a conundrum: criticising Mr Trump risked losing his supporters, but embracing him too closely could have alienated moderate and independent voters who disapproved of his policies.
Mr Trump remains unpopular: 57% of Americans disapprove of his job performance, a Reuters/Ipsos poll showed. But Democrats are not gaining support as a result, with respondents evenly split on whether they would favour Democrats or Republicans in 2026.
