We’re seeing the House map expand in the Dems’ favor. 8 more seats were moved towards the Dems direction today per Cook. Dems now have enough leads to hit 218 per 538. They have a +3 in the over 60 or so battleground races per WAPO. That’s a sign of an expanding map. My predictive range of 35-60 seats seems to be validated by the recent race rating shifts.
In the Senate, the chances of a 50-50 Senate are as likely as any other scenario. The tipping point race there is Missouri. Dems still have slight edges in NV and AZ which would be two pickups. Dems have moved WV off the board. No one seriously believe Manchin will lose.
Dems continue to make noise in TX and TN while the GOP is trying to claim they’re making noise in IN and to a lesser extent in MT. I am yet to see a single public poll show either GOP challenger in MT/IN ahead.
The other trend I see is that the GOP is trying to rev up their base and see this as a base election. However, what I see is that independent voters are leaning Dem and almost every public poll I’ve seen shows Dems getting a net positive cross over vote where more GOPers vote Dem than Dems who vote GOP.
When you map that out against the electorate in the Senate, House, Gubernatorial and legislative races, it points to big Dem victories except in areas which are too red to overcome or where there is a candidate quality issue on our side. That alone would mean in that the GOP would lose most of the House seats up to R+4, which would give the Dems a 35-40 seat gain.
In addition, when you have a base election viewpoint but the reality is those that are not part of your base are turning against you, then you might see situations where Dems are getting more irregular voters in the EV while the GOP is cannibalizing their e-day vote. There are a few signs of that happening in FL and NV. It might also be happening in TX.
The noise Trump is creating is no different than any other Trumper news cycle and it is diminished because of all the focus on the elections. Just keep voting, canvassing and contributing. The numbers point to some big Dem wins.
Thank you for such an informative post, as usual. After reading that article I felt defeated now back on even keel. Thanks.
We’re facing a historically gerrymandered red wall in the House, a very challenging Senate map. Any blue wave victory will by necessity be a district-by-district, state-by-state close-shave. So all the stuff about tightening races is to be expected. It was never going to be any other way.
Heitkamp is blowing a huge opportunity by not brining up the nuclear brinkmanship Trump has just announced, because North Dakota is ground zero in any nuclear war and if there’s one fear that overtakes fears about migrants getting here on foot in about a year, it’s fear of a nuclear wipeout. I don’t understand what she would have to lose with some aptly fearsome ads about nuclear war. It’s sheer lack of political guts if she doesn’t.
Let’s just hope Comey keeps his mouth shut for once!
I would love a blue wave hammering of the GOP and watch trump’s RACIST lies get crammed down his throat. Every day of his term he has told on average 8 lies. Every. Damned. Day. No other politician has come close to his sheer volume. It’s over 5000 at this point and the rate is climbing.
McCarthy in NJ is the slime who brought ACA repeal back from the dead, despite the pleas of his constituents. Remember this?
It’s a keckuva lot easier for people like Chiselin’ Trump, whose heads are stuck deeply into their asses.
I belong to no party but the last thing I would do is vote for a GOPer like McSally. I prefer to believe my vote matters so my custom is to try to be 1st in line to vote. I can pull that off because my district here in Tucson is quite small and I can see the church where my polling place is from my front yard. My custom is to walk to vote.
McSally has sold her soul to the dark side.
Quality polls, particularly in FL, show independents going strongly for the Ds. Since FL is so large and diverse, that could be a harbinger for late-deciders (many of whom are independents) working in the Ds favor just as it worked in the Rs favor in 2016. That’s also standard midterm experience when one party is in full control. Simply put, true independents like split government since they don’t like partisanship.
Furthering this trend is Trump bashing Ds, which does excite the R base (since what they like most about Trump is his enthusiastic bashing of the hated Ds) but independents do not like it. But it is gut-check time now and the Ds have to use their superior people and money advantage in the ground game, particularly in early-voting states.
In trump’s case he comes first and maybe Americans second. Everyone else is considered to be hardened criminals and rapists out fer yer wimminzez
I strongly suspect our “liberal media” just has to have a “horse race” every election year. This is supplemented by Republican propaganda and lies. Remember, folks, the only poll that really matters will be taken on November 6. Republicans can all vote on the following Wednesday.
I’ll predict a 40 seat pickup in the House, 1 Pickup in the Senate (for a 50/50 split) and we’ll have between 27-29 Democratic Governors after the election. Who wants to take that bet?
If “bonanza” means “a spectacular windfall”, then this seems a misleading word to use in the headline.
Talk of a Blue Wave over the summer (maybe if we voted in the summer, it would have made sense) was as maddening as is the current inane press coverage of GOP enthusiasm to cast “thank you” votes for a party that has so far given us ZERO ideas of what it wants to do over the next few years except strip people of their Obamacare protections, which was even unpopular in 2016. I have been following Nate Silver’s house predictions, and they look good, but I feel like Dems are missing some easy talking points with this “caravan” nonsense. E.g., Repubs did not “fix” the “broken” immigration system over the last two years. What are they going to do now, besides shoot to kill anyone who approaches a border checkpoint? Why do Repubs get to act like they haven’t been in complete control for two years and are thus answerable for everything they are complaining about?
Pence has echoed trump fear meme saying “middle easterners” have to be in a crowd as big as that group in Mexico. Reporters on the ground with them cannot find any and they are sesrching them out.
Here’s hoping all the likes you’re getting are for accuracy and not for wishful thinking.