If Democrats narrowly lose the House they have only themselves to blame.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains. However, I worry Dems may fail to take a look in the mirror if the lose the US House because there were several errors they made around the margins that could def cost them.

1. Playing the Gerrymandering Game very poor. The classic example would be New York vs Florida. In New York, Democrat's gerrymander was extremely messy due to incumbent demands, and that is arguably the main reason it got struck down, not the partisan lopsidedness. Districts on their previous map such as NY-10 and NY-17 were absolutely absurd whereas in DeSantis's map, the districts are far cleaner and make geographic sense, even if it results in a lopsided map. There were so many ways Democrats could've passed cleaner gerrymanders in NY and MD that would've had a very good chance of passing legal muster, if only they hadn't heeded to frankly absurd incumbent demands.

Furthermore, some of the people they nominated for redistricting commissions in states such as Colorado and Arizona were quite toxic. In Arizona, it quickly became clear the main Dem and the tiebreaker really began to dislike eachother after the Dems didn't get the map they wanted to and so they basically gave up on seriously trying to make districts like AZ-01 or AZ-06 bluer and basically allowed a Republican gerrymander lite to pass.

2. Nancy Pelosi. and leadership generally. I get she's effective at courting votes but she's a huge lightning rod for Dems, a terrible messenger, and a generally unpopular figure. Republicans are much better at turning over leadership a bit ironically and tend to nominate younger more charismatic voices to lead their caucus. I think people like Nancy Pelosi can be very isolating to a large chunk of the population too since she literally is Rs defintion of the liberal elite which seems to be a huge point of attack against Dems.

3. Spending heavily favors incumbent House Dems even though if Dems want to maintain control, they'll probably need to pick up a few competitive seats (since redistricting costs them a few and not all incumbents in seemingly competitive races will ultimately survive). The lack of Dem investment in seats such as AZ-01, NY-22, and NM-02 is really upsetting even though I'd argue all 3 of those seats could be decisive.

The one thing I do give Dems credit for is overall their slate of candidates in swing seats, both incumbents and newcomers, is quite strong with a few notable exceptions (Christy Smith). No matter what you're never gonna get a perfect slate of A tier recruits for every competitive House seat, but there aren't really many potentially competitive races they outright threw away because of a bad recruit, especially when compared to Rs.

I feel like too often Dems let the internal power structure of their party and trying to protect incumbents/leadership or whatever costs them in terms of raw electoral results around the edges, and as someone who wants the Democrats in charge of the House, I find it frustrating. I really hope some inside the Democratic Party begin to realize this and can possibly adjust their messenging, strategies, and optics accordingly.

[Devils30]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains. However, I worry Dems may fail to take a look in the mirror if the lose the US House because there were several errors they made around the margins that could def cost them.

1. Playing the Gerrymandering Game very poor. The classic example would be New York vs Florida. In New York, Democrat's gerrymander was extremely messy due to incumbent demands, and that is arguably the main reason it got struck down, not the partisan lopsidedness. Districts on their previous map such as NY-10 and NY-17 were absolutely absurd whereas in DeSantis's map, the districts are far cleaner and make geographic sense, even if it results in a lopsided map. There were so many ways Democrats could've passed cleaner gerrymanders in NY and MD that would've had a very good chance of passing legal muster, if only they hadn't heeded to frankly absurd incumbent demands.

Furthermore, some of the people they nominated for redistricting commissions in states such as Colorado and Arizona were quite toxic. In Arizona, it quickly became clear the main Dem and the tiebreaker really began to dislike eachother after the Dems didn't get the map they wanted to and so they basically gave up on seriously trying to make districts like AZ-01 or AZ-06 bluer and basically allowed a Republican gerrymander lite to pass.

2. Nancy Pelosi. and leadership generally. I get she's effective at courting votes but she's a huge lightning rod for Dems, a terrible messenger, and a generally unpopular figure. Republicans are much better at turning over leadership a bit ironically and tend to nominate younger more charismatic voices to lead their caucus. I think people like Nancy Pelosi can be very isolating to a large chunk of the population too since she literally is Rs defintion of the liberal elite which seems to be a huge point of attack against Dems.

