The State of Redistricting

I am not entirely sure when the "blog article drought" is going to completely end (when we go back to daily articles), but it's going to at least start to rain this upcoming week on the blog as I am moving toward having a bit more drive in my life post-Labor Day.  We're going to start out this return with a BIG political article (mostly because I know some of the OVP articles are going to come next).  2024 is shaping up to be one of the most intense mid-decade redistricting cycles in recent memory (in part due to former President Trump's inability to get the census done on time), and there are a lot of moving pieces across about a dozen states.  I've recapped below where each of them are at, my thoughts on the current state of play, and which incumbents/parties might be most impacted by these redraws.  Enjoy!

Rep. Barry Moore (R-AL)

Alabama: One of a few states this week with huge news, Alabama feels like the biggest deal right now, and the state most certain to end up with a gain for the Democrats specifically.  A three-judge federal panel (including two Trump-appointed justices) ruled that the Alabama state legislature had not followed the direction of the Supreme Court in the Allen v. Milligan case, which had found the state had violated the Voting Rights Act (VRA) by not drawing a second, Black-majority district in a state where only 16% of the delegation is Black but 33% of the citizenry is.

This means that the state's maps will be drawn by a special master (essentially by the Courts), and will result in a map with two blue districts-likely one that will have an anchor in Birmingham, and the second in the Black Belt region of the state including Selma, Montgomery, & Mobile.  This will likely mean that Rep. Barry Moore, a second-term Republican, will be drawn into a district he cannot possibly win.  Republicans are banking on once-again running out the clock, or going to the Supreme Court in hopes of getting Brett Kavanaugh to change his mind...but honestly, I think they overplayed their hand here, and they're going to end up with two safe blue districts as a result.

Arkansas: There is no movement on this case that I'm finding in recent months.  I'll be honest-of all of the cases right now, this is the one that feels the least likely to succeed in terms of shifting partisan balance.  There's no doubt that Arkansas is drawn unfairly (the Little Rock metro area is drawn into three different districts for a reason), but honestly the state is so red at this point, even if it got a fair map, it'd probably be, at best, a fourth seat that's competitive in blue wave elections.  I doubt this goes anywhere.

Rep. Al Lawson (D-FL)

Florida: In something of a surprise, the Leon County Circuit Court ruled the Florida congressional redistricting plan to be unconstitutional this past week, setting up a showdown at the Florida Supreme Court to see if we could get a new map next year.  The Democrats conceded a lot (they basically focused their entire argument on one district when initially they wanted a more expansive court case focusing on other regions of the state), but they got to continue pushing forward here specifically over whether there could be a redraw of the House districts around Jacksonville, the state's largest city, which historically has elected at least one Democrat (most recently Al Lawson) in the city that is 31% African-American.  The Florida Supreme Court is very conservative, so this would still be a tough case, but the Democrats have decent standing and have won cases similar to this.  Republican Rep. Aaron Bean, who won his first term last year, would be the odd-man-out if there was a redraw, with Lawson (who ran a quixotic bid last year for reelection) getting rite-of-first-refusal if another blue district emerges in the area.

Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA)

Georgia: Georgia has a multi-level case, involving suing both for an additional Black-majority congressional district as well as several more Black-majority districts in the State House & Senate.  The state added 500,000 new Black residents in the past decade, but no new congressional districts for Black voters in 2020 in both Congress & the State Senate (and only two in the State House).  

The case here is a bit harder to prove, though.  For starters, this isn't clear-cut in the way that Alabama & Louisiana are in assuming that the state violated the VRA.  For example, while Alabama only has 16% of its congressional seats decided by Black voters (while they make up 33% of the state's population), 36% of Georgia's congressional districts are made up of Black members of Congress (on par with the 33% of the state that is African-American).  This isn't to say that the state can't draw another Black majority district in the Atlanta suburbs (it can) or that it's not gerrymandered (it is), but it's more that the state should have another blue district in the Atlanta suburbs rather than another VRA district, something you'll see is a sub-trend in a lot of these states.  Given that there's no federal or state protection against partisan gerrymandering in Georgia, the only route they can go is the VRA...I'm curious to see if this works, but it's more of a stretch than Alabama, Louisiana, or even Florida.  If they are successful, it's entirely possible we'd see a situation similar to Florida where a former member of Congress (Carolyn Bourdeaux) drawn out last time runs again, with a Republican who gained as a result (Barry Loudermilk) getting the boot.

Rep. Andy Barr (R-KY)

Kentucky: This one is a bit harder to find information on than some of the other states.  There does still appear to be a State Supreme Court case in Kentucky, so it's not dead, but it's low on the list.  This would not be a VRA violation, but it would be potentially a violation of Kentucky's Constitution (specifically the Free and Equal Elections Clause).  The argument from Democrats is that the current map used partisan gerrymandering (which based on some readings of the state Constitution is illegal) to include Franklin County into the first congressional district, which spreads all the way into southwest Kentucky to form a "hook."  If successful, similar to Arkansas, the new lines probably wouldn't draw a second safe blue district, but you'd get a purple one around the Lexington-Fayette metropolitan area that, while Joe Biden wouldn't have won it, Andy Beshear would've, and would put Rep. Andy Barr in jeopardy against a moderate Democrat.  This feels like a longshot even if, again, the state is very obviously (a lower court judge said as much) a partisan gerrymander.

Gary Chambers (D-LA)

Louisiana: In June, the Supreme Court refused to hear a Louisiana court case that would've potentially staved off a redraw in the state.  Though Republicans are still appealing (the next court case starts October 6th), I think it's becoming increasingly plausible that Louisiana gets the Democrats a second congressional pickup due to the VRA.  Most proposed maps I've seen would split New Orleans and Baton Rouge into separate districts (currently they're combined), and get the Democrats one very blue district and a second medium blue district. 

While Republicans have talked about a potential general election clash between Rep. Julia Letlow (R) and progressive activist Gary Chambers (D) being a tight race, I'm not buying it.  Chambers would potentially be vulnerable in a red wave midterm (I think he'd be significantly to the left of his district), but in a presidential election I don't see a way a fair VRA district would stop him.  If this redraw isn't held off this cycle, it's probable that Chambers will join Troy Carter (who beat him in a 2021 special election) in the House come 2025.

New Mexico: New Mexico is a unique situation where it's the only court case that's alleging that Democrats, not Republicans, gerrymandered the state.  Specifically, the Republicans are stating that the 2nd Congressional district, which went to Rep. Gabe Vasquez in 2022 (over Republican incumbent Yvette Herrell) violated the state constitution's Equal Protection Clause.  The new map does shift some of the liberal neighborhoods around Albuquerque into the congressional district (ensuring that the seat would've been won by Joe Biden in 2020 where a more compact map would've given us a slim Trump district), but the state Supreme Court (which is filled with Democrats) seem to be setting a pretty high bar over whether or not they will redraw.  Vasquez & Herrell are likely to face a rematch in 2024, but without a redraw, it's hard to see the Democratic incumbent losing in a presidential year.

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY)

New York: We're now moving from court cases to a likely redraw.  In 2022, Democrats (led by Gov. Kathy Hochul) drew an aggressive gerrymander of the state, which would've resulted in a probable 22D-4R map.  However, the New York Court of Appeals overruled the gerrymander 4-3, leading to a much tougher map, and on-top of Hochul's underwhelming election victory, the map ended up being 15D-11R, one of the worst results for Democrats in eons in the Empire State.

