Were the 2022 election results overhyped/overstated for Democrats in hindsight?

[Brad Note]

2022 was universally hailed as a major upset win for Dems, as they gained a Senate seat and only lost a handful of House seats in an environment that should have substantially favored Republicans.

Looking back on it though (especially knowing how 2024 would go two years later), was it really THAT impressive? Republicans won the national congressional ballot by 2.8 points (pretty much exactly on point with pre-election polling), and the Senate map was quite favorable for Dems (all 15 Dem wins came in states Biden won in 2020, and 19 out of the 20 GOP wins came in states Trump won in 2020).

I feel like this was another 2016 situation, where polls were generally pretty accurate (within MoE) but pollsters dramatically misread the room. Most aggregators were translating a 2.5-3 point GCB win into a 25-35 seat pickup in the House, which they seemed to be pulling right out of their a$$es. It just seems like 2022 was a really bad year structurally for a GOP wave, and Dems more or less maintained stasis under unusually favorable conditions.

[Tekken_Guy]

I wonder if people and pollsters modeled 2022 based on expectations for the 2024 electorate and vice versa. Casey easily beats McCormick on the 2022 electorate, but Oz probably wins in 2024. Ron Johnson and Tammy Baldwin would both win by well over a point on swapped electorates whereas Evers-Michels is a nailbiter. 2022 Kari Lake would have beaten Hobbs on the 2024 electorate but 2024 Kari Lake would have gotten blown out by Gallego on the 2022 electorate. Pre-Beetlejuice Lauren Boebert vs. sacrificial lamb Adam Frisch is a relatively comfortable win for the former on the 2024 electorate, whereas fundraising juggernaut Frisch might have had a real shot against Jeff Hurd on the 2022 electorate.

[Zenobiyl]

No, it wasn’t. Democrats gained a senate seat, and held the GOP to a pathetic majority by winning a bunch of red seats including flips! All while Biden was deeply underwater, inflation was at its worst point in decades, and polling was showing a bloodbath.

That democrats defied the midterm odds is already impressive, but to do so in spite of awful economic conditions is downright stunning.

[Progressive Pessimist]

Obviously. All they were an indication of was the new dynamic between which party is favored in off-years versus presidential years, at least as long as Trump is a major presence.

That said, I am still thankful for those elections for providing a small, but not insignificant buffer to the incoming madness in important states. Even though they also ended up providing false hope for this year and helped give Biden and Democrats the wrong idea...I don't know if that's all better or worse than the 2022 midterms being the Republican tsunami they were supposed to be...

[coloradocowboi]

I think both elections are a wonderful lesson in mathematics for us political nerds. But I don't think the results were overhyped so much as in conjunction with public polling, folks seemed to get wrapped up in the fantasy of a shy Kamala voter.

Elections are decided, above all else, by the composition of the electorate. In 2022, relatively high turnout in suburbs benefited moderate candidates above all else. The reason that Dems did so well is that the GOP nominated a bunch of fringe lunatics. In 2024, Trump benefited from many working-class voters who didn't vote in 2022 showing up while Harris failed to mobilize a handful of key constituencies for a mix of fair (Gaza, Biden's age, her lack of focus on economics) and unfair (her gender, Elon rigging Twitter, the economy) reasons.

The only thing I think we can safely extrapolate right now is that the GOP edge in midterms has diminished, while the Dem advantage in generals has as well. In short, we just erased two of the only hard rules in recent American politics. I think we should collect more data before predicting the future though. Nobody would have predicted either of these past elections back in 2012.

[Mr.Bakari-Sellers]

We had an unnatural event occur we had our nominee Biden drop out after he won the primaries and our eventual nominee run a 3 month campaign. If we had a real primary not a fake one we could have won

[CityofSinners]

They were overhyped in predicting 2024. The new midterm edge for the dem coalition could still be predictive for 2026.

I wouldn't be surprised if Trump does decently well for him and republicans still get blown out in 2026.

[Chief Justice PiT]

     Very much so. The GOP lost a lot of House edge in the latest round of redistricting and suffered some of the worst recruitment I've ever seen, especially hitting Senate and Governor. 2022 wasn't a tremendous year for the GOP, but it was a mistake to read it as a Dem victory and this mistake likely played a role in convincing Democrats that they didn't need to adjust for 2024.

[Arizona Iced Tea]

People misinterpreted 2022. The original prediction was a red wave in that the average swing voter would head to the polls with the intent of voting R to punish Biden. However, just because that didn't materialize didn't mean voters wanted to reward Dems. What ended up happening is for the most part voters made their decision based off the individual candidate in every race. Overall on the Senate and House front Dems had much better candidate than Rs in swing districts so it appeared like Dems were overperforming as a party (which they were), but it was mainly because better quality candidates were winning across the board and they skewed overwhelmingly Dem. There probably was some turnout dynamics in the Midwest as well, but overall the country did depolarize but there wasn't a big vote blue sentiment or anything.

