2022 Generic Ballot / Recruitment / Fundraising / Ratings Megathread

[ElectionsGuy]

Inside Elections came out with their full Senate ratings:
https://www.insideelections.com/ratings/senate/2022-senate-ratings-january-7-2022

AZ: Tossup
FL: Likely R
GA: Tossup
NH: Tilt D
NV: Tossup
NC: Lean R
PA: Tilt R
WI: Lean R

Everything else is safe for the incumbent party.

I have my disagreements here, and these people tend to overestimate Democrats the worst historically, but I love that they're not even entertaining Ohio because of "open seat" or "Mandel weak candidate" or some other nonsensical conventional wisdom. That's refreshing.

[ElectionsGuy]

Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) continued to pad her re-election campaign war chest through the end of 2021, raking in more than $3.3 million in the final months of the year and boosting her cash on hand to $10.4 million — a record number for any U.S. Senate candidate in Nevada entering an election year.

https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/cortez-masto-banks-3-3-million-for-senate-bid-in-last-quarter-of-2021

It really wouldn't be that much of a surprise to see Democrats outraise Republicans across the board this cycle. Hell, that's my prediction. People really don't understand the extent to which fundraising is now a useless predictor of elections, especially with these political coalitions. Republicans, even if they're wealthier, tend to be far more skeptical of all politicians and candidates, than Democrats. They don't want to waste money on someone who will burn them later. But your yuppie Democrat type will gladly give to Nancy Pelosi or any establishment Democrat because they can be relied on to work for their interests, and the yuppie has higher levels of institutional trust.

If Republicans can still outraise Democrats, then it should be a massive R wave.

[ElectionsGuy]

Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) continued to pad her re-election campaign war chest through the end of 2021, raking in more than $3.3 million in the final months of the year and boosting her cash on hand to $10.4 million — a record number for any U.S. Senate candidate in Nevada entering an election year.

https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/cortez-masto-banks-3-3-million-for-senate-bid-in-last-quarter-of-2021

It really wouldn't be that much of a surprise to see Democrats outraise Republicans across the board this cycle. Hell, that's my prediction. People really don't understand the extent to which fundraising is now a useless predictor of elections, especially with these political coalitions. Republicans, even if they're wealthier, tend to be far more skeptical of all politicians and candidates, than Democrats. They don't want to waste money on someone who will burn them later. But your yuppie Democrat type will gladly give to Nancy Pelosi or any establishment Democrat because they can be relied on to work for their interests, and the yuppie has higher levels of institutional trust.

If Republicans can still outraise Democrats, then it should be a massive R wave.

Fundraising matters to some extent. It was a reason why TX 15th was so close in 2020 but TX 34th which was politically/demographically identical was a relative blowout. It has diminishing returns very quickly.

True. When we're dealing with nationally recognized candidates and we're getting into millions of dollars, it's close to meaningless. It tends to favor incumbency on a small scale, but that's about it. For example, in 2020...

Iowa

Ernst - $30.3M
Greenfield - $55.6M

Maine

Collins - $30M
Gideon - $74.5M

North Carolina

Tillis - $25.3M
Cunningham - $51.2M

NM-02

Herrell - $2.8M
Small - $8.4M

TX-21

Roy - $5M
Davis - $10.2M

in 2018...

Missouri

Hawley - $11.9M
McCaskill - $38.9M

North Dakota

Cramer - $5.9M
Heitkamp - $31M

You're going to see so many of these same types of disparities despite Republican wins. You have some Republican grifters like Kim Klacik who raise tons of money despite no chance of winning because they're running in a D+60 district, and you see that on both sides, but in competitive races it tends to skew overwhelmingly Democratic at this point.

[ElectionsGuy]

Nobody has posted this whopper yet?

https://www.thetrafalgargroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/TRF-Generic-Ballot-0119-Poll-Report.pdf

R+13.

[ElectionsGuy]

Would Katie Porter Survive an R+13 margin?

She could lose in an R+5 year.

I don't expect R+13 to actually happen, but yes she'd get defeated easily with that.

