Photo: Emily Temple-Wood (NIOSH), via Wikimedia Commons (public domain). File photo of an oil pump jack — not a photo of Wednesday's trading.
Oil prices fell more than 8 percent on Wednesday to settle at their lowest in more than two months, after President Donald Trump's Republican Party lost control of Congress in the midterm elections and investors bet that the shift in power could hasten the end of the US-Israeli war with Iran.
Brent crude futures settled $8.98, or 8.7 percent, lower at $94.62 a barrel, while US West Texas Intermediate crude fell $7.97, or 8.3 percent, to $88.12. Brent dropped below $100 a barrel for the first time since early October, as traders judged a new US strike on Iran less likely after the midterm result.
Why traders see a shorter war
The logic in the market is political. A weakened president facing a Democratic Congress able to constrain his military options has a greater incentive to seek a negotiated exit, two sources close to Gulf government circles told Reuters, adding that a full-scale assault on Iran now looks less likely. Trump told the Financial Times on Tuesday that the United States had no immediate plans to strike Iran, and on Wednesday he acknowledged that the Iran war had played a role in his party's sweeping defeat.
Vice President JD Vance added to the pressure on Wednesday, publicly blaming the war for the midterm losses and saying defecting Trump voters demanded an end to the conflict. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer has said his party will use its new control over government funding to force an end to the war.
Diplomacy steps up — but risks remain
Qatar stepped up mediation efforts to avert a renewed escalation of attacks after the US elections. But a senior Iranian official told Reuters on Tuesday that Iran and the United States remain far from a deal to end their war, and Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei said in a written statement that US hostility would persist regardless of which party was in power.
Yemen's Houthis said they had targeted King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh, though there was no confirmation from Saudi authorities. The eight-month-old war has already disrupted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway carrying about a fifth of the world's oil, and pushed up fuel prices — a factor Trump himself has acknowledged contributed to Republican losses.
What the numbers show
Gulf exports of crude, condensate and refined products, excluding liquefied petroleum gas, averaged 17.1 million barrels per day in October, according to ship tracking data from Vortexa — down from 18.9 million barrels per day in September but still roughly three-quarters of pre-war levels. US crude inventories fell by 865,000 barrels to 409.8 million barrels in the week ended October 30, the Energy Information Administration said.
For American consumers, cheaper crude could eventually ease gasoline prices — the very cost-of-living pressure voters cited most in the midterms. But traders caution that the war is far from over, and any renewed escalation in the Gulf could send prices back up just as fast as they fell.
Sources: Reuters via GMA News, "Oil slumps after midterm election rebuke to Trump raises bets on Iran war exit," November 5, 2026; Al Jazeera, "Iran war live: Trump says war caused election wipeout but he 'had to do it'," November 5, 2026. The claim about Houthi targeting of Riyadh airport is unconfirmed by Saudi authorities; the Gulf sources on war-exit odds spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity.