A Democratic flip in Alabama’s 2nd congressional district still looms large over the fate of which political party will become the majority in the U.S. House for the next two years.

Shomari Figures, the 39-year-old former aide in the Obama and Biden Justice Departments, defeated his Republican opponent, Caroleene Dobson, by more than 9 percentage points Tuesday in a congressional district that was redefined last year through court-ordered redistricting.

According to the latest Associated Press figures, 56 U.S. House seats remain undecided on Wednesday. Republicans hold a 199-180 advantage. It takes 218 seats to claim a House majority. Republicans entered Tuesday’s election with a four-seat advantage.

“You’d rather be a House Republican than a House Democrat now,” said Casey Burgat, legislative affairs program director at George Washington University. “But in terms of House majority, it’s tough to say. The rest of these races is too close to call.”

The Figures victory could prove pivotal in who claims the House majority, Burgat said. It also carries significant national implications after the Republicans claimed the Senate majority and Republican Donald Trump defeated Vice President Kamala Harris for the presidency.

“It’s huge,” he said. “When you come down to a two, three, four seat majority, every single seat matters. This is an instance where it was expected (to sway Democratic) given the redistricting that was done but also you need to (have the Democratic challenger) come through. And he did his job to win a left-leaning district in Alabama.”

Cook Political Report, which has analyzed congressional races since the mid-1980s, labeled 25 House seats as “Toss Ups” headed into the election, and Burgat said many of those races – particularly in California and New York – remained undetermined. Cook Political Report had long labeled the 2nd district race in Alabama as “likely Democratic.”

New York and California were expected to play a pivotal role with at least 13 competitive House races between the two states.

“The irony is that California and New York, we know how they (vote) on the presidential level, but they have a lot to say about the House majorities,” Burgat said, noting that both states are reliably blue during the presidential contests, but could keep the House in a Republican majority.

Burgat said it could be a few days before the final outcome is determined.

“I’m looking at some of these margins, and there are state laws requiring an automatic recount that will delay things,” he said. “There is plenty of gray on this … but by the end of the week, we should have an indication.”

Aside from the 2nd district, Louisiana’s 6th congressional district flipped Democratic. That congressional seat was also altered due to redistricting.

Alabama’s 2nd district was altered after a three-judge federal panel approved a new congressional map last fall. The new map was the result of a decision by the conservative U.S. Supreme Court, in a shocking 5-4 decision in Allen v. Milligan. In that case, the nation’s high court agreed with a lower court’s determination that Alabama should have at least another congressional district in which Black voters were a majority or were close to it.

Figures, during his victory rally in Mobile Tuesday, said the victory allows him a “platform to get to work in Congress” with priorities he sees for the district that include rural health care.

He also emphasized the need to work in a bipartisan fashion, given the razor-thin margins in the House.

“At the end of the day we got into this race because we know this place we call home,” Figures said. “Home is not blue, and home is not red. Home is a collective of people and places and communities who have led this nation in its toughest times and darkest days. We will go up there, work on both sides of the aisle and get things done.”