Idaho
Governor: Idaho may someday elect a Democrat as governor again (we haven’t gotten to them yet, but there are 3-4 red states where the Democrats have decent shots at winning governor’s mansions this year), but not this year. Lt. Gov. Brad Little bested conservative firebrand Rep. Raul Labrador in the primary, and as a result will surely beat State Rep. Paulette Jordan in the general.
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| Sean Casten (D-IL) |
Illinois
Governor: Though he’s hardly any Democrat’s dream candidate (I'm still flummoxed why Lisa Madigan didn't run in the primary), billionaire JB Pritzker (D) is taking on one of the most unpopular governors in the country in Bruce Rauner (R) and has spent a giant mountain of cash to defeat him, which he will, by a double-digit landslide. D+1
House: Here’s where things might get interesting. It’s always hard to tell how a boring or uninspiring topline race will impact down-ballot, but if Pritzker is winning by double-digits against a Republican the GOP doesn’t really like, it may well hurt GOP turnout overall, which could impact the four competitive House races in the state. The Democrats best shot is IL-6, which Hillary Clinton won by seven points and is part of the wealthy suburbs of Chicago. Democrat Sean Casten has started to close the gap against Rep. Peter Roskam, and I think he has the right profile to win here (rumor has it the NRCC is exploring triaging Roskam in the final days of the campaign). The other three races (IL-12, IL-13, and IL-14) are all three ones that would normally favor the Republicans, but in a couple of these races the Democrats batted it out of the park with recruitment (particularly the 12th, with State’s Attorney Brendan Kelly), and a blue wave would probably knock one of these into the Democrats’ column. In a reverse of California, though, I can’t guess which one since taken individually I’d bet on the Republicans in each race. As a result I’m going D+1, even if my gut says there’s an upset brewing in the Land of Lincoln.
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| Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-IN) |
Indiana
Senate: One of the main issues with predicting this year is understanding if the Democrats will underperform at the polls or not. Right now, if you look at the polls, you’re looking at a razor-thin win for Sen. Joe Donnelly, and that is starting to evaporate into a tie. This is probably the best that Donnelly was ever going to do-six years ago he was pretty much the definition of an “accidental senator” after Republican State Treasurer Richard Mourdock endorsed Todd Akin’s “legitimate rape” comments. In a state that even Evan Bayh can’t win anymore, Democrats usually need some sort of help to actually win. It’s possible that Donnelly has received that through Trump and allegations that Mike Braun outsourced jobs (a bad color in industrial Indiana)…plus Braun has hardly been anyone’s idea of an exceptional candidate. But the state is so red, and Donnelly has struggled to get to 50%-is it possible he’s this cycle’s Kay Hagan, where he runs a perfect race but the dynamics of his home state ensure he can’t win? I’m going to side with Donnelly, because the environment should favor him, but if he can’t win this year with this cycle, no Democrat can win statewide in Indiana.
House: Indiana has some of the earliest results of the night, so we should get an indication of the strength of Democrats in Likely Republican districts if they can pull off closes races in the 2nd or 9th against Jackie Walorski or Trey Hollingsworth, respectively. If either of them are in remotely close races, look for a long night for the GOP, but my assumption is both get easy reelections.
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| Gov. Kim Reynolds (R-IA) |
Iowa
Governor: One of the great travesties of there being 30 different stories a minute on election week is that I never had a chance to write a "Really?!?" sort of article about Sen. Chuck Grassley's requests to voters to vote for a Republican governor "because he might not be around much longer." If Grassley has concerns about his ability to do his job, he should resign right now and give the people of Iowa a senator who is up to the task of being a senator...but that's a complaint for another day. If Grassley does have concerns about his abilities, he needs to start making decisions fast, because he's right-Iowa is looking increasingly likely to be a surprise flip next week. While a lot of Republicans can blame their loss on President Trump, few can stake their claim as directly as Gov. Kim Reynolds. She took over for Terry Branstad when he joined the Trump administration, and she has since enjoyed countless, easy attacks on her regarding Trump's tariffs, which are disproportionately affecting Iowa farmers, a big no-no in this part of the country. This is still a state that has a rich history of electing Republicans (or at least Terry Branstads) to the governor's mansion, but I think that Democrat Fred Hubbell is going to win, jumping ahead of a lot of Democrats who skipped this race because they assumed Reynolds was unbeatable. D+1