Hochul, though, has replaced one of the judges (Chief Justice Janet DiFiore) with a much more liberal judge, and it's likely they can get away with a redraw next year.  It's probable that if they get the chance to redraw, the Democrats could pick up as many as six Republican-held seats (the 22D-4R map seems unlikely to go into effect given shifting voting patterns in Brooklyn, as I suspect they'll leave Nicole Malliotakis' Staten Island seat alone as a vote sink).  Nicholas LaLota, George Santos, Anthony D'Esposito, Mike Lawler, Marc Molinaro, & Brandon Williams, all of whom already represent Biden-won seats, could move into considerably bluer districts (it would be pretty easy to draw them all into districts that Biden won by double-digits, almost certainly a death knell for each of them in a presidential year).  Still a lot of room here (New York Democrats have a history of incompetence, and honestly D'Esposito & Lawler proved last year they know how to win in double-digit Biden districts), but this might be the biggest honeypot for the Democrats.

Rep. Don Davis (D-NC)

North Carolina: If you're reading this and thinking it's largely sunny news for Democrats, it is.  Almost all of the court cases in 2023 are focusing on undoing Republican gerrymanders rather than going after Democratic gerrymanders (and yes, they very much exist, though without VRA violations, they're harder to get overturned in court).  But in North Carolina, Republicans are on the offense.  After conservatives won the state Supreme Court in 2022, the court-drawn maps of last year will be thrown out, and with complete control of the legislature and courts (Gov. Roy Cooper doesn't have veto power over the process).  As a result, Republicans will target 3-4 incumbents and draw as strong of a gerrymander as they possibly can to gain the upper-hand in the state.  This means that incumbents like Reps. Kathy Manning, Wiley Nickel, & Jeff Jackson are almost certainly going to be drawn into inhospitable territory; Jackson has even said as much (I subscribe to his newsletter, and he did a video on it), and is rumored to be looking at a run for NC Attorney General instead next year.  

The one question mark in the Tarheel State is if they go after Rep. Don Davis.  North Carolina is only about 20% African-American, but without Davis, only 14% of the state would have African-American representation.  Davis's district would be easy to gerrymander (getting Republicans a fourth pickup), but it has the second highest African-American population in the state, and drawing Davis out could risk a VRA lawsuit (I'd pretty much guarantee one would pop--up).  If they were smart, they'd quite frankly draw Davis a VRA district (it'd be pretty easy to do) to make the rest of the map harder to overrule in the future; not doing so could put them in a situation where a Court forces them to keep the existing lines for all districts, rather than risk a VRA violation (the fact that there are existing maps would make that easy in a way it wouldn't have been in 2022).  Going after four seats rather than three could put the entire enterprise at risk, and would be a major headache for Republicans already facing tough headwinds to hold the House.

Rep. Emilia Sykes (D-OH)

Ohio: One of the biggest reasons I decided to write this today was because of Ohio.  In the state, the Supreme Court today ruled that the partisan gerrymander that was in place in 2022 will stay in effect until 2026.  This sounds bad on the surface, given that the partisan gerrymander is costing Dems at least one seat, possibly as many as three.  But if you read below the surface, it's actually a good thing.  Republicans hold control of both houses of the state legislature right now, and could draw a much more aggressive gerrymander, one that would ensure Democratic incumbents Greg Landsman, Emilia Sykes, & Marcy Kaptur would have no shot of winning again in 2024.  Without a redraw, Landsman is pretty much assured victory in a presidential year, and Sykes & Kaptur would start out as favorites to hold their seats (Kaptur will probably represent a district Donald Trump will win, but she is kind of a magician when it comes to crossover voting, so as long as she runs, I'd bet on her).

The big question here is whether the Democrats can get an independent redistricting commission on the ballot in 2024.  A recent ballot initiative ensured that if they did, and it passed with just 50%, they'd be able to have this in effect in 2026.  Ohio is an increasingly red state, but a fair map would likely give the Democrats a shot at a 50/50 split of the congressional districts.  A compact map would give Landsman a solid blue district in Cincinnati (rather than one that's at risk in a red wave), Kaptur a seat that Biden would be favored to win (albeit by a slim margin in a red-trending region of the state), and give Sykes a safer seat in Akron.  It'd also give the Democrats an extra seat in Columbus, and a swing seat in Dayton they could win in a wave.  Essentially if this passed, the current five seats the Democrats have would be their floor, and they'd be looking at seven seats in a neutral year, putting Republicans like Michael Turner & Mike Carey at risk.

Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC)

South Carolina: South Carolina is the one state on this list we know will be going to the Supreme Court (in October), which is all-the-more-reason to follow it because its decision could impact races in other corners of the country.  The case (Alexander vs. South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP) alleges that the state's 1st congressional district (held by Rep. Nancy Mace) violates the Voting Rights Act.  South Carolina has an African-American population of 25% (compared to its congressional delegation, which only has a 14% representation of African-American districts), so you could make a sincere argument that there should be another Democrat in the state.  The Republicans in the state did gerrymander a lot of Black voters who had initially been in Mace's district (she won the tossup seat in 2020 before it was redrawn) by shoving Charleston County in the 6th congressional district (already represented by Rep. Jim Clyburn, the delegation's sole Democrat).  However, South Carolina is= difficult to draw VRA districts in because the Black population in the state is more spread out (Clyburn's district doesn't even have a 50% African-American population anymore), and so a second VRA district would be a reach.  You could definitely draw a more compact map than what is currently in place and introduce at least one more tossup or blue-leaning district (that would be a fairer map), but without federal laws banning gerrymandering, it's doubtful that the Democrats can win this case in the same way they did Alabama & Louisiana.

Rep. Beth van Duyne (R-TX)

Texas: Of all of the states on this list, no situation appears to be more convoluted than the one in Texas.  This is because unlike most of the cases on this list, which are going after one additional contest, Texas's is looking after a number of different seats, both in the Rio Grande Valley, as well as some around the metropolitan areas of the state (specifically Dallas, San Antonio, and Houston).  There's no doubt that the congressional districts in Texas are drawn in a way that amount to gerrymandering (the districts held by Chip Roy, Beth van Duyne, & Michael McCaul are a joke), but it's not clear that any of the seats, including Monica de la Cruz in the Rio Grande Valley, actually violate the Voting Rights Act, particularly in a way that would hold up in Court.  This feels more like a partisan gerrymander than something that violates the law in Texas or nationally.  This is worth paying attention to because there are so many lawsuits piling up in Texas, one might stick, but this is not high on the priority list for the Democrats because it feels like an uphill climb.

Celeste Maloy (R-UT)

Utah: Next is Utah, where Democrats are going after perhaps the most aggressive gerrymander in the country.  The state is a conservative bastion (it's very, very red), but it has one giant blue spot-Salt Lake City, which given the state's population, should have its own congressional district, one represented by a Democrat.  Here, the debate isn't over the VRA (Utah is a very white state, this wouldn't be an angle for Democrats to win with), but whether the map violates the state Constitution.  In 2018, Utah's voters dictated that they wanted an independent commission to draw the maps, but the legislature superseded that, and passed a map that would ensure four red districts in the state.

I don't think that this is a case that will go to the Democrats, even if the merits are pretty sound (if the people come together, decide to pass a law mandating an independent commission, the legislature overrules them because it limits their power, & the judiciary upholds that...isn't that just a dictatorship?), but if it does, it would be a big deal for Democrats.  All three of the maps that the independent commission brought forward before they were overruled had one district that would go for Biden in 2024 (and did in 2020), but it's hard to tell which Republican would draw the short straw to allow for a Democratic representative.  It's possible Celeste Maloy, who just won the primary election for the open seat vacated by Rep. Chris Stewart, could be the easiest casualty if the Utah judiciary backs state law.

Wisconsin: Our final state is Wisconsin, a state where technically there's no lawsuit yet for congressional districts (the redistricting lawsuit is focused on the more urgent issue of redrawing the gerrymanders in the state legislature).  I kind of want to do a larger article about the issue of Wisconsin later this weekend, so I'm not going to expound on this too much other than to say that with the Democrats having a majority in the Supreme Court, it seems certain that a congressional lawsuit is coming, and could result in 1-2 more blue districts in the state, putting Reps. Derrick van Orden & Bryan Steil at risk.

