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2022 House

Sabato's Crystal Ball

The Different Ways of Expanding the House

Dear Readers: The recent House reapportionment shuffled a handful of seats among the states, but the number of members of the House — 435 — did not change. The House has been stuck at just 435 members since the 1910 census, save for a temporary increase to 437 to account for Alaska and Hawaii becoming states in the late 1950s. Back in 1910, there were about 213,000 Americans for every House member; today, there are about 760,000. As Crystal Ball Editor in Chief Larry J. Sabato wrote in his book A More Perfect Constitution, “There is every indication that the founders believed the House would grow with the population,” yet it has not for more than a century. First-time Crystal Ball contributor Dennis Negron today proposes ways in which Congress could expand the size of the House and delineates how many members an expanded House might have under different scenarios. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — A 1929 law capping the House at 435 representatives has made the number of constituents each House member represents grow larger every census, which has created a discrepancy between small and large states. — The only framework in the Constitution is

Dennis Negron

The Splitting of the Ticket Split

Dear Readers: We are excited to feature a first-time Crystal Ball contributor today, UVA student Ethan Chen. He examines an interesting phenomenon in the 2020 House elections: a much more significant incumbency advantage for Republicans compared to Democrats. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — The 2020 House results were not merely due to a GOP advantage down-ballot. For open House races, Republicans only did slightly better on average than President Trump. — House Republicans benefited from a significantly stronger incumbency advantage than House Democrats. This was the main reason for their performance. — The historical anomaly is not incumbency being stronger for the Republicans, but the absolute collapse of the advantage for Democrats. The GOP’s House incumbency edge In the last election cycle, Democrats won a trifecta by the bare skin of their teeth. However, while both the presidency and the Senate were at times considered Toss-ups, the House was rarely considered to be in play. Yet Democrats lost 13 seats and nearly the House majority. In one sense, this shouldn’t be that surprising — Joe Biden only won 224 House districts, similar to the 222 his party won in the House. Still, as the party with

Ethan Chen

Notes on the State of Politics: May 11, 2021

Dear Readers: This is the latest edition of the Crystal Ball’s “Notes on the State of Politics,” which features short updates on elections and politics. — The Editors VA-GOV: Youngkin wins GOP nomination, race Leans Democratic for the fall Glenn Youngkin, former co-chief executive of the Carlyle Group, won the Republican nomination for the open Virginia governorship last night. He bested second-place finisher Pete Snyder, another businessman, as well as state Sen. Amanda Chase, state Del. Kirk Cox, and others. Youngkin’s victory was not a shock, at least to us — we noted in the Crystal Ball a couple of weeks ago that some of our Republican sources believed Youngkin was the favorite — but this was also an unusual contest with unusual rules. The Republican Party of Virginia opted to nominate its statewide candidates through an “unassembled convention.” Participants registered as delegates and cast ranked-choice votes at about 40 voting sites across the commonwealth. While roughly 53,000 registered to be delegates, just over 30,000 raw votes were cast. That’s close to four times the number of participants in the most recent Virginia gubernatorial convention (2013), but less than a tenth of the turnout in the most recent Republican gubernatorial

Kyle Kondik and J. Miles Coleman

Census Reapportionment: Seat Trade-offs Likelier to Benefit Republicans

Dear Readers: We are publishing a special, early-week edition of the Crystal Ball in order to react to Monday afternoon’s U.S. Census Bureau congressional reapportionment announcement. We’ll be back with a second issue of the Crystal Ball later this week. — The Editors KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — The long-awaited census reapportionment moved seven House seats mostly from slower-growing states in the Northeast and Midwest to faster-growing states in the South and West, although California losing a seat is an exception to this regional dynamic. — Partisan losses in the states losing seats may be a mixed bag collectively. But Republicans may have an edge in the states gaining seats. Gaming out the House reapportionment On Monday afternoon, the U.S. Census Bureau released its new apportionment numbers for the nation’s 435 House of Representatives seats. Released every 10 years, the census reapportionment adjusts the number of House seats to account for population changes. There were some surprises. Earlier projections suggested that 10 seats would change hands. Instead, only seven seats did. Map 1 shows the seats losing and gaining seats, as well as the number of seats each state will hold in the 2020s. Map 1: States gaining/losing House

Kyle Kondik

Notes on the State of Politics: April 20, 2021

Dear Readers: Over the years, the Crystal Ball has published periodic articles with the headline “Notes on the State of Politics.” These articles feature shorter, bite-sized observations about elections and politics. As a way to better serve readers, we’re planning on publishing more frequent “Notes on the State of Politics” issues going forward in addition to our regular issues of the Crystal Ball, typically published on Thursday mornings. Look for future Notes issues on Tuesdays or Wednesdays (the pace of news, election schedules, and other factors will help dictate when we publish). The title of this recurring series of Crystal Ball articles pays tribute to University of Virginia founder Thomas Jefferson, who wrote a book on his birthplace and home titled Notes on the State of Virginia, the prolific writer’s only full-length book. — The Editors Stivers’ resignation sets up another House special election Another prominent establishment-oriented Republican is leaving the U.S. House of Representatives. Rep. Steve Stivers (R, OH-15), a former chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, announced Monday that he is resigning in mid-May to become the president of the Ohio Chamber of Commerce. Stivers appeared to be gearing up to run for the state’s open U.S.