3. Spending heavily favors incumbent House Dems even though if Dems want to maintain control, they'll probably need to pick up a few competitive seats (since redistricting costs them a few and not all incumbents in seemingly competitive races will ultimately survive). The lack of Dem investment in seats such as AZ-01, NY-22, and NM-02 is really upsetting even though I'd argue all 3 of those seats could be decisive.

The one thing I do give Dems credit for is overall their slate of candidates in swing seats, both incumbents and newcomers, is quite strong with a few notable exceptions (Christy Smith). No matter what you're never gonna get a perfect slate of A tier recruits for every competitive House seat, but there aren't really many potentially competitive races they outright threw away because of a bad recruit, especially when compared to Rs.

I feel like too often Dems let the internal power structure of their party and trying to protect incumbents/leadership or whatever costs them in terms of raw electoral results around the edges, and as someone who wants the Democrats in charge of the House, I find it frustrating. I really hope some inside the Democratic Party begin to realize this and can possibly adjust their messenging, strategies, and optics accordingly.

1. Dems did a fine gerrymander in NY, the stupid court just said they couldn't. It wasn't a lack of effort thing on their part whatsoever.

2. They need new blood, it can not be a younger Elizabeth Warren type though. Someone more creative would be helpful.

3. None of those 3 seats are remotely lost for the Ds. NM-2 was Biden +6 and Clinton +9 and could flip based on partisan voting patterns alone. AZ-1 could easily go to Kelly by 5 and NY-22 is looking like it would go blue if the Dems won the national popular vote. If Alaska, OH-9, PA-8, ME-2 all stay blue, GOP will have to win 13 Biden seats to get the majority. Yes, there are the easy ones like Fitzpatrick and Kim but suburban seats like NJ-7, CA-45, NC-13 are exactly the type of places the GOP could collapse late in the game.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains. However, I worry Dems may fail to take a look in the mirror if the lose the US House because there were several errors they made around the margins that could def cost them.

1. Playing the Gerrymandering Game very poor. The classic example would be New York vs Florida. In New York, Democrat's gerrymander was extremely messy due to incumbent demands, and that is arguably the main reason it got struck down, not the partisan lopsidedness. Districts on their previous map such as NY-10 and NY-17 were absolutely absurd whereas in DeSantis's map, the districts are far cleaner and make geographic sense, even if it results in a lopsided map. There were so many ways Democrats could've passed cleaner gerrymanders in NY and MD that would've had a very good chance of passing legal muster, if only they hadn't heeded to frankly absurd incumbent demands.

Furthermore, some of the people they nominated for redistricting commissions in states such as Colorado and Arizona were quite toxic. In Arizona, it quickly became clear the main Dem and the tiebreaker really began to dislike eachother after the Dems didn't get the map they wanted to and so they basically gave up on seriously trying to make districts like AZ-01 or AZ-06 bluer and basically allowed a Republican gerrymander lite to pass.

2. Nancy Pelosi. and leadership generally. I get she's effective at courting votes but she's a huge lightning rod for Dems, a terrible messenger, and a generally unpopular figure. Republicans are much better at turning over leadership a bit ironically and tend to nominate younger more charismatic voices to lead their caucus. I think people like Nancy Pelosi can be very isolating to a large chunk of the population too since she literally is Rs defintion of the liberal elite which seems to be a huge point of attack against Dems.

3. Spending heavily favors incumbent House Dems even though if Dems want to maintain control, they'll probably need to pick up a few competitive seats (since redistricting costs them a few and not all incumbents in seemingly competitive races will ultimately survive). The lack of Dem investment in seats such as AZ-01, NY-22, and NM-02 is really upsetting even though I'd argue all 3 of those seats could be decisive.

