I think Demos will recapture control of the Senate by a seat or two. Lots of Republicans Senate seats are up, with not nearly so many Democratic Senate seats. I believe 20 out of 33 Senate seats up for election this November are currently Republican seats. Demos just need to flip four Senate seats.
The House is gonna go Demo in a big way, methinks. Thanks, Cheeto.
Yes, there are indeed more Republican seats up for reelection this round than Democratic seats. I am aware. The problem is how many of those seats are actually in play for Democrats, because many of them aren’t. Here is a list of states that have a Senate seat up for grabs currently held by a Republican:
Oklahoma, West Virginia, Louisiana, Maine, Texas, Arkansas, Montana, Idaho, Iowa, Wyoming, South Carolina, Tennessee, Mississippi, Kansas, Nebraska, Kentucky, South Dakota, Alaska, North Carolina, and Alabama
Of those 20 seats currently held by Republicans, maybe, and I stress
maybe, 5 are or potentially could be in play for Democrats, with 2-3 of them being long shots IMO. So, even if Democrats have a good night, and they probably will, their odds of flipping the Senate are still slim to none.
The current Senate balance is 53 Rs to 45 Ds (2 Independents are essentially Ds). So, you could say it’s currently 53-47 in favor of Rs. The Democrats would have to have an incredibly fantastic night by winning at least 4/5 seats that by my calculations, again,
could be in play for them. That would give Ds a 51-49 advantage (assuming no D loses their seat to a Republican, which most likely won’t happen unless Ossoff were to get upset).
The most likely scenario, right now at least, is Democrats picking up a net of 2 seats to make the balance 51-49 (2 of those 49 being Independents) in favor of Rs. A 50/50 split outcome would be IMO an exceptionally good night for Ds, although you would still have Rs in control with VP Vance being the tiebreaker. An extreme “Blue Wave” of Ds picking up 4 seats would be a dream scenario for Team Blue, which would probably mean something like Iowa going blue to replace Joni Ernst. Possible? Sure. Likely? I doubt it.
In short, I don’t see it. Perhaps you can point out to me where I am going wrong, but IMO 51-49 Rs is probably the most realistic, best-case scenario for Ds. Of course, there could be another blue moon (pun maybe intended) like when Alabama briefly went blue because Roy Moore was outed as a sexual predator and pedophile. (And, hey, lol, with MAGA being MAGA, all bets are off.) It’s just not likely, though. But, if the economy really hits the sh*ts by November and the national average for gas is something like $6.79, then yeah, it’s possible more Rs could face a lot of pissed off voters. We’ll see.
