Democrats still have A Path To keep The House

By Christina Animashaun/Vox

It all depends on remaining mail ballots in several key states.

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Christina Animashaun/Vox

Part of The 2022 midterm elections, explained

Control of the House of Representatives remains unclear as of Sunday morning, as Republicans appear to have an edge but a path to a Democratic majority remains.

To win a majority, a party needs 218 seats. The totals for several close contests and races with many uncounted mail ballots remain in flux. But currently, Republican candidates lead in 221 districts and Democrats lead in 214.

So to hold their majority, Democrats need to gain the lead in four House races where Republicans are currently ahead — as well as holding on to their own leads, some of which are quite narrow.

A Democratic takeover is probably not the likely outcome at this point, but it is possible. One contest where a Republican previously led, in Maryland’s Sixth District, flipped to Democrats Friday, when Rep. David Trone (D) was called the winner. There are several other uncalled contests, particularly in California, where only 60 percent or so of the vote has been counted and tallies of the remaining mail ballots could change the leads.

The catch is that Democrats’ small leads in other close races are far from secure. In recent days, Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), who unexpectedly trailed her Democratic challenger, regained a small lead. And in three other uncalled contests, the Democrat is leading by less than 2 percentage points. So a lot would still have to go right for Democrats for the GOP’s takeover to be thwarted.

There are 10 uncalled House contests where Republicans currently lead, so for a majority, Democrats would need to win four of those. And their hopes overwhelmingly hinge on whether slow tallies of mail-in ballots could shift outcomes in their favor.

But their hopes will probably hinge on California, another heavily vote-by-mail state, where there are several uncalled races where Republicans currently lead, and only about half the vote has been counted.

So those are Democrats’ hopes — to be saved by mail ballots and California’s slow counting process again. Still, it’s worth noting that though the conventional wisdom is that late-counted mail ballots benefit Democrats, that is not necessarily true in every state or district. (Washington and California have nonpartisan primaries, and in some of these, Republicans gained ground as mail ballots were counted this year.)

Having five contests flip where Republicans currently lead isn’t exactly easy, but it is possible considering how close some of those races are and how many mail ballots haven’t been counted.

Yet the extra challenge Democrats face is that they need to hold on to their own leads, including in some very tight races. That isn’t a sure lead, and they already saw leads in two contests (CO-03 and CA-41) slip away midweek.

The districts where Democratic leads may be a bit shaky include:

Democrats did get some good news Saturday in Washington’s Third District, when Marie Gluesenkamp Pérez (D) was called the winner over Trump-endorsed Joe Kent (R). This is a major upset in a Republican-leaning district where the incumbent, Trump-critical Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (R), failed to advance from the top-two primary.

In addition, Rep. Mary Peltola (D-AK) currently leads Alaska’s at-large district and Rep. Jared Golden leads Maine’s Second District, but their fates will be decided by ranked-choice voting, after lower-performing candidates in those races are eliminated and their ballots are reallocated to the voters’ second choice.

If some of these Democratic leads slip away in favor of Republicans, it’s possible the House will be called for the GOP relatively soon. But if Democrats hang on here and start gaining ground in contests where Republicans are up, House control could take weeks to determine, as California and other states deal with the slow process of processing and counting many thousands of mail ballots. Buckle up.

Update, November 13, 10:00 am: This story was originally published on November 10 and has been updated with election calls and race counts.