The one thing I do give Dems credit for is overall their slate of candidates in swing seats, both incumbents and newcomers, is quite strong with a few notable exceptions (Christy Smith). No matter what you're never gonna get a perfect slate of A tier recruits for every competitive House seat, but there aren't really many potentially competitive races they outright threw away because of a bad recruit, especially when compared to Rs.

I feel like too often Dems let the internal power structure of their party and trying to protect incumbents/leadership or whatever costs them in terms of raw electoral results around the edges, and as someone who wants the Democrats in charge of the House, I find it frustrating. I really hope some inside the Democratic Party begin to realize this and can possibly adjust their messenging, strategies, and optics accordingly.

1. Dems did a fine gerrymander in NY, the stupid court just said they couldn't. It wasn't a lack of effort thing on their part whatsoever.

2. They need new blood, it can not be a younger Elizabeth Warren type though. Someone more creative would be helpful.

3. None of those 3 seats are remotely lost for the Ds. NM-2 was Biden +6 and Clinton +9 and could flip based on partisan voting patterns alone. AZ-1 could easily go to Kelly by 5 and NY-22 is looking like it would go blue if the Dems won the national popular vote. If Alaska, OH-9, PA-8, ME-2 all stay blue, GOP will have to win 13 Biden seats to get the majority. Yes, there are the easy ones like Fitzpatrick and Kim but suburban seats like NJ-7, CA-45, NC-13 are exactly the type of places the GOP could collapse late in the game.

1. Yes it was an effective gerrymander but there were so many ways they could've made a cleaner 22-4 gerrymander without conceding much in terms of partisanship. It was extremely extra, and unlike Illinois or Texas, it couldn't be taken for granted from the start that the map would survive

2. I agree 100%

3. Yes those seats might flip on partisanship alone, but with more investment they could move further into Ds column, and it'd be nice to see more spending in seats without D incumbents. Many on the Dem side seem to have this belief their path will be almost entirely incumbents holding on when that's just not realistic.

[Ferguson97]

If Democrats only narrowly lose to house, that would be a historically great result for them, so I’m not sure I accept your premise that they would need to “blame” someone. Republicans will have been the one to fumble a strong lead, so if anyone needs self-reflection it would be them.

[Spectator]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains. However, I worry Dems may fail to take a look in the mirror if the lose the US House because there were several errors they made around the margins that could def cost them.

1. Playing the Gerrymandering Game very poor. The classic example would be New York vs Florida. In New York, Democrat's gerrymander was extremely messy due to incumbent demands, and that is arguably the main reason it got struck down, not the partisan lopsidedness. Districts on their previous map such as NY-10 and NY-17 were absolutely absurd whereas in DeSantis's map, the districts are far cleaner and make geographic sense, even if it results in a lopsided map. There were so many ways Democrats could've passed cleaner gerrymanders in NY and MD that would've had a very good chance of passing legal muster, if only they hadn't heeded to frankly absurd incumbent demands.

Furthermore, some of the people they nominated for redistricting commissions in states such as Colorado and Arizona were quite toxic. In Arizona, it quickly became clear the main Dem and the tiebreaker really began to dislike eachother after the Dems didn't get the map they wanted to and so they basically gave up on seriously trying to make districts like AZ-01 or AZ-06 bluer and basically allowed a Republican gerrymander lite to pass.

2. Nancy Pelosi. and leadership generally. I get she's effective at courting votes but she's a huge lightning rod for Dems, a terrible messenger, and a generally unpopular figure. Republicans are much better at turning over leadership a bit ironically and tend to nominate younger more charismatic voices to lead their caucus. I think people like Nancy Pelosi can be very isolating to a large chunk of the population too since she literally is Rs defintion of the liberal elite which seems to be a huge point of attack against Dems.

3. Spending heavily favors incumbent House Dems even though if Dems want to maintain control, they'll probably need to pick up a few competitive seats (since redistricting costs them a few and not all incumbents in seemingly competitive races will ultimately survive). The lack of Dem investment in seats such as AZ-01, NY-22, and NM-02 is really upsetting even though I'd argue all 3 of those seats could be decisive.