[ElectionsGuy]

I was doing some research on the differences between Senate and House votes in states that hold them simultaneously. Here's the results for competitive-ish states for both 2018 and 2020.

+ = House races more R than Senate
- = Senate races more R than House

2018

AZ - House: D+1.7% ; Senate: D+2.4% ; Difference: +0.7%
FL - House: R+5.2%* ; Senate: R+0.1% ; Difference: +5.1%*
IN - House: R+11.0% ; Senate: R+5.9% ; Difference: +5.1%
MI - House: D+7.8%** ; Senate: D+6.5% ; Difference: -1.3%**
MO - House: R+12.5% ; Senate: R+5.8% ; Difference: +6.7%
NV - House: D+5.3% ; Senate: D+5.0% ; Difference: -0.3%
PA - House: D+10.2%** ; Senate: D+13.1% ; Difference: +2.9%**
TX - House: R+3.4%** ; Senate: R+2.6% ; Difference: +0.8%**
WI - House: D+7.6%** ; Senate: D+10.8% ; Difference: +3.2%**

*Inflated R number due to D districts not having votes, difference would be smaller
**Deflated R number due to uncontested races, difference would be larger in WI, PA, TX, smaller in MI

2020

AZ - House: R+0.2% ; Senate: D+2.4% ; Difference: +2.6%
CO - House: D+9.5% ; Senate: D+9.3% ; Difference: -0.2%
GA - House: R+2.0% ; Senate: R+1.8% --> D+1.2% ; Senate (S): R+1.0% --> D+2.0% Difference: +0.2%-1.0% --> +3.2%-4.0%
IA - House: R+5.9% ; Senate: R+6.6% ; Difference: -0.7%
MI - House: D+1.3% ; Senate: D+1.7% ; Difference: +0.4%
MN - House: D+2.5% ; Senate: D+5.2% ; Difference: +2.7%
NM - House: D+9.8% ; Senate: D+6.1% ; Difference: -3.7%
NC - House: D+0.6%* ; Senate: R+1.8% ; Difference: -2.4%*
TX - House: R+9.3% ; Senate: R+9.6% ; Difference: -0.3%

*Inflated D number due to R's not contesting a race, the difference would be smaller

Senate races tend to track very closely to House vote margins in recent times. Rarely ever 5 points or more apart, and if they are, it's usually a case of "moderate" Senators.

[ElectionsGuy]

PPP, Profoundly Poor Polling. Not that it was unexpected because it was internal anyway.

I can't wait for all the bad house polls. It's going to be a true test of whether people have learned anything about our current political situation and structural polling bias. The 2020 house polls were some of the worst and most unrealistic polls I had ever seen. People believed them anyway, and it led many (most, actually) to assume Democrats would do even better in the House than in 2018. What happens when a bunch of polls put Democrats at or even overperforming their 2020 performance in multiple districts, despite the generic ballot being much more R? Or forget that even, we're already seeing right now huge disparities between Biden approval and generic ballot between pollsters (Quinnipiac has Biden approval at -19, GB at R+1 while Fox has Biden approval at -5 but GB at the same R+1) and GB's ranging from R+14 to D+6. Do the "experts" over at Cook, Sabato, or 538 change their outlook on the House, and doubt Republicans actually take control (Dem gerrymandering is also going to help that argument)? Does the narrative soon become "red wave doesn't look likely" despite some of the worst fundamentals for the Democratic Party since 2010 or 1994? We'll see by the summer or early fall if these "nonpartisan" election forecasters try to sell a narrative favorable to Dems again. They can also point to fundraising, which is going to favor Democrats as they have mastered the use of dark money and have billionaires casually dumping hundreds of millions to help them out. It's going to get interesting, but once again (unfortunately) many people are going to be duped and misled in the process.

[ElectionsGuy]

PPP, Profoundly Poor Polling. Not that it was unexpected because it was internal anyway.