Kyle Kondik and J. Miles Coleman

The Mini-Midterms: Five Takeaways from Six Decades of House Special Elections

Dear Readers: Join us tonight (Thursday, April 15) at 6:30 p.m. eastern for a free, virtual panel: “The Changing Face of America: Voters of Color in the 2020 Election.” Theodore Johnson of the Brennan Center for Justice will moderate, and Andra Gillespie of Emory University, Mark Hugo Lopez of the Pew Research Center, and Natalie Masuoka of UCLA will participate as panelists. You can sign up for the event here, or just tune in tonight at this direct link. This is the third of three University of Virginia Center for Politics panels leading up to the release of A Return to Normalcy? The 2020 Election That (Almost) Broke America — the University of Virginia Center for Politics’ new look at the 2020 presidential election and its consequences. The book is now available through UVA Bookstores, IndieBound, and other online booksellers. Crystal Ball readers can also buy the book directly from the publisher, Rowman & Littlefield, and receive a 30% discount using the code RLFANDF30. Edited by Crystal Ball editors Larry J. Sabato, Kyle Kondik, and J. Miles Coleman, A Return to Normalcy? brings together what Booklist calls a “stellar coterie of reporters, pundits, and scholars” to “parse the 2020 election via

Kyle Kondik

The House: Unclear Lines, Clear Expectations

  Dear Readers: Next month, the Center for Politics will be releasing its biennial post-election book, A Return to Normalcy? The 2020 Election That (Almost) Broke America. For this volume, several top journalists, academics, and analysts partnered with the Center for Politics’ team to analyze last year’s historic election. This evening, Crystal Ball Managing Editor Kyle Kondik will host a panel featuring three writers who contributed to the book. Speakers will include: — Theodore Johnson, Senior Fellow, Brennan Center for Justice — Diana Owen, Professor of Political Science, Georgetown University — Sean Trende, Senior Elections Analyst, RealClearPolitics This virtual event will begin at 6:30 p.m. eastern. Registration is free and can be found at this link, or just tune in at this direct link this evening. If you can’t watch live, we’ll post the video at our YouTube channel, UVACFP, following the event. The book is available for pre-order through UVA Bookstores.   — The Editors   KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE — Delays in the redistricting process mean that we won’t be releasing Crystal Ball House district ratings for the foreseeable future. — However, midterm history along with GOP advantages in redistricting make the Republicans clear, though not certain, favorites to win

Kyle Kondik

The Key to Forecasting Midterms: The Generic Ballot

KEY POINTS FROM THIS ARTICLE: — Given that Democrats only hold a single-digit majority in the House of Representatives, the 2022 midterms will be extremely competitive. — The generic ballot is the best tool for forecasting the House popular vote, and is especially useful in cycles without presidential races atop the ballot. — From 2004 to 2020, a 1% increase in a party’s share of the generic ballot has translated to an average 0.87% bump in the House popular vote. The 2022 midterms begin The 117th Congress was sworn into office just over a month ago, and yet the 2022 midterms are already underway. Some defeated incumbents have already announced that they want a rematch in 2022, and candidates in competitive districts will soon start calling donors and building out their campaign staff. After a surprise loss of 13 seats in the House of Representatives this November, congressional Democrats will need to break one of the most reliable trends in electoral politics if they are to hold their House majority. The president’s party almost always gets crushed in midterms and has lost an average of 33 seats over the last 40 cycles. Given that Democrats only won a 222-213 majority

Seth Moskowitz

The Objectors Versus the Rejecters

Dear Readers: Last night, UVA Center for Politics Director Larry J. Sabato interviewed Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) about last week’s chaos on Capitol Hill, the moment he “knew there was a massive disaster that was underway,” possible sanctions for fellow lawmakers who participated in instigating the Capitol insurrection, the Democrats’ priorities in the Senate now that the party has nominal control of the chamber, and much more. To watch, see here or visit our YouTube channel, UVACFP. And in case you missed it, make sure you check out last week’s Democracy Dialogues, in which Prof. Sabato discussed the Capitol attack, the Georgia Senate runoffs, and much more with former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-WI), Gov. Phil Murphy (D-NJ), CBS News’ Margaret Brennan, CNN’s Don Lemon, ABC News’ Jonathan Karl, former Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Director Chris Krebs, and commentators Paul Begala and Tara Setmayer. That program is also available on our YouTube channel and at this direct link. UVA Today and the Cavalier Daily also recapped the program. In this week’s Crystal Ball, we’re taking a closer look at something many of you have heard a lot about but perhaps, because of everything else, did not get

Kyle Kondik