The State of the House

All throughout July, we have been doing a series of "State of..." articles (I have as a task during August for me to add a label for previous "State Of" articles as I know for political fans of this site that those are some of the most-liked, and so that's on my agenda to make it easier to sort through).  We have hit the Senate, White House, and Governors races, which means our final article is going to be focused on the House.

The House is always the hardest of the contests to write in this forum because it has the most races, and because it's hard to tell the dynamics of the House races, especially this far out.  I can promise, a year from now, both sides will have managed to drop seats that right now feel like prime opportunities because they bet on poor challengers, and other seats that shouldn't be competitive will be because of an incumbent scandal or a party botching an open seat.  As a result, we're going to group these into four categories, and discuss key races to watch in each of them.  Our four groupings will be based on redistricting, presidential partisanship, and the potential for swing districts, especially if one side starts to gain in the presidential race.

A few things to ground the conversation before we begin.  First, the House is currently divided 222R-213D, a very slim majority for Speaker Kevin McCarthy to try to hold onto.  There are also currently 226 seats that went for Joe Biden in 2020, compared to 209 won by Donald Trump, which means that McCarthy's majority is based in large part on the 18 Republicans who won in districts that voted for Joe Biden in 2020 (only five Democrats represent Trump districts).  If you look at McCarthy's leadership style, where he regularly forces those 18 Republicans to take tough votes that Nancy Pelosi wouldn't dream of forcing her Democrats to take for no reason, he doesn't appear aware of that, but it will be a crucial part of the conversation if we do get the expected Biden/Trump rematch in 2024.

Rep. Jeff Jackson (D-NC)

1. The Redistricting Limbo Seats

Despite 2022 being the year of redistricting, 2024 is shaping up to be not only a major redistricting cycle for some states, but it is certainly the most consequential aspect of the House contest at this point, with both sides potentially able to either further gerrymander (or in some cases, thanks to legal action, un-gerrymander) in a way that will change their fortunes & improve their odds.

Two states seem likely to help McCarthy's cause: Ohio & North Carolina.  In both states, the state's Supreme Court was able to stop the most aggressive gerrymandering in 2022, but thanks to Democrats losing key Supreme Court races in these two states in 2022, it now seems probable that both states will redraw.  In Ohio, this would put Reps. Greg Landsman, Emilia Sykes, & Marcy Kaptur in danger (Kaptur already is one of five Democrats representing Trump districts, so she's already vulnerable but could be made more so), while in North Carolina, Reps. Kathy Manning, Jeff Jackson, Wiley Nickel, & Don Davis could be drawn in a way that would make reelection impossible.  Davis, specifically, feels the safest of these seven incumbents, given the recent Supreme Court decision in Allen v. Milligan (Davis represents a largely African-American district, which carving up would potentially put the whole map in peril given the VRA ramifications...if NC GOP is pragmatic they'll leave him alone or shore him up while going after the three remaining Democrats).  Either way, Republicans should be able to pickup something in the ballpark of 5-7 seats in these states through gerrymandering alone (for posterity, I will point out that while gerrymandering is bad regardless of who does it, only one side supports eliminating gerrymandering, so this is not a "both sides" issue-Democrats have the moral high ground here).

The Democrats, though, appear to have a few options on their end as well.  For starters, New York seems increasingly likely to be able to pass the aggressive gerrymander that they weren't able to pass in 2022 thanks to a court overrule of the map.  Due to a new judge on the NY Supreme Court, the old map feels like it will likely be able to be passed if Gov. Hochul and the state legislature has the gumption, and so far it appears they do.  The map Hochul initially signed in 2022 would've only left four Trump-won seats in the state's 26-seat delegation, with the remaining seats being comfortably Biden seats (i.e. he won them by more than 9-points).  Reps. Nick LaLota, Nicole Malliotakis, Brandon Williams, George Santos, Marc Molinaro, Mike Lawler, & Anthony D'Esposito would be in hot water with this map...in fact, while a couple (like Malliotakis & Williams specifically) would be able to plausibly win, the bulk would be DOA.  If you're comparing this to NC/OH, your math is not wrong-a 22-4 map that panned out for NY Democrats would wipe out seven incumbent Republicans, pretty much negating everything the Republicans might gain in NC/OH.

Rep. Julia Letlow (R-LA)

Which brings us to the "un-gerrymandering" section of this article (far more heartening), which is entirely focused on states that would go bluer if the maps are redrawn (a court case in New Mexico conceivably could imperil Rep. Gabe Vasquez, but I don't think that ends up victorious).  So far, Democrats have won court cases in Alabama & Louisiana, but the state legislatures are being defiant in hopes that they'll be able to find some loophole by going back to the conservative Supreme Court.  While I wouldn't put anything past Brett Kavanaugh, I don't think this pans out in these two states, which are clearly in violation of the Voting Rights Act (VRA), and I'm going to be honest-I would be surprised if the state's were able to run out the clock.  In both cases, a state redraw would add another Black-majority district, and in a presidential race, there's no way that the Democrats wouldn't then score two pickups.  It's likely this would mean that Rep. Julia Letlow loses in Louisiana, while Alabama will probably have Reps. Jerry Carl & Barry Moore fighting out a primary against each other rather than run in an unfriendly district.  Either way, AL/LA should get Democrats two more seats.

The one other state that seems likely to get a redraw is Wisconsin.  Currently, Wisconsin has a 6-2 gerrymander that is the result of the aggressively conservative Republican state legislature.  The Democrats recently won back control of the state Supreme Court (newly-elected Justice Janet Protasiewicz will take office in just over a week), and a top priority for Democrats are redraws of the congressional & state legislative maps.  Wisconsin is hard to draw a 4-4 map without feeling a little bit like a gerrymander to favor the Democrats because most of the state's voter base is in densely populated areas of Madison & Milwaukee, but you can definitely draw a map that would make it through the court that would give you four Biden districts, making Reps. Bryan Steil & Derrick van Orden sitting ducks in a presidential rematch.  The Supreme Court could intervene here (that is the Republicans' hope), but the odds are stronger that the Democrats just get their victory, and add another two seats to their total.

A few other court cases to keep an eye on are much longer shots for the Democrats.  In the wake of the Milligan result, redistricting cases in Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, & Texas pose a potential opportunity for Democrats to make more gains under the VRA, though it's unclear how strong these cases are (from my amateur view, I think Georgia has the best shot, Texas has the worst, and the other two are somewhere in the middle but still unlikely).  There is also a court case in Utah that would force a redraw of their maps (in my opinion, after Louisiana & Alabama, the most undemocratic gerrymander in the country).  Recent reads see the Court case leaning toward the Democrats' favor, but it's a very conservative court so don't count any districts before they get a result.  Utah has a 4-0 Republican delegation, and a fair redraw would result in Salt Lake City getting its own, blue district, so this would be a net loss of one if the Republicans lose.  All-in-all, both sides stand to make gains in mid-decade redistricting, but the Democrats are in a better position right now to net seats in redistricting if the court cases/new maps land as expected.

Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-OR)

2. The Republican-Held Biden Seats

Not all states are going to redraw their districts, and yet some of those will still flip in 2024.  Like I said, there are 18 Biden-held districts where the Republicans will have to find at least some Biden 2020 voters to join their side.  7 of those seats are in New York, which even if it doesn't get a redraw is built on a leaning tower for the GOP (Reps. George Santos & Anthony D'Esposito are goners regardless of what happens, and while Democrats look to be making a tactical error in possibly nominating Mondaire Jones, who is well to the left of NY-17, that seat is so blue even Jones would be competitive).  But there are plenty of other districts that Democrats will make a play after in 2024 that will impact the math for Hakeem Jeffries bid for the Speaker's gavel.

