Republicans Poised to Have Greater Majority Than Dems Did Going Into Midterms
While Republicans learned that they took back control of the House of Representatives last week, they still do not know the exact size of their majority.
The GOP appears likely to end up with one or two seats more than the Democrats’ current 220 to 213 lead.
As of this writing, the Republicans hold 220 seats, with three races yet to be called, according to The New York Times.
One is in California, one in Colorado and one in Alaska.
Republican candidates lead in two of the outstanding contests and a Democrat is ahead in the remaining one, meaning if current trends hold, the GOP will have won a 222 to 213 majority over the Democrats.
In California’s newly drawn 13th congressional district, Republican John Duarte holds a less than one thousand vote lead over Democrat Adam Gray.
The Modesto Bee reported the race could take “many more days” to call.
Meanwhile, The Associated Press called Republican Kevin Kiley the winner over Democrat Kermit Jones Tuesday in California’s new 3rd congressional district bordering Nevada.
Moving over to Colorado, GOP Rep. Lauren Boebert faced a much tighter re-election race than expected against Democrat Adam Frisch. The incumbent trailed at points along the way, but now holds a 554-vote lead in a contest in which over 327,000 ballots were cast.
[firefly_poll]
Frisch has conceded the race, though by state law there will be a recount.
“The likelihood of this recount changing more than a handful of votes is very small,” Frisch said in a news conference streamed on his Facebook page, according to Reuters.
Conservatives are happy warriors!
That’s all. pic.twitter.com/LzJ1I6tArB
— Lauren Boebert (@laurenboebert) November 7, 2022
Finally, Democrat Mary Peltola in Alaska has about a 60,000 vote lead over Republican Sarah Palin and a 66,000 advantage over Republican Nick Begich.
With Alaska’s rank-order voting system, the first candidate to reach over 50 percent will be the winner, and Peltola stands at 48.7 percent.
The rank-order count will begin Wednesday.
Prior to the midterm elections, Fox News contributor and Townhall political editor Guy Benson argued that the most important number Republicans should be focused on was the total number of seats controlled when the counting was over, not the total seats gained.
“Republicans are starting from a higher floor because they did well in 2020. So the final number of seats controlled is more, I think, revelatory and more telling than the actual map of how many seats do they gain,” he said.
One of the oddities of the 2020 general election is that Republicans gained 12 seats in the House, even as President Donald Trump, at the top of the ticket, lost his re-election bid.
Benson pointed to 1994’s 230 seats and 2010’s 242 seats held by the GOP after those midterm elections as good benchmarks as to whether a red wave has occurred.
So by this measure, 2022 was not a red wave, but the Republicans may have a net gain of 10 seats when all is said and done, or 22 seats over the last two election cycles.