The one thing I do give Dems credit for is overall their slate of candidates in swing seats, both incumbents and newcomers, is quite strong with a few notable exceptions (Christy Smith). No matter what you're never gonna get a perfect slate of A tier recruits for every competitive House seat, but there aren't really many potentially competitive races they outright threw away because of a bad recruit, especially when compared to Rs.

I feel like too often Dems let the internal power structure of their party and trying to protect incumbents/leadership or whatever costs them in terms of raw electoral results around the edges, and as someone who wants the Democrats in charge of the House, I find it frustrating. I really hope some inside the Democratic Party begin to realize this and can possibly adjust their messenging, strategies, and optics accordingly.

1. Dems did a fine gerrymander in NY, the stupid court just said they couldn't. It wasn't a lack of effort thing on their part whatsoever.

2. They need new blood, it can not be a younger Elizabeth Warren type though. Someone more creative would be helpful.

3. None of those 3 seats are remotely lost for the Ds. NM-2 was Biden +6 and Clinton +9 and could flip based on partisan voting patterns alone. AZ-1 could easily go to Kelly by 5 and NY-22 is looking like it would go blue if the Dems won the national popular vote. If Alaska, OH-9, PA-8, ME-2 all stay blue, GOP will have to win 13 Biden seats to get the majority. Yes, there are the easy ones like Fitzpatrick and Kim but suburban seats like NJ-7, CA-45, NC-13 are exactly the type of places the GOP could collapse late in the game.

1. Yes it was an effective gerrymander but there were so many ways they could've made a cleaner 22-4 gerrymander without conceding much in terms of partisanship. It was extremely extra, and unlike Illinois or Texas, it couldn't be taken for granted from the start that the map would survive

2. I agree 100%

3. Yes those seats might flip on partisanship alone, but with more investment they could move further into Ds column, and it'd be nice to see more spending in seats without D incumbents. Many on the Dem side seem to have this belief their path will be almost entirely incumbents holding on when that's just not realistic.

As to Point #3, I agree that any Dem path to the majority probably requires Democrats to beat incumbents in CA-22, CA-27, and NE-02 while retaining NJ-07 and IL-17 and flipping open seats in NC-13 and NY-22. The number of Democrats in Trump seats will probably be pretty small, so it does require some defeats of incumbent Republicans to have a chance at retaining the majority.

[MABA 2020]

All things considered, Democrats would do very well to only narrowly lose the house, as unsatisfying as that result would be.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Users are so anxious, Oct 1st over polls we are just 5 weeks away from EDay, it won't make that much difference because EDay 24 is upon us soon

[Devils30]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains. However, I worry Dems may fail to take a look in the mirror if the lose the US House because there were several errors they made around the margins that could def cost them.

1. Playing the Gerrymandering Game very poor. The classic example would be New York vs Florida. In New York, Democrat's gerrymander was extremely messy due to incumbent demands, and that is arguably the main reason it got struck down, not the partisan lopsidedness. Districts on their previous map such as NY-10 and NY-17 were absolutely absurd whereas in DeSantis's map, the districts are far cleaner and make geographic sense, even if it results in a lopsided map. There were so many ways Democrats could've passed cleaner gerrymanders in NY and MD that would've had a very good chance of passing legal muster, if only they hadn't heeded to frankly absurd incumbent demands.

Furthermore, some of the people they nominated for redistricting commissions in states such as Colorado and Arizona were quite toxic. In Arizona, it quickly became clear the main Dem and the tiebreaker really began to dislike eachother after the Dems didn't get the map they wanted to and so they basically gave up on seriously trying to make districts like AZ-01 or AZ-06 bluer and basically allowed a Republican gerrymander lite to pass.