Top of the list, in my opinion, are a handful of freshman Republicans who represent districts that will be harder holds in a presidential race.  John Duarte & Lori Chavez DeRemer are already underdogs in districts that Biden won by more than 8-points...I think both would need some unforced errors on the Democrats' part to get a second term.  Other freshmen members like Juan Ciscomani, Tom Kean, & Jen Kiggans represent more marginal districts, but if Democrats want to knock them out, 2024 is the time to do it before they become too entrenched.  We've seen how that plays out in California, where Reps. Young Kim, Michelle Steel, Mike Garcia, & David Valadao have defied the odds multiple times in Biden seats...I personally think Steel & Kim are safe (honestly, I wonder if Biden can hang onto Kim's district or if that's a possible Trump flip), but the blue nature of Valadao & Garcia's seats (Biden won both by more than 12-points) make them harder to hold if Democrats can resist nominating Christy Smith again.  I'll round out by saying that there are a few Republicans who are vulnerable, but the DCCC is probably hoping for a surprise retirement; David Schweikert, Don Bacon, and especially Brian Fitzpatrick are established in their seats, and are an uphill battle for the left, but their seats would be flips if having to kowtow to Marjorie Taylor Greene makes them want to sit out the 2024 cycle.  Democrats may have a 4+ seat gain if all of the expected redistricting happens, but remember they need five seats to win back a majority, and they'll likely lose a couple of their own seats-at least a few of the names I just mentioned need to be collecting unemployment in January 2025 for the left to win back their majority.

Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-WA)

3. The Trump-Held Biden Seats

There are only five Democrats left in Trump-won seats after 2022, where redistricting & a few election losses (Al Lawson, Cindy Axne) brought their numbers down tightly.  Just one of these is a freshman representative this Congress: Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, who won a seat solely by the Republicans screwing up in a primary (removing moderate Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler in favor of MAGA conservative Joe Kent).  Kent is already in this race, and while Herrera Beutler could also join (or Trump could be able to carry Kent in with higher turnout), this is now a race the Republicans will actually have to challenge, though I will say that Gluesenkamp Perez does feel like an underdog (though not necessarily DOA) to me in a way the other four incumbent Democrats do not.

The other four include three established incumbents (Jared Golden, Marcy Kaptur, & Matt Cartwright), and one second-term congresswoman who got to her office during a late special election last congress (Mary Peltola).  Golden feels the safest, continually winning due in large part to Ranked-Choice Voting, and Peltola might be in a similar boat if Alaska continues to flirt with pink state status (though I still think this race is a tossup if Republicans nominate someone better than Sarah Palin).  Cartwright also feels safe, and it's worth noting both Josh Shapiro & John Fetterman won his district in 2022 so Biden could be a threat to take it back, but he's always a risk for retirement, as is Kaptur (the longest-serving woman in the House, and if she wins another term, the dean of the Democratic caucus given Steny Hoyer's probable retirement).  Kaptur will likely wait and see what redistricting does to her seat before she decides again.  

Rep. Susan Wild (D-PA)

4. The Swing Districts

Some of these Democrats could end up losing (Gluesenkamp Perez, if I was forced to predict, would be one I'd guess will flip), but the short list here means that if Republicans can't make their gains in redistricting, they're going to have to either hold vulnerable incumbents in Biden districts or find more Biden territory to win over voters, which was a decided challenge for them in 2022.  This brings us to our last category-the seats that one party has both the presidential & House seats currently, but still want to flip on the House level.

This is harder to do than you'd think, but it does happen.  In 2020, Biden won five seats that eventually went to Republicans despite the Democrats previously holding them, though no Trump seats suffered a similar fate.  Part of this is predicting which of these seats will flip on a presidential level (after all, this helped Republicans flip FL-26 in 2020 and Democrats to flip GA-7, where both POTUS/House flipped).  For Republicans there are four seats that Biden won by less than 5-points that have Democratic incumbents (I'm not counting any state likely to be redrawn like Ohio & New York) that are considered to be somewhat vulnerable: CO-8, MI-7, MI-8, & PA-7.  The problem for Republicans is that in all three of these states, they're seeing a leftward tilt.  While Biden won MI-7 and MI-8 by 1 and 2-points, respectively, Gretchen Whitmer won them by 10 and 12-points respectively...this makes it likelier that they hold.  Same with PA-7, where Biden won it by less than a point, but John Fetterman took it by 4-points.  And Colorado continues to just vault to the left.  This might speak to the strength of candidates like Whitmer & Fetterman, but it also poses a challenge for Republicans-if they couldn't win these seats in 2022, can they win them in 2024 unless Biden loses?

Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA)

Republicans have a few districts that went for Trump/House GOP in 2020/22 by less than 5-points that are also deemed competitive, specifically three in CA-41, IA-3, & MI-10.  Unlike the Democrats, these actually are in districts that are trending left.  California's 41st could be trouble for incumbent Ken Calvert with Trump on the ballot, while Gretchen Whitmer won the 10th congressional district by double digits.  Iowa's 3rd is in a red state, but in the bluest part of the state, and all three of these districts would be on the top of my list of Biden flips.  Given straight-ticket voting, that could be a problem for the Republican incumbents if Trump loses his grasp here.

Obviously there are other districts that could flip, but I'm going to leave it there for now until we have a better read on places like Colorado's 3rd or Indiana's 1st, where the presidential race (and who is likely to win) is going to matter more than the fundamentals.  Overall, I will say that if we're assuming Joe Biden wins reelection, which as of today would be the likeliest of outcomes, the Democrats also look like they'll take the House with it, though the Republicans remain the decided frontrunners to control the Senate and the majority of the governorships.  That is the "State of the Race" as I see it 16 months out from the consequential 2024 elections.

The State of the Governors

In a month full of "State of..." articles where we've been counting down the biggest races of the next two years, we are now reaching the category where "the next two years" needs to apply.  Unlike federal contests, governor's races happen every year, and under a weird cadence (each state kind of has its own reasons, in many cases when it entered the union, as to why they might have governor's races in a specific year).  Governor's races are also not a big deal in presidential years-only 11 states have theirs during presidential years, and only 3 states have theirs the year before a presidential year, so we're going to curtail this down to just five contests to rank, as not only are there less than last year's midterms, there's honestly less competitive contests.  As a reminder, this is list that ranks based on partisan flipping, so the #1 seat is the contest I think is most likely to switch partisan hands (in this case, I think it's a guarantee).

Honorable Mention: There's not really a lot of honorable mentions.  In the old days, Missouri, Montana, & Indiana would occasionally elect Democratic governors (Montana did it as recently as 2016), but in an era of less ticket-splitting, I think this is unlikely.  Gov. Tate Reeves in Mississippi has been uniquely awful (particularly given the water crisis the state went through), but the state is so red that even a quality candidate like Mississippi Public Service Commissioner Brandon Presley (a second cousin of Elvis Presley) doesn't have much of a chance even though he'll do respectably.  As a result, if any of these contests even become competitive it'll be a major achievement.

Gov. Phil Scott (R-VT)

5. Vermont

The big question for our numbers 4 & 5 here are not whether or not they'll be competitive-it's whether or not the incumbent will run again.  Particularly in Vermont, this is the only question to ask.  New England has a history (in the past 30 years) of voting for Democrats on a federal-level but falling for Republican governors, and that's been the story of Vermont the past eight years, the country's most liberal state consistently reelecting moderate Gov. Phil Scott (in literally any other state, he'd be a Democrat).  If Scott runs again, there's no contest here-he'll win a fifth term (Vermont & New Hampshire have two-year terms for their governors).  If he doesn't, this becomes a probable flip with Lt. Gov. David Zuckerman, Attorney General Charity Clark, & State Auditor Doug Hoffer all waiting patiently for the chance at this race.

