27
posted ago by Gandiva ago by Gandiva +29 / -2

https://www.cookpolitical.com/ratings/house-race-ratings

I mostly agree with the Cook Report ratings at the above link, more so than the RCP ones. Cook has put in a lot more work than RCP this year on these, and they update it more frequently. I do, however, disagree with two DEM ratings and two REP ratings. I think the IL-17 race should be lean DEM, not likely, and the ME-2 race should be lean DEM, not toss up. I also think the IA-1 race should be lean REP, not toss up, and the PA-10 should also be lean REP, not toss up. Also, the AL-2 race should be safe DEM, not likely. That's a court-forced majority-black redistricting, so there's not a snowball's chance in hell it isn't going blue.

So, by my count, not theirs, that's 175 Safe DEM, 15 likely DEM, 14 lean DEM, and 10 toss up DEM; 191 safe REP, 10 likely REP, 8 lean REP, and 12 toss up REP. Assuming the leans etc. fall as expected, that's 204 to 209, with just about equal toss ups. I believe three DEM-held seats in 2020 Trump-voting districts are going to flip: AK, WA-3, and PA-8. I don't think any other 2020 Trump-voting district is going to go DEM, leaving only two such seats in the whole nation: ME-2 and OH-9. So to my mind, that takes 3 seats off the DEM toss up list, pushing the lead to 204 to 212. We're left with 7 toss up DEM vs 12 toss up REP. DEMs would have to take 14 out of the remaining 19 races to take a one-seat majority, more than 2/3rds, which is quite unlikely under the REP-favorable circumstances: that the winds are still at REPs' back, it's a presidential election with Trump running, and the recent flip of the RCP congressional generic poll. If, on the other hand, we just cut the chances in half, giving 9 to REPs and 10 to DEMs, we'd end up with 214 to 221, or the current number. Alternatively, if we just give the 7 DEM toss ups to DEMs and the 12 REP toss ups to REPs, we'd get 211 to 224.

However, there is a bit of a DEM advantage here once we boil everything down to 7 DEM toss ups and 12 REP toss ups: All 7 of these remaining DEM toss up seats are 2020 Biden-voting districts. Some of them are only Biden-voting by small margins, and three of them are lacking incumbency which makes things even harder to defend. On the other hand - and here's the DEM advantage - 10 of the 12 toss up REP seats are districts that went for Biden in 2020. So there's more defense being played by REPs in this toss up list. 4 of the 5 CA seats were 2020 Biden districts, including 3 of those 4 being >10 victory margins. Both NY seats were Biden 2020 districts, with 1 of the 2 being >10. In fact, the startling number of REP victories in >10 2020 Biden-voting districts was one of the unspoken, because too nuanced, facts of the 2022 midterms that actually made that election closer to the projected Red Wave than the biased media wanted to admit. The only DEM victory in 2022 that came close was the AK DEM winning a +10 Trump district, and that only because of the screwy ranked-choice system they were using for the first time. REPs actually won 3 >10 seats in CA and 2 in NY, though Santos got ejected and replaced by a DEM in the special election to replace him, thus leaving the 4 >10 seats we currently see in the REP toss up list (one more >10 NY seat held by a REP was created by the 2024 NY redistrcting, NY-22, which as you can see is slated to be eliminated easily). NY got redistricted again in 2024, so all the Biden-voting districts held by REPs got a little more precarious. So there's this >10 4-seat, >5 4-seat DEM advantage in those toss up 12 REP races. So, if instead of cutting things equally in half between the 12 REP toss ups and 7 DEM toss ups, lets account for this DEM advantage by subtracting 4 from the 12 REP toss ups and giving them to the DEMs, leaving us with 8 REP toss ups to 7 DEM toss ups. This then gives us a count of 208 to 212. Then, even on the off chance that each race falls the way of the current party incumbent or retiring incumbent, that would result in a final 215 to 220 REP majority, one less than currently. And, it should be added, those 3 Open DEM toss up races are not high-margin 2020 Biden-voting districts: 1 MI one was 2.0, 1 MI one was 0.5, and the VA one was 6.8. So at least 2 of those could very well pass to REPs. If that happened, we would finish 213 to 222, or 1 more REP seat than at present. But if we start again at 8 REP toss ups and 7 DEM toss ups and simply divide them randomly, we end up with the same 215 to 220, or 216 to 219 if you give the extra seat to DEMs because of dividing an odd number in half. However, If you give 2/3rds of those remaining toss ups to REPs, then you get 213 to 222, or the same number as if those two weaker Open DEM MI races flip to REP.

Therefore, if you want to define the range of prediction, start with the 208 to 212 number, with 8 REP toss ups and 7 DEM toss ups remaining, so that we get a range starting at the low end of 218 to 217 for DEMs if they win 2/3rds of those remaining 8 REP toss ups and 7 DEM toss ups, and a high end of 213 to 222 REP majority if REPs take 2/3rds of the remaining 8 REP toss ups and 7 DEM toss ups, a net gain of 1 or exactly back to where REPs started in January 2023. The median of the range sould be each party winning their respective current or retiring incumbent toss ups, making for a 215 to 220 REP majority, a net loss of 1 for REPs. Either way, you see by my method that it predicts REPs in all likelihood retain their majority. The low end of the range would give the DEMs a mere bare majority. The high range increases the REP current majority by 1. The final scale, therefore, is: REP -4 low end -- REP -1 median -- REP +1 high end. The very highest REPs could do, with any realism - let's call it the out of range high end - would be that 211 to 224 number we earlier calculated before subtracting those 4 >10 Biden-voting but REP-held districts. But those are going to be very hard to hold onto, especially with one of them being redistricted more DEM now than in 2022.

The relative inelasticity of potential swings, historically speaking, is due to a confluence of factors: the ever-tightening of redistricting that has reduced the number of competitive districts to record lows; the geographical partisan aggregations that continue to intensify, making even more possible such elimination of competitive distrcts by redistricting; and the record-low number of split-party voters, which is part and parcel with the ideological (conservative vs liberal) polarization of the parties. If each party were to win only the districts they won in the presidential vote of 2020, it would be 211 REP to 224 DEM. So if only 2 Trump-won districts remain DEM-controlled after 2024, it means that REPs will control somewhere in the range of 8 to 13 Biden-won districts, depending on what the final REP majority ends up being.

That's my House prediction. My Senate prediction of 52-48, flipping WV, MT and OH. But I can't make a Presdient prediction due to massive fraud potential.

But if my prediction comes true, then it's going to be a wild wild two years of a REP trifecta. RINO troublemaker Senators Murkowski and Collins won't be able to stop it. The blue islands are absolutely going to melt down. But Trump will have the mandate of the entire right of center and much of the slightly left of center (Musk, RFK, Jr., Tulsi Gabbard, etc.).