2. Nancy Pelosi. and leadership generally. I get she's effective at courting votes but she's a huge lightning rod for Dems, a terrible messenger, and a generally unpopular figure. Republicans are much better at turning over leadership a bit ironically and tend to nominate younger more charismatic voices to lead their caucus. I think people like Nancy Pelosi can be very isolating to a large chunk of the population too since she literally is Rs defintion of the liberal elite which seems to be a huge point of attack against Dems.

3. Spending heavily favors incumbent House Dems even though if Dems want to maintain control, they'll probably need to pick up a few competitive seats (since redistricting costs them a few and not all incumbents in seemingly competitive races will ultimately survive). The lack of Dem investment in seats such as AZ-01, NY-22, and NM-02 is really upsetting even though I'd argue all 3 of those seats could be decisive.

The one thing I do give Dems credit for is overall their slate of candidates in swing seats, both incumbents and newcomers, is quite strong with a few notable exceptions (Christy Smith). No matter what you're never gonna get a perfect slate of A tier recruits for every competitive House seat, but there aren't really many potentially competitive races they outright threw away because of a bad recruit, especially when compared to Rs.

I feel like too often Dems let the internal power structure of their party and trying to protect incumbents/leadership or whatever costs them in terms of raw electoral results around the edges, and as someone who wants the Democrats in charge of the House, I find it frustrating. I really hope some inside the Democratic Party begin to realize this and can possibly adjust their messenging, strategies, and optics accordingly.

1. Dems did a fine gerrymander in NY, the stupid court just said they couldn't. It wasn't a lack of effort thing on their part whatsoever.

2. They need new blood, it can not be a younger Elizabeth Warren type though. Someone more creative would be helpful.

3. None of those 3 seats are remotely lost for the Ds. NM-2 was Biden +6 and Clinton +9 and could flip based on partisan voting patterns alone. AZ-1 could easily go to Kelly by 5 and NY-22 is looking like it would go blue if the Dems won the national popular vote. If Alaska, OH-9, PA-8, ME-2 all stay blue, GOP will have to win 13 Biden seats to get the majority. Yes, there are the easy ones like Fitzpatrick and Kim but suburban seats like NJ-7, CA-45, NC-13 are exactly the type of places the GOP could collapse late in the game.

1. Yes it was an effective gerrymander but there were so many ways they could've made a cleaner 22-4 gerrymander without conceding much in terms of partisanship. It was extremely extra, and unlike Illinois or Texas, it couldn't be taken for granted from the start that the map would survive

2. I agree 100%

3. Yes those seats might flip on partisanship alone, but with more investment they could move further into Ds column, and it'd be nice to see more spending in seats without D incumbents. Many on the Dem side seem to have this belief their path will be almost entirely incumbents holding on when that's just not realistic.

As to Point #3, I agree that any Dem path to the majority probably requires Democrats to beat incumbents in CA-22, CA-27, and NE-02 while retaining NJ-07 and IL-17 and flipping open seats in NC-13 and NY-22. The number of Democrats in Trump seats will probably be pretty small, so it does require some defeats of incumbent Republicans to have a chance at retaining the majority.

I think there’s a good chance all of these but CA-27 (Garcia is pretty much cooked) go the same way. NJ-7 has the best trends but Rs have a decent candidate. IL-17 is the Dems worst trend but it’s ancestrally Dem enough you can see it trending R but still staying blue.

[wbrocks67]

I follow that Twitter account that notes all of the outside spending and I'm pretty sure outside Dem groups have definitely invested in all 3 of those races.

[Tekken_Guy]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains. However, I worry Dems may fail to take a look in the mirror if the lose the US House because there were several errors they made around the margins that could def cost them.

1. Playing the Gerrymandering Game very poor. The classic example would be New York vs Florida. In New York, Democrat's gerrymander was extremely messy due to incumbent demands, and that is arguably the main reason it got struck down, not the partisan lopsidedness. Districts on their previous map such as NY-10 and NY-17 were absolutely absurd whereas in DeSantis's map, the districts are far cleaner and make geographic sense, even if it results in a lopsided map. There were so many ways Democrats could've passed cleaner gerrymanders in NY and MD that would've had a very good chance of passing legal muster, if only they hadn't heeded to frankly absurd incumbent demands.

