DemDaily: US House: Update on the Landscape!
October 22, 2024
At two weeks out from the 2024 elections, the high-stakes fight for control of the US House of Representatives is far from decided.
| The partisan breakdown of the 118th Congress of the US House of Representatives stands at 221 Republicans to 214 Democrats. That includes one Republican vacancy (WI-8) and two Democratic vacancies (NJ-09, Texas-18). The special general elections for those seats will be held concurrently with the fall general election on November 5. There are an additional six non-voting members of Congress from DC and the Territories. |
The Political Landscape
With Republicans holding just a 221-to-214 majority, Democrats need only a four-seat net change in their favor to regain a one-seat edge in the House.
By our estimates, Democrats are defending roughly 17 vulnerable seats with 11 in the "toss-up" category. Comparatively, the GOP is defending 20 vulnerable seats, 10 of which are considered toss-up.
Races to Watch
The most vulnerable GOP seat is Alabama's 2nd Congressional District, being vacated by retiring two-term Congressman Barry Moore (R) -- where former Deputy Chief of Staff to Attorney General Merrick Garland Shomari Figures (D) is universally expected to take the seat.
Similarly, Republicans are expected to flip the two open Democratic seats in North Carolina's 13th and 14th Districts -- which most analysts rate as solidly Republican. Their Democratic colleague, freshman Don Davis (NC-5), is also among the top targets in the newly anointed presidential swing state.
We have moved four-term Republican Congressman Don Beacon into the "leaning Democrat" category in Nebraska's Second CD -- also the target of its one presidential electoral vote and intense GOTV efforts for the unexpectedly competitive US Senate race.
Perennial target Jared Golden, a third-term Democrat who represents Maine's Second District, is fighting for reelection in a district that voted for Donald Trump in both 2016 and 2020.
Alaska's At-Large representative Mary Peltola (D) is among Democrats' most vulnerable incumbents, along with freshmen Democrat Amelia Sykes (D) in Ohio's 13th CD and Yadira Caraveo (D) in Colorado's 8th CD.
Colorado's 3rd CD is an open seat as incumbent Lauren Boebert (R) has opted to run for re-election in the 4th District. Democrat Adam Frish, who lost to Boebert by 546 votes in 2022, is waging a fierce campaign, outraising Republican Jeff Hurd nearly 8-to-1 in the Republican-leaning district.
GOP California freshman John Duarte (CA-13), six-term Congressman David Valadao (CA-22), and Mike Garcia (CA-27), who was first elected in a 2020 special election following the resignation of Congresswoman Katie Hill (D), are all top targets.
In California's 47th CD, vacated by three-term incumbent Katie Porter to run, unsuccessfully, for the Democratic nomination for US Senate, Democrat Dave Min and Republican Scott Baugh are in a tight contest.
In battleground Michigan, three-term Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin, the Democratic nominee for the US Senate to succeed retiring Senator Debbie Stabenow (D), leaves open the competitive 7th CD. where former State Senator Curtis Hertel (D) is trailing Republican Tom Barrett, who unsuccessfully challenged Slotkin in 2022.
In central Michigan's 8th CD, where five-term Democratic Congressman Dan Kildee is retiring, State Senator Kristen McDonald Rivet (D) and former Deputy District Attorney Paul Junge, who was the 2020 and 2022 GOP nominee in the seat, are within the margin of error.
Four of the New York congressional seats that the GOP overturned in 2022 to gain control of the US House are among the key targets. Those include Anthony D'Esposito (NY-4), Mike Lawler (NY-17) and Marcus Molinaro (NY-19). The most endangered of the delegation, however, is New York's 22nd District, where Democratic John Mannion (D) is leading incumbent Republican Brandon Williams.
Congresswoman Lori Chavez-DeRemer, elected in 2022 as the first Republican since 1994 to represent Oregon's 5th CD, is facing a serious challenge from State Representative Janelle Bynum (D).
In Pennsylvania, perhaps the most crucial of presidential battlegrounds, Democratic incumbents Matt Cartwright (PA-8) and Susan Wild (PA-7) are both in the toss-up category.
| An October 14-18 Suffolk University/USA Today poll showed Democrats have a slight bump in the Generic Congressional Ballot, with 47% of voters preferring Democrats to control Congress to 45% who want Republicans in charge (MOE:±3.1%). |
Among the most high-profile of 2024's House races is the open seat in Virginia 7th CD, vacated by Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger (D), first elected in 2018, who is running for Governor.
The Democratic candidate is former US National Security Council Legal Advisor Eugene Vindman (D), who gained recognition for reporting a phone call between former President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that played a role in Trump's first impeachment trial.
Vindman and Derrick Anderson (R), a former attorney who worked in the Office of National Drug Control Policy, are in a dead heat in polling.
Washington's Third District Congresswoman, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, who flipped the seat in 2022, is being challenged by former US Army Special Forces veteran Joe Kent, a Trump-endorsed ultra-conservative Republican whom she defeated in 2022.
In one of the country's closest House races, an October 1-2 Public Policy Polling/Northwest Progressive Institute survey of likely voters had the candidates tied at 46%-46%
House Forecast
According to FiveThirtyEight, which uses polling, economic and demographic data to project election outcomes, control of the US House is a toss-up. In their model simulations, Republicans win control 51 times out of 100 and Democrats win control 49 times out of 100.
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Sources: Cook Political Report, FiveThirtyEight, Sabato, Politico, Inside Elections, Washington Post, State News, US House, New York Times, State SOSs, The Hill, ABC, Ballotpedia