Executive Councilor Cinde Warmington (D-NH)

4. New Hampshire

New Hampshire is slightly higher for a trio of reasons.  First, I think it's more likely that Gov. Chris Sununu (who has now foregone two federal races he was expected to get in, making me wonder if he's just done with politics) retires than Scott.  Secondly, Sununu is more conservative than Scott, particularly on abortion, and is more vulnerable to be taken down even though he'd be a strong favorite running for another term.  And third, the Democrats already have their A-Team in the race.  New Hampshire Executive Councilor Cinde Warmington has declared she's in, and Manchester Mayor Joyce Craig has formed an exploratory committee. If Sununu retires, it might attract more candidates (specifically Rep. Chris Pappas), but even with him in the race the Democrats are putting up top tier options...though I do think Warmington & Craig are largely assuming he'll retire, and this is a chance to get a head-start on Pappas.

Gov. Andy Beshear (D-KY)

3. Kentucky

The top three races are all much more naturally competitive, or at least more likely to flip, than the other two that are really contingent on some retirements.  Like the Senate, most of the flip opportunities this cycle are for Republicans taking out Democrats.  In third we have Kentucky, where Gov. Andy Beshear is running for reelection.  Beshear has actually maintained extremely strong popularity ratings all through his term in office, and in a different era he'd be a cinch for reelection.  However, in a world where Trump loyalty for Republicans matters more than anything, Beshear is running as a Democrat in a very red state, and he's doing so against Attorney General Daniel Cameron, one of Mitch McConnell's protégées (he went to school on a McConnell scholarship, and was his legal counsel during his time as Majority Leader), and with McConnell clearly in legacy mode right now (I suspect he'll retire in 2026), this appears to be a contest that he genuinely cares about winning.  Expect a tight race, even if Beshear is technically the favorite.

Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson (R-NC)

2. North Carolina

North Carolina is one slot higher not necessarily because it's much more competitive (I think both Kentucky & North Carolina are pretty much tossup races), but because it's an open seat whereas Beshear is still a well-liked incumbent.  Gov. Roy Cooper is a retiring Democrat, and even in a pink/purple state, eight years of one party would normally give the other side the upper-hand in a battle, but Republicans may have stretched themselves too thin with their nominee.  Lt Gov. Mark Robinson (R) is maybe the most out-of-mainstream statewide elected politician running for major office in 2024 (I say that with an asterisk because it is Trump's GOP, but Robinson's views are nuts).  He has publicly been very antisemitic (he once said Black Panther was made by "agnostic Jews and satanic Marxists"), called the coronavirus a "globalist conspiracy to defeat Donald Trump" and said he didn't believe Paul Pelosi was attacked in 2022.  He has publicly mocked the Parkland survivors as "spoiled, know it all children" and has called LGBTQ+ people "filth" and "maggots."  Yes, this is a man running for governor in a state that Donald Trump won by less than 2-points in 2020.  The Democrats have wisely chosen to nominate their highest-ranking official, moderate Attorney General Josh Stein (D) who will surely be using all of those public comments from Robinson to pull a Josh Shapiro in NC and win a third consecutive term for his party.

Attorney General Jeff Landry (R-LA)

1. Louisiana

Louisiana is, similar to the West Virginia Senate race, a foregone conclusion-it's going to flip.  The Democrats were kind of miraculous in that they got to win this seat in the first place for eight years.  Gov. John Bel Edwards is one of the last remaining relics of a time when the South would occasionally flirt with Democratic governors, and he won in 2015 against Sen. David Vitter largely due to seemingly forgotten (Vitter had won a Senate term since them) stories about Vitter frequenting sex workers.  With Edwards term-limited, it seems certain that Attorney General Jeff Landry will beat a host of lesser-known Republicans and Democrat Shawn Wilson, a former state Secretary of Transportation.  Edwards, a conservative Democrat, is a good lesson of what winning even 1-2 terms can do for a state from a progressive perspective though.  He helped remove anti-gay laws, enacted Medicaid expansion, helped reduce sentencing for non-violent criminal offenders, used a court case to get African-Americans' a second congressional seat in the state, and got a raise in teacher pay for the first time in a decade.  I'm just saying Mississippi, Missouri, Indiana...you all would be better off if you occasionally punished Republicans by showing a Democrat can be your governor sometimes...

The State of the White House

Last Sunday, we talked about the Senate majority race, and did a check-in on what next year's Senate composition is going to look like.  That contest looked like it would be a difficult hold for the Democrats.  With most of the competitive Republican-held seats up in 2026-28 (Wisconsin, Maine, North Carolina), there's less room for Democrats to make a lot of headroom, and they are big underdogs to hold the Senate (putting more pressure on Sen. Schumer to confirm as many judges as possible before then).

This also puts an inordinate amount of constraint, if Democrats want any chance of eventually gaining back the Supreme Court, on the party to win the White House in 2024.  I've said this a couple of times on here, but given the ages of Justices Thomas & Alito, the doomsayers proclaiming "the Supreme Court is 100% lost for 30-40 years" are provably wrong, even without Court expansion, but they're going to need to hold the White House and/or the Senate continually until at least the early 2030's (it's morbid, but it's reality) in order for these pessimists to be wrong.  President Biden winning reelection quickly becomes a pivotal piece of the Court conversation, if not the only piece of the Court conversation, given the uphill odds the Senate Democrats face.

So the question is-what are his odds next year?  We are a year out, and Biden's approval ratings are poor.  It's not entirely clear how poor they are, as a chunk of the softness is coming from voters who don't like Biden's age or who voted for him but are disappointed (i.e. voters who would probably vote for him with their nose held if the Republicans don't make a compelling case not to).  Normally this would be a problem for a sitting president, and it's hard not to think of Biden as being vulnerable (anyone who says otherwise is lying to you).  But the biggest advantage the incumbent president has, other than a rosy economy, is that his opponent feels likely to be former President Donald Trump.  Trump's approval ratings are also low, and given Trump's age, pending criminal record, and the general fear of giving him a second term in office for moderates or for former Republicans who may want to go back-to-the-fold but are willing to hold their nose for Biden again...Biden remains in my mind (currently) an odds-on favorite in a rematch.

Part of that is the electoral college, which gets us to our article today.  In 2020, Joe Biden won 306 electoral votes to Donald Trump's 232.  Since then, the US has gone through a census, which means that the Biden states are now worth 303 votes to Trump's 235.  As a reminder, the winner needs 270 electoral votes to win the White House, so the onus is on Trump to flip at least 34 electoral college votes to win the White House.  That's challenging, and we're going to get into why below.  Our list today is going through the states most likely to flip in a rematch between the two men, with #1 being the most likely...but it's worth noting this is a rematch, and in American politics a rematch frequently means both sides get more entrenched, not less.  The problem for Trump is-even the #1 seat on this list is not an easy flip for the former president.

Trump with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis

Honorable Mention: A few honorable mentions stand out, and almost all of them are Trump states.  Right now I'm assuming a status quo election, where Biden's states get a little bluer, Trump's states get a little redder, and just a handful of states have enough room to grow for Trump to play in (enough for him to win, yes, but not enough for him to win easily).  But it's worth noting that a late-breaking criminal indictment of Trump is very possible, and that would make it harder for the former president to compete.  States like Florida, Ohio, and Maine's second congressional district (Maine & Nebraska give out electoral votes by district) are slipping away from the Democrats, but not so much that Biden wouldn't be able to take them if there was a complete implosion in the race.  Florida, specifically, would become in play (despite a terrible 2022 for the Democrats there, 2016/18/20 would still indicate this is winnable even if it's a reach state for the left).  Conversely, Virginia would probably be in play if Biden faltered (either due to a health issue, which admittedly is also a risk for Trump who is nearly the same age as Biden and is in objectively worse shape, or a failure in the economy).  The one state I just want to mention for posterity is Alaska, a state that is looking increasingly competitive (or at least moderating).  It won't flip, but the margin on the state is something Democrats will be keeping their eyes on as the Last Frontier has Senate races in 2026 & 2028 that Democrats for which Democrats will make a play.

