5 takeaways from Democrats flipping George Santos' House seat in New York

Republicans were hoping concerns over immigration would put them over the top Tuesday in a closely watched special election in suburban New York to replace the disgraced former Rep. George Santos.

Instead, Democrats parried the attacks and flipped the seat.

Democrats also retained control of the state House in Pennsylvania, holding onto a seat in the Philadelphia suburbs, where the winning candidate campaigned, in part, on abortion rights.

Both areas lean Democratic, but Republicans were hoping to make inroads. Instead, they're left still trying to find a winning message in the suburbs — and now have an even slimmer House majority in Washington.

Special elections are low-turnout affairs and don't always indicate what will happen in future elections, but there were some important consequences and lessons to draw out of Tuesday's results:

1. Republicans' historically narrow majority got even smaller.

What gets thinner than a whisker? That's essentially Republicans' current majority in the House — only three seats. You think governing has been hard for House Republicans? It just got that much harder.

2. Republicans continue to struggle in the suburbs.

Education, crime and now immigration. None of those issues has really turned the tide for Republicans in the suburbs. With former President Donald Trump as the likely standard bearer again for the party, their job is made even harder. The latest NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll found that almost two-thirds of suburban voters have an unfavorable opinion of Trump and, in a head-to-head matchup, Biden leads Trump by 16 points with suburban voters.

If the GOP can't get the message — and the messengers — right, it could prove difficult for them to expand their majority in the House