[CentristRepublican]

I wonder if people and pollsters modeled 2022 based on expectations for the 2024 electorate and vice versa. Casey easily beats McCormick on the 2022 electorate, but Oz probably wins in 2024. Ron Johnson and Tammy Baldwin would both win by well over a point on swapped electorates whereas Evers-Michels is a nailbiter. 2022 Kari Lake would have beaten Hobbs on the 2024 electorate but 2024 Kari Lake would have gotten blown out by Gallego on the 2022 electorate. Pre-Beetlejuice Lauren Boebert vs. sacrificial lamb Adam Frisch is a relatively comfortable win for the former on the 2024 electorate, whereas fundraising juggernaut Frisch might have had a real shot against Jeff Hurd on the 2022 electorate.

I agree w this. The point about Johnson and Baldwin is especially stark - the fact that they both barely won their respective races (literally a less than 2-pt partisan difference between the two) is pretty crazy to think about, given that both times the state was taken for granted by the party that held it.

In a way though I'm glad it cancels out, it always irked me a little bit that we missed an opportunity in WI in 2022 - nominated a low B tier candidate and didn't invest into the state and still came within a point. But the exact same happened with Rs in 2024, except that the margin was somehow even closer (Baldwin+0.85 versus Johnson+1).

[America needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

snip

okay its objectively false that turnout favored Dems in 2022. Dems held up well in 2022 as a result of a substantial persuasion edge and despite losing on turnout. The reason why the persuasion edge disappeared in 2024 was because people really disliked Kamala Harris, and if Dems nominated any of their popular Governors from across the country for President, it would have been a blue wave.

[Pericles]

2022 logically should have been a red wave, Democratic turnout should have been depressed and swing voters should have reflexively voted against the administration. Midterms are supposed to be a referendum on the incumbent President, not a choice like presidential elections. The Republican Party clearly limited its ability to use Biden's unpopularity against down-ballot Democrats, and judging by the 2024 results that problem did not fully go away for them either.

[Mr.Bakari-Sellers]

No, they weren't as there is still a blue wall we will win the Rust belt Governorships easily except MI.  Trump only won those states narrowly.  Those blue States with a better nominee will be back in 28

[GAinDC]

Not at all. It was an extremely impressive showing relative to what the fundamentals were predicting.

I’ll never forget seeing those first exit polls and being shocked how high abortion and democracy were scoring with voters. Then, when RI 2 was almost auto-called for Seth Magaziner, I knew there would be no red wave.

It could have and should have been so much worse, but Republicans really fumbled things, while Dems ran an incredibly smart and disciplined campaign. It shows that the tactics the GOP relies on during the Trump years just don’t work when he’s not on the ballot.

[For Trump, everything. For immigrants, the law]

Given the previous four midterms before 2022, it was still a massive overperformance of expectations for Democrats. Many expected Republicans to gain four Senate seats and get close to 240 House seats. It didn't end up being very predicative of 2024 (in the same way that 2010 didn't mean much for 2012), although Democrats still did a bit better downballot, so it might've suggested that the party as a whole isn't as unpopular as Biden. Though it is interesting that one of the states in which Democrats performed best in 2022 (Pennsylvania) was a trainwreck for them this year.

I guess it just goes to show that 2026 (which I think is likely to be a very good year for Democrats) won't necessarily tell us much about 2028.

[GAinDC]

Given the previous four midterms before 2022, it was still a massive overperformance of expectations for Democrats. Many expected Republicans to gain four Senate seats and get close to 240 House seats. It didn't end up being very predicative of 2024 (in the same way that 2010 didn't mean much for 2012), although Democrats still did a bit better downballot, so it might've suggested that the party as a whole isn't as unpopular as Biden. Though it is interesting that one of the states in which Democrats performed best in 2022 (Pennsylvania) was a trainwreck for them this year.

I guess it just goes to show that 2026 (which I think is likely to be a very good year for Democrats) won't necessarily tell us much about 2028.

My prediction is a really good cycle for Dems in 2026, followed by a much more competitive one in 2028.

Or maybe an underwhelming performance for Dems in 2026 followed by a D blowout in 2028.

Who knows? lol

[Raccoon]

A factor people overlook is lack of low hanging fruit.. the gop just didn't have 40 to 60 seats they could gain in 2022...
Its why I think 2026 will be a relative blue ripple even if Democrats take the house.

The senate losses in 2018 way overshadowed just how big the dem wave in 2018 was.