Biden with New Hampshire Sen. Maggie Hassan

10. New Hampshire

I kind of object on some level to New Hampshire (which Biden won) going on a list of the most competitive states, because there have really been no signs that the state will go red in 2024 (even though it's oftentimes listed as a competitive state), and you could make a serious argument that Florida will have a closer margin at the end-of-the-day than New Hampshire.  The Granite State is a combination of rural white voters (more likely to be in Trump's camp) but also spillover from the Boston metropolitan area, which is much likelier to be blue.  While Chris Sununu won reelection in the state in 2022 (and will probably win again in 2024 if he ran), the Democrats won both congressional races and a Senate race there last year, and Biden won the state by 7-points.  This feels like the sort of state that someone like Chris Christie would be competitive in if he could get close to the Republican presidential nomination (I'll say it just once for the record-Trump is leading by a margin that would indicate he's near impossible to beat, but he's not as entrenched as Biden, and while this list assumes Trump is the nominee, someone like Christie would make this Top 10 a much different exercise).  This is a close state, but it's a state that's hard to see actually flipping to Trump.

Trump campaigning in Nebraska

9. Nebraska-2

The same can be said for Nebraska's 2nd congressional district.  This is a district that also went for Biden by just under 7-points (slightly closer than New Hampshire), but it's even more exacerbated by the changing demographics of the district.  While the Republicans made the district redder than it could've been (or would've been under the old lines), the district is entirely encompassing the Omaha-Council Bluffs metropolitan area, which is very blue.  Jim Pillen won the district in 2022 in the open gubernatorial race, so it's still capable of electing Republicans that are running pretty conservative campaigns, but in a contest he won statewide by 23-points, he won the district by less than a tenth of a percentage.  The bigger question here isn't whether or not Biden holds it (against Trump, it's near-certain), it's whether against Trump he'd be strong enough to knock out Rep. Don Bacon, who represents one of 18 districts that Republicans hold that went for Joe Biden in 2020.  I kind of wonder if a Biden/Trump rematch might be too much even for the popular Bacon to hang on next year.

Trump with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz

8. Texas

Here's the deal.  Nebraska-2, Minnesota, & New Hampshire were all far bigger blowouts in 2020 than Texas, so don't give me that look.  Texas is a state that Democrats have claimed "demographic destiny" will make blue for decades, and that hasn't held water.  But in 2024, while Texas is still probably pink, the blue-trending nature of the suburbs, combined with a Republican ticket that is uniquely unappealing to said voters (Trump & Ted Cruz) could make the state a proper swing state for the first time in its existence if the Biden second term train seems likeliest to hit the station.  I still think that 2028 is probably the year where Texas could actually turn blue, but I do think we're going to see a Democratic victory in the state that, in many ways, stands as proxy for the Republican identity.  It also has to be said-there's been a lot of (correct) conversation about the electoral college having a disproportionate bias to the Republicans, but if Texas were to go blue, that goes out the window.  Trump would have to win all of the next seven states to barely win the White House if Texas was blue, that's how big of a piece of the pie Texas is to Republicans' White House strategy.  Throw in the Senate campaign in Texas (where a Colin Allred upset victory would go a long way in helping Democrats defy the odds next year), and there's a lot of reasons for Democrats to go here if they can afford it.

Biden with Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer

7. Michigan

Michigan is a weird state.  It's in the Great Lakes region, a section of the country with a lot of white, working class voters, and it's the place that Republicans are eventually hoping to counter Texas with.  But other than 2016, which Hillary Clinton barely lost (and I maintain, had she known she could lose it, she likely wouldn't have), it's not really that swingy, so much as it is close.  Tight Senate races in 2018 & 2020 and a decently close presidential race in 2020 mean it has to be on this list, but Democrats' won landslides in 2022, and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer remains insanely popular here.  Michigan's geography is different than Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and even Minnesota in that the blue sections of the state are scattered.  It's not like Wisconsin where if Democrats don't drive bonkers numbers in Milwaukee & Madison, they've lost.  Democrats have a number of medium-sized communities, frequently built around colleges, that give them an advantage.  As a result, of the seven "swing" states most often characterized by the media, this is the one I think is least likely to break.

Biden with Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman

6. Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania has also proven a challenge for Republicans since 2016, when they pulled off a first-in-decades POTUS victory over Hillary Clinton and a surprise win over Katie McGinty for the Senate.  2018, 2020, & 2022, have given Democrats impressive victories.  In fact, the only really close election in that bunch was Biden/Trump in 2020, where this state served as the tipping point state in the presidential election.  There's little indication since then that Trump's standing has improved-it certainly didn't in 2022, when his hand-picked candidate (Mehmet Oz) got clobbered in the Senate campaign, and Biden is already starting in a better position in 2024 with a popular governor (Josh Shapiro) and a better Senate running-mate than Clinton got in 2016 in Sen. Bob Casey, easily the most consistent swing state politician of this century.  This will be close, but again, if the election were held today between Trump & Biden, it's tough to make the case for Trump.

Trump with North Carolina Sen. Ted Budd

5. North Carolina

The one Trump state that pretty much every pundit agrees is competitive and a potential pickup for Biden is North Carolina.  North Carolina has kind of been the opposite of Nevada for a number of years now-occasionally it will go to the other side (Joe Lombardo & Roy Cooper repping both states outliers), but on a federal level it's largely just flirting with being a swing state rather than actually committing.  It's been telegraphed by the Biden camp that they want to go all-in on North Carolina, a state that is difficult for Democrats to overcome (it has a large rural population that is very red, and they've not totally capitalized on the major metropolitan areas yet), but has potential given the Charlotte, Raleigh, & Greensboro metro areas continue to grow.  It's worth noting how much Trump needs to hang on here.  Trump likely has to flip four states to win the White House in 2024-losing North Carolina would mean he'd need to go into Michigan or Pennsylvania to get a fifth, which would be a tough sell given Biden's inherent advantages there.

Biden with Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema

4. Arizona

For those keeping count, Arizona would be the tipping point state for Democrats in my rankings.  Technically, Trump could win the White House with just 1, 2, & 4 on this list, but that's not really how these things work, and I think Arizona is going to be where Republicans are going to run into one of their biggest challenges.  This state should be competitive.  Biden barely won it in 2020 (becoming the first Democrat to win the state since Bill Clinton in 1996), taking it by under 11k votes, an extremely marginal race.  But Republicans have badly misjudged the nature of the state, treating it like a Republican stronghold still, which came back to bite them in the ass in 2022, when not only did Sen. Mark Kelly win a full-term in the US Senate, but the presumed frontrunner in the governor's race (Kari Lake) lost to Democrat Katie Hobbs.  The Republicans, therefore, have no institutional advantages here (Democrats hold the Gov/SoS/AG offices and both Senate seats), and have proven that the state doesn't want to vote for a Trump-like candidate anymore (they want a Republican, but a moderate one, and they'll take a Democrat over a MAGA devotee).  Lake also has done a fine job of bankrupting the state party's finances, and turned off a lot of moderates in the GOP (it's probable that by 2024, Independents will outnumber Republicans for registration numbers, something Trump didn't have to deal with in 2020).  This is a competitive state, no doubt, but Republicans are not doing what they need to do to win here.