I can't wait for all the bad house polls. It's going to be a true test of whether people have learned anything about our current political situation and structural polling bias. The 2020 house polls were some of the worst and most unrealistic polls I had ever seen. People believed them anyway, and it led many (most, actually) to assume Democrats would do even better in the House than in 2018. What happens when a bunch of polls put Democrats at or even overperforming their 2020 performance in multiple districts, despite the generic ballot being much more R? Or forget that even, we're already seeing right now huge disparities between Biden approval and generic ballot between pollsters (Quinnipiac has Biden approval at -19, GB at R+1 while Fox has Biden approval at -5 but GB at the same R+1) and GB's ranging from R+14 to D+6. Do the "experts" over at Cook, Sabato, or 538 change their outlook on the House, and doubt Republicans actually take control (Dem gerrymandering is also going to help that argument)? Does the narrative soon become "red wave doesn't look likely" despite some of the worst fundamentals for the Democratic Party since 2010 or 1994? We'll see by the summer or early fall if these "nonpartisan" election forecasters try to sell a narrative favorable to Dems again. They can also point to fundraising, which is going to favor Democrats as they have mastered the use of dark money and have billionaires casually dumping hundreds of millions to help them out. It's going to get interesting, but once again (unfortunately) many people are going to be duped and misled in the process.

I can't wait to see the democrat meltdowns after the midterms. Right now on this forum most D users overestimate democrats, but that's nothing compared to outside this forum. For example on alternatehistory.com, where users are significantly less politically aware than people on this forum (but still more than the average person), the average prediction I saw on a midterm prediction thread was democrats GAINING Senate seats, losing no governorships and barely losing the house. If that's how people are viewing the midterms on an (admittedly left-leaning) more politically aware and intelligent forum, I can't imagine how your average democrat voter who is fed daily with "Jan 6 is the end of the GOP" headlines will react to a red wave.

Your average Democrat does know that Biden's approval is very bad (and they think it's coming from their own partisan side, lol) but as you said they're engulfed in Trump is Hitler; Jan 6th was worse than Pearl Harbor type propaganda, so in their minds, the GOP is an extremist party that shouldn't be able to garner more than 30% of the vote. It will be a "democracy is dead" type of meltdown for them if both chambers flip, but still only a fraction of the reaction to a potential 2nd Trump term in 2024. MSNBC will be a must-watch on election night.

It really is weird how there are so many blue wave predictions out there basically every cycle no matter what, but I never see Republicans massively overpredict their own side. Even the most staunch Trump supporters like RedEaglePolitics I think underpredict what's likely to happen in the midterms in some races. It's a very bizarre asymmetrical phenomenon, partially I think because Republicans are more defeatist (used to losing) and media/political coverage makes it seem like they're weaker than they are, and some of them buy into that even subconsciously.

[ElectionsGuy]

Your average Democrat does know that Biden's approval is very bad (and they think it's coming from their own partisan side, lol) but as you said they're engulfed in Trump is Hitler; Jan 6th was worse than Pearl Harbor type propaganda, so in their minds, the GOP is an extremist party that shouldn't be able to garner more than 30% of the vote. It will be a "democracy is dead" type of meltdown for them if both chambers flip, but still only a fraction of the reaction to a potential 2nd Trump term in 2024. MSNBC will be a must-watch on election night.

The average Democrat doesn't really care that much, and neither does the average Republican.

It really is weird how there are so many blue wave predictions out there basically every cycle no matter what, but I never see Republicans massively overpredict their own side. Even the most staunch Trump supporters like RedEaglePolitics I think underpredict what's likely to happen in the midterms in some races. It's a very bizarre asymmetrical phenomenon, partially I think because Republicans are more defeatist (used to losing) and media/political coverage makes it seem like they're weaker than they are, and some of them buy into that even subconsciously.

Interesting, I always see both sides overpredict. I'm not gonna pretend that I've never overpredicted myself so it's nothing hard against them but back when I was watching Trump-aligned subreddits, online polls, it always seemed like they severely overestimated Republicans. I specifically remember many of them believing Minnesota and Oregon would be in play.