Furthermore, some of the people they nominated for redistricting commissions in states such as Colorado and Arizona were quite toxic. In Arizona, it quickly became clear the main Dem and the tiebreaker really began to dislike eachother after the Dems didn't get the map they wanted to and so they basically gave up on seriously trying to make districts like AZ-01 or AZ-06 bluer and basically allowed a Republican gerrymander lite to pass.

2. Nancy Pelosi. and leadership generally. I get she's effective at courting votes but she's a huge lightning rod for Dems, a terrible messenger, and a generally unpopular figure. Republicans are much better at turning over leadership a bit ironically and tend to nominate younger more charismatic voices to lead their caucus. I think people like Nancy Pelosi can be very isolating to a large chunk of the population too since she literally is Rs defintion of the liberal elite which seems to be a huge point of attack against Dems.

3. Spending heavily favors incumbent House Dems even though if Dems want to maintain control, they'll probably need to pick up a few competitive seats (since redistricting costs them a few and not all incumbents in seemingly competitive races will ultimately survive). The lack of Dem investment in seats such as AZ-01, NY-22, and NM-02 is really upsetting even though I'd argue all 3 of those seats could be decisive.

The one thing I do give Dems credit for is overall their slate of candidates in swing seats, both incumbents and newcomers, is quite strong with a few notable exceptions (Christy Smith). No matter what you're never gonna get a perfect slate of A tier recruits for every competitive House seat, but there aren't really many potentially competitive races they outright threw away because of a bad recruit, especially when compared to Rs.

I feel like too often Dems let the internal power structure of their party and trying to protect incumbents/leadership or whatever costs them in terms of raw electoral results around the edges, and as someone who wants the Democrats in charge of the House, I find it frustrating. I really hope some inside the Democratic Party begin to realize this and can possibly adjust their messenging, strategies, and optics accordingly.

1. Dems did a fine gerrymander in NY, the stupid court just said they couldn't. It wasn't a lack of effort thing on their part whatsoever.

2. They need new blood, it can not be a younger Elizabeth Warren type though. Someone more creative would be helpful.

3. None of those 3 seats are remotely lost for the Ds. NM-2 was Biden +6 and Clinton +9 and could flip based on partisan voting patterns alone. AZ-1 could easily go to Kelly by 5 and NY-22 is looking like it would go blue if the Dems won the national popular vote. If Alaska, OH-9, PA-8, ME-2 all stay blue, GOP will have to win 13 Biden seats to get the majority. Yes, there are the easy ones like Fitzpatrick and Kim but suburban seats like NJ-7, CA-45, NC-13 are exactly the type of places the GOP could collapse late in the game.

1. Yes it was an effective gerrymander but there were so many ways they could've made a cleaner 22-4 gerrymander without conceding much in terms of partisanship. It was extremely extra, and unlike Illinois or Texas, it couldn't be taken for granted from the start that the map would survive

2. I agree 100%

3. Yes those seats might flip on partisanship alone, but with more investment they could move further into Ds column, and it'd be nice to see more spending in seats without D incumbents. Many on the Dem side seem to have this belief their path will be almost entirely incumbents holding on when that's just not realistic.

As to Point #3, I agree that any Dem path to the majority probably requires Democrats to beat incumbents in CA-22, CA-27, and NE-02 while retaining NJ-07 and IL-17 and flipping open seats in NC-13 and NY-22. The number of Democrats in Trump seats will probably be pretty small, so it does require some defeats of incumbent Republicans to have a chance at retaining the majority.

I think there’s a good chance all of these but CA-27 (Garcia is pretty much cooked) go the same way. NJ-7 has the best trends but Rs have a decent candidate. IL-17 is the Dems worst trend but it’s ancestrally Dem enough you can see it trending R but still staying blue.