Biden with Nevada Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto

3. Nevada

No swing state gave Republicans unequivocal good news in 2022-they all were either a mixed bag or a total victory for the left.  But Nevada arguably gave them the best reason to be intrigued, knocking out an incumbent governor (Steve Sisolak), the only incumbent governor to lose a general election in 2022.  Nevada is the only state in my Top 4 to have been won by Biden by more than a point in 2020 (it was the sixth closest state, with PA & NC both being closer), but it is trending Republican slowly, particularly given college education levels in the state.  Trending doesn't mean destiny (just ask the Texas Democratic Party) and turnout will be much higher in 2024 than it was in 2022, and abortion still becomes an issue here (it's almost certainly the prime reason that Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto still has a job and Steve Sisolak doesn't is because of her focus on getting abortion legalized on a federal level whereas the blue state legislative majorities meant that wasn't an issue on a state-level), but Biden will need to find a way to stop the Republican friendliness in Clark County, and do a better job with Latino voter outreach in the state to ensure this stays in his column.  Let's not forget, while this is only six electoral votes, Nevada has a Senate race in 2024 that the left will need to hold to have any shot of taking a Democratic majority.

Trump with Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson

2. Wisconsin

In 2020, Wisconsin was the tipping point state in the contest between Joe Biden & Donald Trump, and was very close (decided by 21k votes, less than a percentage point between them).  In 2024, this state will also be close, and will continue to be a dance that the state has perfected in the last decade-Madison & Milwaukee versus the rest of the state.  For Trump, there's room to grow here.  We've talked a lot about Trump's weaknesses as a candidate in this article, but he has strengths too, and one of them is a unique appeal with rural voters.  In Wisconsin, that's a lot of opportunity, and while the Democrats have seen steep declines in the rural regions of the Badger State, that doesn't mean the floor has fallen out yet-there's still room for them to go down further.  On Biden's side, though, you've got two advantages-one is that Dane County (Madison) seems to somehow get bluer every cycle, to the point where it's become a bit of a running joke on Election Twitter.  The second, and maybe more crucial, is that the Milwaukee suburbs continue to become, while not blue, at least less red.  This is a big part of why Republicans can stay competitive here-the three main Milwaukee suburbs (Waukesha, Ozaukee, & Washington, collectively called the WOW counties) have 640k citizens, and are the bedrock of Republican strategy in the state-the more votes they hemorrhage there, the more votes they have to pick up in the less densely-populated rural areas.  Wisconsin will be close, but these are the two dynamics in the state to watch.

Biden with Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock

1. Georgia

I put Georgia #1 for a variety of reasons.  For starters, it was the closest (percentage-wise) state in 2020.  Biden won it by just two-tenths of a percentage point, which is basically just a few city blocks in Atlanta making the difference.  The state also had a unique 2022.  While Democrats were able to deliver the most important race on the map (Raphael Warnock's Senate victory), they didn't make any other flips.  Unlike Wisconsin, Arizona, Michigan, & Pennsylvania, they didn't win the governor's race, and they didn't win any seats down-ballot (which while they lost the governor's race there, they did achieve in Nevada).  This can be attributed in part to Brian Kemp being a uniquely good candidate for Republicans in the governor's race and Stacey Abrams being a uniquely bad one (sorry, but at this point there's no denying Abrams was all midterm hype, at least in terms of her politicking abilities), but plenty of bad candidates won in 2022 based off of the Dobbs decision against arguably better candidates.  That Georgia Democrats couldn't pull it off makes me wonder what the precise formula is here.  Georgia is trending Democratic, it's true (the Atlanta metro region threatens to turn the state into Illinois at some point if it continues this way), but it's not there yet in 2024-it'd be easy to see Trump running up votes in the rural communities, putting a disproportionate amount of pressure on Biden to deliver not just sky-high numbers in Atlanta, but also strong votes in the Black Belt region of the state, where he was helped last time by Raphael Warnock.  I don't feel confident in any state at this point flipping (honestly, I'd probably predict an exact copy of 2020's map if forced to today), but Georgia is the one I'm least confident in, and is a state that any type of Trump rebound would get him a victory.

The State of the Senate

I have honestly been avoiding doing a "State Of..." series for a while, because, quite frankly, what I got to in December hasn't really changed that much.  In an era where ticket-splitting has started to go the way of the Dodo, it's easier and easier to guess in advance who will be the most competitive races, and it genuinely takes a big change or a major flub on one side to make the list alter radically.

But it's been over six months, and while the rankings here are barely shifting (the Top 6 remains stagnant), what has changed is the candidates.  Senate races, unlike House races, are so expensive that we usually have a good idea of who is in and who is out of a Senate race by July of the previous year.  This isn't always the case (Jon Ossoff in 2020 being the best, most recent example), but generally if you're going to be a Senator in 2025, you'd be in the race by now.  So we're going to take a peak at where each of the Senate races are, and kick off a full month of "State Of..." articles every Sunday as we wade into all of the contests of 2023-24.

(A quick reminder-this is ranked as the states most likely to flip partisan sides, with #1 being the most-likely.  For the sake of this article, if you're an Independent caucusing with the Democrats, I'm only counting it as a flip if it goes to the Republicans, not to another Democrat.)

Honorable Mention: At this point, almost none of the remaining races are competitive.  Tim Kaine (VA) and Angus King (ME) both announced they were seeking reelection, keeping those races totally off of our radar, and Amy Klobuchar (MN) doesn't feel like she's in any trouble, especially in a presidential year, even if it's unlikely she repeats her "wins every district" streak as she goes for a fourth term.  There are potentially competitive primaries on the calendar in Maryland, California, & Utah, but none of those have their eventual partisanship at stake, so we're not including those on this list.

Sen Rick Scott (R-FL)

10. Florida

I'm adding Florida onto this list after keeping it off in December for a couple of reasons.  The first, and biggest, is that Sen. Rick Scott is considering a run for the White House, making him the third major Floridian to enter the presidential race (alongside President Trump and Governor DeSantis).  An open seat would make this a lot more interesting, particularly if MAGA-acolyte Rep. Byron Donalds got into the race.  But right now I think we're still looking at Rick Scott running for a second term (I don't think Scott can best Trump even if I think he might beat DeSantis, and this might all be posturing for a bid to take on Mitch McConnell in 2025 for Senate Leader).  The Democrats do not have a decent candidate in the race yet.  Former Reps. Stephanie Murphy & Debbie Mucarsel-Powell remain in the mix, but in a race where Scott's fundraising is basically an infinity symbol, if they're going to run, they're going to need to run soon. (Previous Ranking: N/A)

Dave McCormick (R-PA)

9. Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania is moving down on our list this month.  This is in part because Sen. Bob Casey (D) is running for a fourth term.  Casey is as close as you can get to impenetrable in a state as swingy as Pennsylvania, and it doesn't help the cause for Republicans that he's got lousy competitors so far.  Republicans dodged twin bullets when Kathy Barnette & Doug Mastriano both declined runs, but they're still left at this point with (at best) Dave McCormick, who is wealthy (and can self-fund), but also lost to Dr. Oz in 2022, and is not a great competitor (his connection to Pennsylvania is about an inch deep, compared to Casey whose father was the state's governor and their family goes back generations in Scranton).  Casey will likely outrun Joe Biden by at least 4-5 points here...and Biden is arguably in the favored position in the Keystone State anyway against Donald Trump.  As a result, the PA GOP is going to need a stronger red tide to take this seat. (Previous Ranking: 8)

Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI)

8. Michigan

Also moving down one slot is Michigan, which is doing so more because I'm feeling bullish about our #7 ranked spot and less because I think this is less competitive.  The entries of both Pamela Pugh & Leslie Love into the race may end up negating the goal both women have (of making sure the US Senate has a Black woman in the next Congress, which to be fair it almost certainly will anyway thanks to Delaware), leaving Rep. Elissa Slotkin the probable nominee for the Democrats to replace outgoing Sen. Debbie Stabenow.  On the Republican side, it's still a lot of noise.  The latest buzz is around Rep. Mike Rogers, a former congressman who would be formidable...if he could make it through to the general election.  Rogers is definitely from the Romney Wing, not the Trump Wing, of the party, and it's hard to imagine another Republican that would be more Trump-friendly won't get in if it's just Rogers.  However, right now the Republican Primary is just a bunch of air while Slotkin continues to solidify herself as the frontrunner on not just her side of the aisle, but the general as well. (Previous Ranking: 7)

