2020 House

KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — District partisanship was by far the strongest determinant of the results of House elections in 2018, with Republican candidates typically running behind Donald Trump’s 2016 margins in all types of districts. — Whether incumbents under- or over-performed was unrelated to ideology. Moderate Republicans actually were more likely to be defeated than those with solidly conservative records. How the 2016 presidential results explained the 2018 House results In my book, The Great Alignment: Race, Party Transformation and the Rise of Donald Trump, I argue that the United States has entered a new era of electoral competition in the 21st century. The most important characteristics of 21st century elections are partisan polarization and nationalized elections, and the results of the 2018 House elections provide striking evidence of both. The outcomes of House contests in 2018 were overwhelmingly determined by two factors — the partisan composition of House districts and the unpopularity of President Trump in many of those districts, including some that had supported him in 2016. Democrats gained at least 40 seats in the House with one disputed election in North Carolina still undecided. This was their largest seat gain since the post-Watergate election of

KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — Following the 2018 election, it appears as though Republicans will only hold three districts won by Hillary Clinton in 2016, while Democrats are on track to hold 31 districts won by Donald Trump in 2016. — As Republicans plot a House comeback in 2020, most of their obvious targets are in those Trump-won districts now represented by Democrats, many of whom just got elected. House 2020: A first look As of Wednesday afternoon, Democrats appeared likely to hold a 235-200 majority to start the next House, or a net gain of 40 seats, a handful more than it seemed like they had won in the immediate aftermath of the election. A lot of that has to do with the laborious and long vote count in California, where Democrats do better in the votes that are counted later in the process (there’s nothing new or unusual about this, by the way, so please look for conspiracies elsewhere). Earlier this week, engineer T.J. Cox (D) took the lead over Rep. David Valadao (R, CA-21), and as of this point Cox appears to be in the driver’s seat to win. Assuming Cox wins and nothing else changes,