Garcia has a decent chance at holding on given he did so in 2020 in a district that’s not much better than his new one.

[Interlocutor is just not there yet]

"If Dems narrowly lose the House in a midterm where historical precedent and the economy is completely against them and where they should be suffering massive losses, they have only themselves to blame"

[Reactionary Libertarian]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains.

All three chambers of Congress?

Also, Nancy Pelosi is an incredibly effective Speaker, and to whatever degree her bad image hurts Dems electorally, she more than makes up for it in her legislative prowess. Plus any Dem Speaker would become a lightning rod for the right.

[°Leprechaun]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains.

All three chambers of Congress?

[ProgressiveModerate]

I follow that Twitter account that notes all of the outside spending and I'm pretty sure outside Dem groups have definitely invested in all 3 of those races.

Oh yeah they have, but the Dem Party itself always invests in a way that heavily favors incumbents, even when non-incumbent seats may be easier to win.

[Progressive Pessimist]

I will gladly take a narrow House loss.

[dw93]

I will gladly take a narrow House loss.

I would too as it means we kept control of the Senate, possibly netting a gain there.

[Born to Slay. Forced to Work.]

Aren’t most outlets projecting exactly that?

Projections have gone from roughly 240 republican seats to now just barely over 220, that’s a pretty significant decrease. The premise of this post is faulty

[MARGINS6729]

Just to be clear, I am a Democrat who want Democrats to ideally hold all 3 Chambers of congress and possibly make gains. However, I worry Dems may fail to take a look in the mirror if the lose the US House because there were several errors they made around the margins that could def cost them.

1. Playing the Gerrymandering Game very poor. The classic example would be New York vs Florida. In New York, Democrat's gerrymander was extremely messy due to incumbent demands, and that is arguably the main reason it got struck down, not the partisan lopsidedness. Districts on their previous map such as NY-10 and NY-17 were absolutely absurd whereas in DeSantis's map, the districts are far cleaner and make geographic sense, even if it results in a lopsided map. There were so many ways Democrats could've passed cleaner gerrymanders in NY and MD that would've had a very good chance of passing legal muster, if only they hadn't heeded to frankly absurd incumbent demands.

Furthermore, some of the people they nominated for redistricting commissions in states such as Colorado and Arizona were quite toxic. In Arizona, it quickly became clear the main Dem and the tiebreaker really began to dislike eachother after the Dems didn't get the map they wanted to and so they basically gave up on seriously trying to make districts like AZ-01 or AZ-06 bluer and basically allowed a Republican gerrymander lite to pass.

2. Nancy Pelosi. and leadership generally. I get she's effective at courting votes but she's a huge lightning rod for Dems, a terrible messenger, and a generally unpopular figure. Republicans are much better at turning over leadership a bit ironically and tend to nominate younger more charismatic voices to lead their caucus. I think people like Nancy Pelosi can be very isolating to a large chunk of the population too since she literally is Rs defintion of the liberal elite which seems to be a huge point of attack against Dems.

3. Spending heavily favors incumbent House Dems even though if Dems want to maintain control, they'll probably need to pick up a few competitive seats (since redistricting costs them a few and not all incumbents in seemingly competitive races will ultimately survive). The lack of Dem investment in seats such as AZ-01, NY-22, and NM-02 is really upsetting even though I'd argue all 3 of those seats could be decisive.

The one thing I do give Dems credit for is overall their slate of candidates in swing seats, both incumbents and newcomers, is quite strong with a few notable exceptions (Christy Smith). No matter what you're never gonna get a perfect slate of A tier recruits for every competitive House seat, but there aren't really many potentially competitive races they outright threw away because of a bad recruit, especially when compared to Rs.

I feel like too often Dems let the internal power structure of their party and trying to protect incumbents/leadership or whatever costs them in terms of raw electoral results around the edges, and as someone who wants the Democrats in charge of the House, I find it frustrating. I really hope some inside the Democratic Party begin to realize this and can possibly adjust their messenging, strategies, and optics accordingly.