Rep. Colin Allred (D-TX)

7. Texas

We're moving this up because the Democrats appear to have done exactly what they intended to do in getting Rep. Colin Allred into the race.  While it's not clear Allred has a clear shot at this seat (State Sen. Roland Gutierrez is also considering a run, though Allred has gained pretty much all of the establishment support already, and his strong fundraising may make taking him on impossible), he's the probable frontrunner.  It says a lot about the state of Texas that Sen. Ted Cruz has been weirdly moderating on certain issues (namely on international LGBT rights issues), and publicly stating he expects this to be a close race.  Texas has become a running joke for confident Republicans, with them bragging that Democrats keep trying but not succeeding, and they're right...to a point.  Texas was closer in 2020 than New Hampshire was, despite the latter frequently being called a swing state.  To be honest, I don't know what the candidate who ultimately flips Texas will look like (other than I know they exist, and should be known by the end of the decade, but if Kyrsten Sinema (Arizona) or Raphael Warnock (Georgia) are any indication, it's probably not going to look like what we've consistently gone with (which is a series of white men running in diverse Texas).  Allred, an African-American former NFL player who defeated a longtime incumbent to win in 2018, is definitely a different tactic for the Democrats-we'll see if the pass connects. (Previous Ranking: 7)

Sheriff David Clarke (R-WI)

6. Wisconsin

In a similar fashion to Michigan, Wisconsin has pretty much no obvious Republican frontrunner, while the Democrats have an easy pass in the primary with Sen. Tammy Baldwin running for a third term.  This is higher because Wisconsin is the swingiest state in the country (Michigan is bluer), but it might move down if the Republicans can't find another candidate.  Rep. Mike Gallagher, their preferred option, is out of the race, and so far no major candidates are biting.  Rep. Tom Tiffany has flirted with a run, and if their House seats get torn up by a likely redistricting, Reps. Bryan Steil & Derrick Van Ordern (or State Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, also in a position where his job is in jeopardy due to redistricting) could get them to try to run for a promotion rather than defend tough territory, but the longer this remains open, the more probable that something heinous happens for the party.  Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke, who would be a poison pill in the state, has openly flirted with running, and would make a swing state fall off of this list if he was the nominee. (Previous Ranking: 6)

Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV)

5. Nevada

Nevada stays higher than Wisconsin for two reasons on this list.  The first is that Sen. Jacky Rosen (D) isn't as established as Baldwin, as she's only one-term into her tenure.  The second is that the Republican Party here seems likely to get their preferred candidate, Afghan War veteran Sam Brown.  Brown ran in 2022, but lost in the primary.  Since then, though, Republicans have come around to him, most likely because all of the best options against Rosen have fallen by the wayside.  Former State Rep. Jim Marchant is also in the race, and his connections to QAnon put the risk of a challenge from Brown's right in play.  Brown has already had to stake some pretty tough conservative angles in this race, especially on abortion in a very pro-choice state, but Nevada is a state where Democrats have lost ground (it's the only swing state where Biden's 2020 margin was thinner than Clinton's 2016 margin), and so they can't take anything for granted. (Previous Ranking: 5)

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ)

4. Arizona

Unlike the other races, two questions remain in Arizona, and two big ones.  The first is whether or not Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I) will run for reelection.  She has made every motion that she intends to run again, and her candidacy will put Democrats in a tough spot.  So far, while high-profile Democrats like Nancy Pelosi have gotten behind Rep. Ruben Gallego (the de facto nominee for the party), Senate Democrats and the DSCC have been mum on what they'll do with Sinema, who continues to caucus with them but has refused to run in the primary.  Polling shows Sinema in a distant third place, and it's still not entirely clear whether or not she'd help or hurt the left flank, but most Democrats would prefer she get out of the race entirely to avoid the confusion.  On the Republican side, it's not clear who is going to be the nominee.  Kari Lake, who barely lost the 2022 gubernatorial election and would probably be the frontrunner if she ran, has been more focused on rehashing her close election loss than acting like a Senate candidate.  If Lake is out, you could see a lot of options, probably better ones, but I still think a Lake v. Gallego v. Sinema is most likely to happen, and honestly no one should claim they know what happens in that scenario, other than it's a Tossup. (Previous Ranking: 4)

Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-MT)

3. Montana

We need to remember, the Democrats need to either pickup a seat in Texas or Florida, or they need to take 2/3 of the Top 3 on this list (along with hanging onto every other seat they current hold, including Sinema's) in order to win the Senate again.  The top three are all states that Donald Trump is widely expected to win in 2024, and so these Democrats are going to have to do something only Susan Collins has done in the past two cycles-win while the top of the ticket is losing their state.  The most likely of the three to do this remains Sen. Jon Tester (D), who has shown a knack for pulling off victories in tough reelection contests.  Republicans are weirdly pushing for Tim Sheehy, who as a former Navy SEAL would be a unique counter to Tester's tough-guy rancher schtick.  But Sheehy's business connections are already drawing eyebrow raises (his company Bridger Aerospace gets most of their money from government contracts, which as a US Senator he would be able to oversee funding for, setting up a huge conflict-of-interest), but more pressing is that he will be facing a sitting congressman in the primary, as Rep. Matt Rosendale seems intent on running to his right and looks like he'll probably enter the race.  Tester beat Rosendale in 2018 (which is why Republicans are trying to avoid his candidacy), and I suspect Tester himself would rather face him, but either way...this is a tough race. (Previous Ranking: 3)

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH)

2. Ohio

Almost all of the major Republicans in Ohio seem to have dropped out of the race to take on Sen. Sherrod Brown, a sign that they are coalescing around Secretary of State Frank LaRose, who technically isn't in the race yet but has telegraphed he's a certain candidate.  LaRose didn't support Donald Trump's claims of irregularities in 2020, but he still endorsed him anyway for reelection in 2022, so it's not clear what side of the coin he'd land on if businessman Bernie Moreno were to run to his right.  Brown is running in a state that Joe Biden made closer than Montana in 2020, but I have it higher because Tester has proven his ability to outrun the rest of the ticket more solidly than Brown in the past (let's not forget, the last time Brown was up in a presidential election, Barack Obama was winning the state as well).  I'm not entirely sure what the angle would be here-Brown maybe tries to keep some of the blue-collar counties from having the floor drop out and then run up his numbers as much as possible in the Cleveland/Columbus/Cincinnati markets?  LaRose's views on abortion will probably help Brown (LaRose is VERY anti-choice), but I don't know how much-this feels charitable to even call a tossup, and is likely more Leans Republican. (Previous Ranking: 2)

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV)

1. West Virginia

Tester & Brown, I can see paths for their reelection...an upset, to be sure, but a path.  But West Virginia...I have no idea how the Democrats pull this off.  Joe Manchin could outrun Joe Biden by 25-points...and still lose.  It's not clear yet whether or not Manchin will even try to run again, but he's been telegraphing with bipartisan votes on a number of judgeships that he does intend to run again.  It's clear that the Republican Primary will decide the degree of his loss.  Gov. Jim Justice (whom Manchin detests, as Justice fired Manchin's wife, who was a cabinet secretary in his administration) is the better and more moderate of the candidates, but Rep. Alex Mooney (R) will probably end up getting the Trump endorsement, and his tenuous ties to West Virginia compared to Manchin would be easier to exploit.  Still, even though some Democrats may celebrate this (I don't-we might not get a senator as progressive as Manchin to represent West Virginia again in my lifetime), it does look like Manchin's time as one of the most important politicians in America will come to a close next year. (Previous Ranking: 1)