Of course though all these are just anecdotes. Onto real data, it looks like according to YouGov, the distribution's much more even than you might expect:

Image Link

That's a good point. I'm more or less talking about the online political world. Average Republicans (and Democrats) do dramatically overestimate themselves, but online personalities and pundits that represent Republicans tend not to do as much in my observations. But maybe my observations are skewed.

I was listening to a podcast with Ted Cruz, and he insisted that the Senate was "50/50" in terms of who's favored to control it after 2022. A toss-up? Doesn't really sound like he thinks a red wave is coming unless it's some weird tactical ploy to say they overperformed later.

[ElectionsGuy]

Susquehanna's Biden approval is -10 and GB is R+6
CNN's Biden approval is -15 and GB is R+1

I have questions. This is why it's extremely important you get a representative sample across the board. A sample may look appropriate or even R-leaning based on Biden approval, but you could be getting way too many people who are metro/urban college-educated independents who are "disappointed" with Biden but aren't actually much different from Democrats. Out of these two, I know which one I'm trusting more, based off track records and common sense. CNN's generic ballot in 2020 was a laughable D+12.

[ElectionsGuy]

(A-) rated Trafalgar Group*

https://www.thetrafalgargroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/COSA-National-Issues-Full-Report-0209.pdf
1,073   LV   

R 54%
D 42%

If the gold standard says R+12, that means a bigger red wave than 2010. Thanks, DNC, for choosing Biden over Bernie.

Right, because Bernie would be so much more popular right now, therefore able to avoid the political gravity of midterm elections with record high inflation.

[ElectionsGuy]

(A-) rated Trafalgar Group*

https://www.thetrafalgargroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/COSA-National-Issues-Full-Report-0209.pdf
1,073 LV

R 54%
D 42%

If the gold standard says R+12, that means a bigger red wave than 2010. Thanks, DNC, for choosing Biden over Bernie.

Right, because Bernie would be so much more popular right now, therefore able to avoid the political gravity of midterm elections with record high inflation.

Eh, I don't think Bernie would stop a red wave in the midterms but I think he would do better than Biden. He's better at hammering in on certain favorable topics and he'll definitely avoid the base not showing up. He's certainly more rhetorically gifted than Biden.

I actually argued for months in the primaries that Bernie would've been as strong or stronger in the general election than Biden. However, the current conditions were not avoidable with a different Democrat. This is broadly to do with the economy as it stands and the Democratic Party as it stands. And I don't buy the idea that "the base" won't show up in the midterms when 81 million people voted for this guy just over a year ago and he claims he's going to be "heavily involved" with the elections. Every single one of these elections is going to be made into some existential threat for democracy so I think it's independent losses, not base turnout, that will be the main problem for them.

[ElectionsGuy]

Bye-bye democracy, I'll miss you.

Well it's clear democracy has been redefined as simply Democrats winning and getting everything they want.

The truth is, most of the left hates democracy. They have contempt for regular people and think they're too stupid to make decisions for themselves. This can be seen on this forum all the time, including a thread where most Democrats are in favor of abolishing midterms because they're too inconvenient. Most of the left after the 2020 election, was slightly relieved but very distraught at just how many people chose to vote Republican after such vitriolic and hyperbolic propaganda that shamed anybody who even thought about voting for him. They clearly think half this country is irredeemable, so why continue this song and dance about how much they love democracy? They love centralized power and they love winning. The only thing that is actually giving the Republican Party a chance in this country is democracy. If it were up to institutions and oligarchs, the current Republican Party would be vastly overwhelmed and defeated, as it "should have been" in 2020.

[ElectionsGuy]

https://twitter.com/timelywriter/status/1496577073669881859

Meuser running in PA-09, not against Cartwright.

Well, isn't this good news for Cartwright.
He may as well be the luckiest man today.

He's still extremely vulnerable? If he were to win, Dems would keep the House.

[ElectionsGuy]

I still feel quite good about Republicans taking the House.

Texas Primary was 64 % Republican / 36 % Democratic

We will have to see if this holds in places like Ohio, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, etc in May.