House: Grassley could get a double whammy on election night as not only could the governor lose, he might see a future opponent to he or his fellow Sen. Joni Ernst make it to the House. That's because there are two very competitive House races on the map that Democrats could win. Despite the polls saying otherwise, my best bet is that Grassley's protégée Rep. David Young will be the more vulnerable of the two seats. A swing district that went for Trump, the Democrats got what seemed to be a third-tier candidate, but Cindy Axne has been one of the better finds of the cycle, and I think she pulls this off when all is said and done. The same should be said for State Rep. Abby Finkenauer, running in a much friendlier district against Rep. Rod Blum, but Blum has crafted a pretty solid perch for himself here (he won in a shock in both 2014 & 2016, so he shouldn't be under-estimated and I've been twice burned predicting he'd lose in the past two cycles). That said, I'm going to assume that a rough cycle for him will allow Finkenauer to become one of the youngest members of Congress at only 29 (if she or Axne win, they would be the first woman to represent Iowa in the US House, as the Hawkeye State is one of only five in the union never to send a woman to the House). It's worth noting that Rep. Steve King has seen a flurry of activity in the past few days, with Republicans denouncing his white supremacist positions, and him even losing the support of Steve Stivers, chair of the NRCC. King is as blatantly racist as an elected politician can be in 2018, and with him losing support from corners of his district he normally could hold down he might be vulnerable, but this is a very red district, the kind that has forgiven King before (though admittedly there's never been this much of an effort to oust him). It's entirely possible that King goes down to JD Scholten (who would become DOA for his 2020 reelection, enough to the point that I suspect he'd run for Ernst's Senate seat as he'd have a better shot beating her than winning reelection), but I'm going to need to actually see the checkmark before I believe that Steve King can be beat. D+2
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| House Minority Leader Paul Davis (D-KS) |
Kansas
Governor: Oh Kansas, will you ever learn? One of the reddest states in the nation has been a conservative testing ground in the past few years, with Gov. Sam Brownback becoming one of the nation's most unpopular governors, in large part due to his mismanagement of the state's budget (he handled it so badly they had to end a school year early because they didn't have the funding to pay for the entire semester). Brownback has since joined the Trump administration, and his successor, Jeff Colyer, lost a primary against arguably one of the most polarizing figures in American politics, Secretary of State Kris Kobach. Kobach's views on immigration and voting rights are so far to the right they're nearly off the map, and in a head-to-head, he'd probably fall to State Sen. Laura Kelly (D). However, Kelly has to deal with an independent candidate, Greg Orman (who was the Democrats' de facto Senate nominee in 2014), who is likely to take at least a few points off of her margin here. That very possibly is enough to best Kelly. I don't try to put my own two cents on who I want to win here so as to remain unbiased, but for the sake of the people of Kansas, there's no race I hope more that I'm wrong in this article than right here: Kobach by a point, and if that's the case, expect Orman to become a swear word in Democratic circles in a way to rival Ralph Nader and Jill Stein.
House: Democrats should have a much nicer night in the House. Despite its red nature, Kansas did have a district that went for Hillary Clinton (the 3rd), and Republican Rep. Kevin Yoder has struggled against Sharice Davids, who would become the first Native American woman elected to Congress were she to win (the same would also be true for Deb Haaland of New Mexico if she wins as expected). Davids is running a good campaign, and it's telling of Yoder's internals that with just a week to go, he's trying to link Davids to Donald Trump to boost his own bonafides-those are the actions of a man who is behind. The same is probably true for the 2nd district, where Rep. Lynn Jenkins is retiring and Democrats may have lucked into a pickup opportunity. The Democrats have former House Minority Leader Paul Davis who lost a tight race to Brownback for governor in 2018, and who probably shouldn't be as close as he is in the 2nd district (a Trump-held one) as he is, but that's the situation the Republicans have put him in thanks to Steve Watkins, a former army ranger, running one of the worst campaigns of the cycle. Caught multiple times telling biographical lies and now facing allegations of sexual misconduct, Watkins is headed the wrong direction with him already down in the polls. Democrats will struggle to hold this seat in future cycles, but that's not their problem right now-it's just getting to 23. If I'm right about Kansas, they'll only need 21 more. D+2
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| Amy McGrath (D-KY) |
Kentucky
House: Every midterm there's at least one state that doesn't have a governor or Senate race keeping it in the conversation, and Kentucky appears to be it this year. As a result, I'm going to change what I initially had predicted for this race. I had planned on saying that Rep. Andy Barr would beat Democrat Amy McGrath, mostly because Barr has the advantage of a red district, and despite McGrath running (in my opinion) the best House campaign by a challenger this cycle, that doesn't mean anything if you're a candidate who can't actually win your seat. But McGrath has proven adept in the district (dispatching Lexington Mayor Jim Gray despite his local popularity), and her ability to fundraise should help, plus with no other major races than this one driving voters out, I think this contest will come down to excitement with the base, and that's something McGrath has. If she wins, expect a future superstar here (Mitch McConnell, get nervous)...and I think she's going to do just that. D+1
Louisiana
House: Wait! Louisiana is also a state that has neither a major Senate or governor's race, and unlike Kentucky, it doesn't have a significant House race. This will remain the status quo as the state preps for a battle of the titans next year when John Bel Edwards and John Kennedy will (probably) face off for governor.
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