Pelosi is a fantastic messenger, I don't know why you think she's terrible. She has some gaffes but lately she has been on fire.

[Arizona Iced Tea]

In retrospect this was a pretty good explanation. They did okay nationwide, but New York basically did them in. Had they won NY-03, NY-04, NY-17, and flipped Katko's NY-22 seat they would have won the house. The reddest one of those seats was only Biden+7.6 (NY-22) but it looks like Hochul and Schumer 's collapse costed them the house. They could have done better in California as well, but the NY performance was the worst.

[Mr.Phips]

In retrospect this was a pretty good explanation. They did okay nationwide, but New York basically did them in. Had they won NY-03, NY-04, NY-17, and flipped Katko's NY-22 seat they would have won the house. The reddest one of those seats was only Biden+7.6 (NY-22) but it looks like Hochul and Schumer 's collapse costed them the house. They could have done better in California as well, but the NY performance was the worst.

It really came down to Dems not intervening in the redistricting case at the state appeals court level and jawboning judge Madeline Zingas into voting to uphold their maps.  Dems did a lot for Zingas in the 2015 Nassau county district attorney race and should have been able to get her to side with them on redistricting.

Had the map remained, Dems would have surely won NY-22 and very likely NY-17, NY-18, and NY-19 as well as all three incumbents likely would have run for re-election in their respective districts.

NY-11 is more hazy as it looks like Zeldin won there by two points and Maliotakis only performed a point worse than him on Staten Island.  Not sure if Rose would have been able to run ahead of Hochul in the Brooklyn section to make up for it.

[Bojack Horseman]

I just do not understand why we can't win D+8 seats in places like California and Oregon. I mean it's unacceptable for Young Kim to defeat a Democratic incumbent on the same day that Biden heavily carried the district. I firmly believe that the Dems seriously need to Fox Newsify their base for this reason.

[Born to Slay. Forced to Work.]

I just do not understand why we can't win D+8 seats in places like California and Oregon. I mean it's unacceptable for Young Kim to defeat a Democratic incumbent on the same day that Biden heavily carried the district. I firmly believe that the Dems seriously need to Fox Newsify their base for this reason.

This is maybe the worst idea I've heard in terms of having a healthy democracy

[Mr.Phips]

I just do not understand why we can't win D+8 seats in places like California and Oregon. I mean it's unacceptable for Young Kim to defeat a Democratic incumbent on the same day that Biden heavily carried the district. I firmly believe that the Dems seriously need to Fox Newsify their base for this reason.

Yep.  No incumbent should be losing when their party’s nominee for President is winning the district/state.  This was the most annoying part of the 2020 election. 

Had Dem incumbents held onto their Biden seats in FL-27, CA-21, CA-39, CA-48 in 2020, they would have held 226 seats in this last congress (rather than 222) and all of those incumbents (except Shalala in FL-27) would have won this year.  That would have given Dems three more seats after this election and potentially the majority.  Dems need to do a better job making sure their Presidential voters vote Dem down the ticket.

[Citizen (The) Doctor]

I just do not understand why we can't win D+8 seats in places like California and Oregon. I mean it's unacceptable for Young Kim to defeat a Democratic incumbent on the same day that Biden heavily carried the district. I firmly believe that the Dems seriously need to Fox Newsify their base for this reason.

Yep.  No incumbent should be losing when their party’s nominee for President is winning the district/state.  This was the most annoying part of the 2020 election.

It's like voters choose different candidates for different reasons based on local politics, demographics, and complexities or something.

[An American Tail: Fubart Goes West]

If Democrats only narrowly lose to house, that would be a historically great result for them, so I’m not sure I accept your premise that they would need to “blame” someone. Republicans will have been the one to fumble a strong lead, so if anyone needs self-reflection it would be them.

As much as I’ve mocked Sean Patrick Maloney, I’ve probably given him more than he deserves only because of how close the House ended up being. If it was 235-200, Maloney would be just another loss.