Those are actually liberal saboteurs who showed up just to defeat the Trumpians. Strangely enough, my cousin’s sister-in-law’s friend is one of these and he said he’s a Biden -> Biden disapprover -> generic ballot undecided -> R primary -> straight ticket D voter

Nonsense! The Enthusiasm all over the Country are with Republicans. You will see Record Primary Turnouts in GOP Primaries.

Your sarcasm detector needs repair

[ElectionsGuy]

Monmouth National Poll has Biden at 39/55 JA, the Right Track/Wrong Track Number at 20/72

BUT the GCB at 46/46

Give me a break! What is Monmouth and their Pollster Patrick Murray fabricating here? Unbelievable!

Democrats are not going to overperform Bidens Number by 7 Points Nationally.

There's a very clear pattern here with the liberal media and university polls (Quinnipiac, Monmouth, Ipsos, YouGov, etc.). They overwhelmingly overestimated Biden's margins in the 2020 elections. They had overwhelming numbers of approval in his early presidency (55-62%), but now they have very low numbers of approval for Biden (like the accurate pollsters) but either statistically tied or Democrats leading in the generic ballot. Their independents are clearly too metropolitan and liberal (and they underrepresent Republicans in many cases). You still see some polls (like Marist with their "Biden bump") showing a D+6 electorate. The 2020 election was a D+1 electorate. The days of D+4 or more are over, but especially for this midterm.

Let's just say that I'm looking at a pollster I trust right now and they have a very similar Biden approval but their generic ballot is dramatically more Republican. Again, common sense, does it make sense that a president in the low 40's in approval would tie or win the generic ballot vote in a midterm? Has that ever happened in the modern era?

[ElectionsGuy]

There's a very clear pattern here with the liberal media and university polls (Quinnipiac, Monmouth, Ipsos, YouGov, etc.). They overwhelmingly overestimated Biden's margins in the 2020 elections. They had overwhelming numbers of approval in his early presidency (55-62%), but now they have very low numbers of approval for Biden (like the accurate pollsters) but either statistically tied or Democrats leading in the generic ballot. Their independents are clearly too metropolitan and liberal (and they underrepresent Republicans in many cases). You still see some polls (like Marist with their "Biden bump") showing a D+6 electorate. The 2020 election was a D+1 electorate. The days of D+4 or more are over, but especially for this midterm.

Let's just say that I'm looking at a pollster I trust right now and they have a very similar Biden approval but their generic ballot is dramatically more Republican. Again, common sense, does it make sense that a president in the low 40's in approval would tie or win the generic ballot vote in a midterm? Has that ever happened in the modern era?

Ah, the old I don't like the results so they must be wrong arguement.

Ok, well have fun believing the generic ballot is a toss-up. I'll be laughing all the way until November.

[ElectionsGuy]

NBC's little 2 point lead for R's is historically bad for Democrats. The same 46-44 spread was the result of a late October poll in 2010. In 2014, their last poll was a tie, 48-48. This poll has a consistent pattern of underestimating Republican margins.

What's more, check this out...

Democratic Party favorability

March 2022: 33/47
Late October, 2014: 36/43
Late October, 2010: 39/42

Republican Party favorability

March, 2022: 34/40
Late October, 2014: 29/47
Late October, 2010: 34/41

Right Direction/Wrong Track

March, 2022: 22/71
November, 2014: 27/63
Late October, 2014: 31/60

The Democratic Party has the highest unfavorables they've ever had, the wrong track number is also historically high, and Democrats have both the legislative and executive branches currently. One of the reasons I think 2010 was as strong or stronger than 2014 in the PV was that despite better Obama approval and Dem Party favorability, they had majorities of both chambers of Congress, so Republicans couldn't be blamed as easily. In 2014, Democrats could yell "Republican obstruction" and it could resonate to a degree with the House. Somewhat similar dynamic here as with 2010, just with a much narrower trifecta. There's a good chance this could be worse than 2010 or 2014 in sheer popular vote margins and depth of the gains in light blue districts.

