You can’t steal a glance at a computer, phone or television right now without seeing someone call this November’s Presidential race “the closest election of our lifetimes”. Yet it might not even be the closest election of this cycle.
While the Presidential contest is understandably dominating the headlines, the battle for the next House majority may well prove to be the tighter contest. After all, the House Democrats need to flip just six seats to make Hakeem Jeffries Speaker.
Moreover, some polling aggregators see the national battle for the House as closer than the Presidential race. For instance, FiveThirtyEight and RealClearPolitics respectively give Democrats a 1.2% and 1.3% lead in the generic Congressional ballot while finding Harris ahead by 2.5% and 1.8% nationally.
The prognosticators predict a closely-divided battleground as well, with our sister site Elections Daily giving Republicans 210 House seats and Democrats 208 with 17 defined as toss-ups.
The Cook Political Report, on the other hand, sees it as a 207 to 202 House GOP advantage with 26 toss-up seats. Furthermore there’s Sabato’s Crystal Ball, which sees a 211 Republican to 206 Democratic split with 18 toss-ups.
The following is a streamlined run-through of this tug of war, rather than a detailed race-by-race deep dive. Consider it instead an overview of the larger fight for the House majority.
The Seven Swing States
There’s a number of competitive House races in the Presidential contest’s Big Seven swing states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Unsurprisingly, perhaps, the largest swing state – Pennsylvania – is home to the most competitive House contests. Republican Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick in PA-1 (Bucks County and a bit of Montgomery) and Democratic Rep. Chris Deluzio in PA-17 (half of Allegheny as well as Beaver County) are both favored to prevail.
Less certain, though, are the trio of Matt Cartwright, Scott Perry and Susan Wild. Democratic incumbents Cartwright and Wild are both seeking to hold on in the toss-up Northeastern and Lehigh Valley sections of the commonwealth.
Perry, on the other hand, is a Republican running in the increasingly blue 10th District, home to Harrisburg and its suburbs. For years I’ve written about how Perry’s hardcore conservatism was bound to catch up to him as his district drifted away. Well now, he’s running against an ex-TV news anchor and a recent Susquehanna Poll found him trailing by an eye-popping nine points.
Let’s move on to the quartet of Michigan House seats that are considered to be in play, although two of them look like a bit more of a stretch. Democratic Congresswoman Hillary Scholten and Republican John James hold an edge in their 3rd and 10th districts, while the open 7th and 8th districts are considered up for grabs. Those latter two seats represent Central Michigan cities like Flint and Lansing, where Harris will likely need to hold her ground in order to win the Wolverine State’s 16 Electoral Votes.
Next up is the trio in Nevada: Democratic Reps. Dina Titus, Susie Lee and Steven Horsford. These three are generally considered to be ‘Likely Dem’ seats, so if the GOP wins any of them it will be welcome news for Speaker Mike Johnson.
Also out west in Arizona are a pair of Republican incumbents, David Schweikert and Juan Ciscomani, who represent areas just outside of Phoenix and Tucson respectively. Arizona is lately looking like one of Trump’s better swing states, which could help out these two incumbents. Although conversely, Senate nominee Kari Lake appears to be one of the weakest statewide candidates in a major race.
In the heart of Obama-Trump country in western Wisconsin, controversial Rep. Derrick Van Orden is seeking to win a second term. Meanwhile, GOP Congressman Bryan Steil is thought to be a stretch target in Paul Ryan’s old seat, representing Kenosha. Remember that the Badger State was Trump’s best of the Blue Wall trio, so Speaker Johnson likely can’t afford to lose either of these seats.
Finally, we need to make a note in North Carolina that the GOP is expected to easily win three Democratic seats here, thanks to an especially generous round of redistricting. In fact, it’s quite possible this new map could provide Republicans with their margin of victory when all is said and done.
Moreover, a fourth Democratic incumbent – Don Davis – is trying to hold on in North Carolina’s heavily Black Northeastern corner. Of course, any Harris upset in the Tar Heel State will depend on doing extraordinarily well in these Black precincts.
California and New York
While the swing state contests are exciting, the majority is likely to be decided on a far different battlefield, the deep blue states of California and New York. On the surface, this should be terrific news for the House Democrats. Until, that is, you remember that Nancy Pelosi couldn’t handle the gavel to her chosen successor Hakeem Jeffries because their home states disappointed so spectacularly in 2022.
The Empire State contains seven competitive seats, and the two Democratic ones (NY-3 and NY-18) are favored to stay in their hands, while Republican NY-4 and NY-22 are widely expected to flip.
Jeffries can get even closer to the Speaker’s Gavel, though, if he can also manage to pick off NY-17 and NY-19, a pair of Hudson Valley seats in the northern section of New York City’s media market. An especially great night would involve also winning over NY-1, which covers the Easternmost section of Long Island.
Lastly, there’s the 10 seats out in California that we’ll all be watching in the days after Election Night. Half of these districts are judged to be likely to stay in their incumbent party’s column: CA-3 and CA-40 for the GOP; CA-9, CA-47 and CA-49 for the Democrats.
The other five California seats (CA-13, CA-22, CA-27, CA-41 and CA-45) could very well decide everything. Not only are all of them held by Republicans, but all five of the districts also voted for Biden in 2020. These districts cover the state’s Central Valley, as well as parts of the Southern California suburbs.
As you can see, this battle for the House majority promises to be just as entertaining as the headlining Presidential fight. Plus, it’s likely to last much longer. For the House, at least, we might be making a temporary return to the experience of Election Week.