I was looking over the history of midterms since the direct election of senators started. And the history shows why the conventional wisdom is the conventional wisdom, to wit, you'd much rather be the Republicans than the Democrats in 2022. A very unsophisticated data analysis.
-
Show this thread
-
Since World War II, there have been 19 midterm elections. If you count each house of Congress separately, that's 38. In those 38, the president's party lost seats 30 times (17 House, 13 Senate), broke even twice in the Senate, and gained seats 6 times (2 House, 4 Senate).
3 replies 4 retweets 17 likesShow this thread -
Just based on those numbers, you'd have to like the Democrats' chances in the Senate better than the House, since the president's party has done slightly better in the Senate than the House. It's gained seats only twice in the House, but lost none or gained in the Senate 6 times.
1 reply 1 retweet 8 likesShow this thread -
After the election, the House had a 222-213 Democratic majority. You need 218 for a majority, which means Republicans need to make a net gain of five seats in 2022 to flip the House. The Dems would need to lose 4 or fewer seats to hold it.
1 reply 1 retweet 7 likesShow this thread -
To hold the House, therefore, Democrats would need to match the lowest number of seats lost by the president's party in a midterm, 4 in 1962, to keep the House. The next four lowest totals, 5, 8, 12, and 15, would all give the House to the GOP.
3 replies 5 retweets 15 likesShow this thread -
Replying to @varadmehta @baseballcrank
Have we ever had an ex President who seems so determined to undermine his party? That could easily offset these historical facts.
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
Teddy Roosevelt was. And House Republicans still gained 62 seats in 1914, 24 in 1918. (Senate Rs lost 3 seats in 1914, gained 6 in 1918).
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.