[ElectionsGuy]

Imagine Republicans don't target NH heavily and then they do "surprisingly well" and almost win it. Well, seems like that could reasonably happen with the way the GOP establishment does politics.

[ElectionsGuy]

All April 29th.

2022

GB: R+5
Biden: -12

2018

GB: D+7
Trump: -12

2014

GB: D+1
Obama: -8

2010

GB: R+1
Obama: +2

The common thread: All generic ballots ended up worse for the party in power on election day than at this point. D's only slightly better in 2018 because Trump marginally improved his approval. Biden's approval seems to have bottomed out and been relatively stable in the low 40's these past 4 months.

[ElectionsGuy]

Collectively, these 5 pollsters showed Biden leading Trump by 10.4% in their last 2020 polls. They now collectively show Republicans with a tiny 0.4% lead, basically tied. People can decide for themselves what information they want to trust, but would it be wise to trust the same ones who failed in the last election?

[ElectionsGuy]

Monmouth has R+7

50
43

Abortion went from 9% to 25% as far as most important issue. Amazing how wrong the punditry continues to be on this.

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1522608091027623936

Liberals are so used to winning they can't understand this is exactly how conservatives felt through most of 2020 (but especially the summer). But nobody made that argument in favor of Republicans then.

[ElectionsGuy]

Monmouth has R+7

50
43

Abortion went from 9% to 25% as far as most important issue. Amazing how wrong the punditry continues to be on this.

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1522608091027623936

Liberals are so used to winning they can't understand this is exactly how conservatives felt through most of 2020 (but especially the summer). But nobody made that argument in favor of Republicans then.

Well to be fair , the summer of 2020 probably did reduce the size of the democratic win so I’m not sure if this a great point to make if we are talking about electoral impact

Everybody seems to think this now but I don't think that's actually accurate. Why is it that during the summer of 2020, Biden and Democrats had their largest polling leads, and Trump had his lowest approval? It's understandable to think this in retrospect to explain how badly wrong the expectations were. But at the time that defunding the police was becoming trendy, it wasn't exactly helping Republicans, and everybody here thought the general unease in the country would hurt Trump (it did) even if some of their antics backfired.

Btw, I'm not totally sold on the idea that it won't help Democrats at all. It will probably juice their turnout a bit. But it won't fix their core issues, which have to with Biden and the economy.

Liberals are so used to winning

HAHAHAHAHA, good one.

Well yeah, these last few months haven't exactly been great for the left. And that's why the reaction has been what it's been. When you're not used to losing, it hurts. From the end of the 2016 election all the way to late 2021, the left has broadly won the culture and the political battles, and ideologically captured nearly every institution in American life, with the only exception being the Supreme Court?

How much you want to bet, as soon as this decision actually comes down, if it even comes down the way everybody's assuming it will, that big corporations everywhere will put out statements condemning the court decision, claiming it's an attack on women's rights, and providing financial cover for abortion expenses? We still haven't found the leaker apparently, which speaks volumes.

[ElectionsGuy]

Monmouth has R+7

50
43

Abortion went from 9% to 25% as far as most important issue. Amazing how wrong the punditry continues to be on this.

https://twitter.com/NateSilver538/status/1522608091027623936

Liberals are so used to winning they can't understand this is exactly how conservatives felt through most of 2020 (but especially the summer). But nobody made that argument in favor of Republicans then.

Well to be fair , the summer of 2020 probably did reduce the size of the democratic win so I’m not sure if this a great point to make if we are talking about electoral impact

Everybody seems to think this now but I don't think that's actually accurate. Why is it that during the summer of 2020, Biden and Democrats had their largest polling leads, and Trump had his lowest approval? It's understandable to think this in retrospect to explain how badly wrong the expectations were. But at the time that defunding the police was becoming trendy, it wasn't exactly helping Republicans, and everybody here thought the general unease in the country would hurt Trump (it did) even if some of their antics backfired.

Btw, I'm not totally sold on the idea that it won't help Democrats at all. It will probably juice their turnout a bit. But it won't fix their core issues, which have to with Biden and the economy.

