The democrats had a great night this election day. While the biggest of the night from the media was Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani’s win in the New York Mayoral Race, defeating former governor Andrew Cuomo in a campaign largely defined by affordability, it wasn’t actually the biggest story of the night. For example, Democrats won both the Virginia and New Jersey gubernatorial races by double digits (flipping the former from Republican control and outperforming polls for the latter by around 10 percentage points). Meanwhile in California, the Gavin Newsom backed Prop 50 passed by over 25 percent, ushering in up to 5 new seats for Democrats in the house and at least partially countering Republican gerrymander initiatives across the nation. Even more underreported, Pennsylvania retained multiple liberal supreme court justices by sweeping margins, and in Georgia two Democrats beat incumbent Republicans by over 20 percent each in the Georgia Public Service Commissioner elections, the first time they have won a non-federal statewide race in almost 20 years. These large wins in less publicized races signalizes that Democrats are now the party of high propensity voters. All of this data points to a larger disapproval with president Trump’s governance across the country, rather than just a localized progressive surge in New York City. As the night wrapped up, DNC Chair Ken Martin gave a defiant statement, “We’re back to win”, showing how the Democrats are already looking to turn this swing into a blue wave in the upcoming midterms. So, based on what we know now from these elections, how has our understanding of next year’s map changed? Let’s take a look.
The house of representative elections are a little bit harder to predict due to the gerrymandering battle between both parties to siphon off as many districts as possible. While it started in Texas, it quickly engulfed the entire nation. Below is a list of both Republican and Democratic states that are planning gerrymanders or have already gone through.
Republican:
Texas (confirmed) = Net five seats
Missouri (confirmed) = Net one seat
North Carolina (confirmed) = Net two seats
Ohio* (confirmed) = Net one seat
Democrat:
California (confirmed with Prop 50) = Net five seats
Virginia (likely to be confirmed) = Net three seats
*Ohio redistricting was scheduled, but still Republican biased, making it a gerrymander
Based on this, the Republicans will likely end up netting only one or two seats from these Gerrymandering wars, even though potential redistricting in states like Indiana, Maryland, Florida, and Illinois could complicate that number.
States which have no plans to gerrymander are easier to forecast, since their districts are usually more competitive and standard. Currently, based on declining approval ratings for President Trump (upper 30’s or lower 40’s) and the high amount of enthusiasm of Democrats and Democrat learning independents seen from this years elections, I believe that it is very likely that the following districts, which Republicans only narrowly won in 2024 (less than 5 percent) by riding Trump’s coattails, will be captured by Democrats.
- Arizona’s first, sixth congressional district
- Colorado’s eight congressional district
- Iowa’s first, third congressional district
- Wisconsin’s third congressional district
- Michigan’s seventh congressional district
- Pennsylvania’s seventh, eighth, and tenth congressional districts
This would net the Democrats around 9 seats from non gerrymandered races. Note that I also expect Nebraska’s second congressional district (which voted for Harris) to flip blue due to its popular moderate Republican incumbent retiring, and the opposite to happen in Maine’s second congressional district. However, this dynamic will likely be the subject of an entire article on its own.
If we combine my estimate of the Republicans gaining two seats in gerrymandered states and Democrats gaining 9 seats in non gerrymandered states, we see that the Democrats will ultimately net seven districts. This would come out to the Democrats having a majority in the house with 222 seats compared to the Republicans 213 seats. A democrat majority in the latter half of Trump’s term would grind any final pieces of legislation he had in mind to a halt. This would likely cause Trump to attempt to force authority through executive orders, however those would very likely trigger lawsuits and get muddled up in court. While Democrats have a clear pathway to gaining the house majority and speakership in 2026, the path to winning the senate is a lot harder, as they have been confronted with an unfavorable map for the last two consecutive cycles. Soon, I will be posting an article that digs deep into each of the key races in the 2026 Senate Elections, from liberal Maine to battlegrounds like Michigan and North Carolina, to even Republican strongholds like Nebraska. Stay tuned.