Liberals are so used to winning

HAHAHAHAHA, good one.

Well yeah, these last few months haven't exactly been great for the left. And that's why the reaction has been what it's been. When you're not used to losing, it hurts. From the end of the 2016 election all the way to late 2021, the left has broadly won the culture and the political battles, and ideologically captured nearly every institution in American life, with the only exception being the Supreme Court?

How much you want to bet, as soon as this decision actually comes down, if it even comes down the way everybody's assuming it will, that big corporations everywhere will put out statements condemning the court decision, claiming it's an attack on women's rights, and providing financial cover for abortion expenses? We still haven't found the leaker apparently, which speaks volumes.

The Democratic Party won some victories in 2018 and to an extent in 2020, though to say that the left is in control of any institution is to either greatly misunderstand what the left is, or move the goalposts very far to the right. Institutions are somewhat favorable to corporate Democrats (so long as they vow not to fundamentally change the status quo much), but are probably more hostile to the actual left than they are to Trump, with the 2016 and 2020 primaries being prime examples of this. And much of Biden's presidency has been anything but victorious for the left. He was already an enormous compromise for us, and even his watered down agenda has been all but derailed.

If the networks do this, it is for ratings, not because they truly "support" the left. They love a good conflict more than anything, and if Democrats were to, say, strengthen gun control, we'd never hear the end about how much they were tearing America apart and showing that they don't care about "real Americans."

As a left-winger, I am so unused to winning that it almost feels weird when my ideology actually scores something resembling a victory.

I actually agree. The populist/hard-left Bernie Sanders wing has been thoroughly defeated, even more so than either the establishment or Trump-aligned right. As a result, they're so insignificant as far as their political influence that I end up saying "the left" a lot referring to establishment Democrats and their allies, which is most of the Democratic Party, and nearly all of their institutional influences. You call them corporate Democrats, but that's what I'm referring to when I say the left, because like it or not they have been dominant with little dissent among their own ranks (in comparison to Republicans). The problem here is even progressives like Elizabeth Warren haven't differentiated themselves that much from this element. It's only the squad and the Sanders folks.

However, I don't buy at all that they're more hostile to Sanders than Trump. And I don't buy that harsher gun control would get negative coverage anywhere other than Fox News and the minority of right-leaning outlets. I watch MSNBC and CNN every once in a while. They are pure Democratic Party propaganda still pretending like they're objective news. You can tell every time they have to cover Biden's approval it's this attitude that people are too ungrateful to see how well Biden is doing.

[ElectionsGuy]

New NBC poll has GCB tied at 46-46

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2022-election/support-abortion-rights-hits-new-high-midterm-outlook-stays-mostly-unc-rcna28869

Roe is the only thing that can save Dems, Biden's approval is trash but a lot of younger people who disapprove are repelled by the idea of SCOTUS removing a constitutional right. If Dems can keep the GCB close then perhaps the GOP will lose a bunch of swing state races due to bad candidates.

Anecdotal evidence is notoriously not worth much, but I will say that I have a fair number of younger, left-wing friends who simultaneously think the Democratic party leadership (both Biden and the Congress) is woefully out of touch with the problems they face, and who also would never vote for the Republican party under any circumstances. Finding a way to turn out those sorts of young voters - edit: while also not alienating other persuadable voters - is going to be very important for any Dem who wants to hold on in a difficult national electoral environment.

Yeah, I think the best realistic Dem scenario is all of the GOP Senate candidates flame out due to abortion stances and they pick up 2 seats while losing House but keeping GOP to a 12 seat or so gain. It is not going to be a R+7 vote like VA and NJ suggested, both had considerably better candidates than anything GOP will offer in swing states in 2022. I think the lack of rape exceptions on abortion is going to trip up some Rs, this position is supported by a fringe 5-10% of the country and as toxic as defunding the police.

Lol D+2 in the senate and R+12 in the house is very optimistic for Ds. That’s basically an R+1-2 vote.

The only way you get D+2 in the Senate is if Dems win the popular vote by at least as much as they did in 2020.