While most national attention is on the top-of-the-ticket race between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, control of Congress will be equally consequential.
Republicans currently hold a narrow majority of eight seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, meaning they can only spare three defections on big votes. Democrats, with four independents, hold a one-seat majority in the Senate and the tie-breaking vote.
While Republicans are favored to reclaim the Senate, the fate of the House remains more uncertain.
Whoever is president will need full control of Congress to get much done.
House Republicans seek to grow their thin, ideologically divided majority, and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has indicated his intention to seek reelection as speaker.
Democrats are seeking to reclaim the majority, which they controlled from 2019 to 2023, and to place House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) in the speaker’s chair.
Of the 435 House races, there are around two dozen that are expected to ultimately determine control of the House of Representatives in the 119th Congress.
New York
Republican control of the House is largely due to the party’s victories in New York state in 2022, when several Republicans won districts that had voted for Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden just two years prior.While the expected red wave didn’t fully materialize nationwide, there was a notable Republican surge in New York state.
The most surprising win was Rep. Mike Lawler’s (R-N.Y.) defeat of incumbent Rep. Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.), the then-chair of the Democrats’ House campaign arm.
Lawler, whose district lies just north of New York City, won by a 0.6 percent margin in an upset that shocked even bullish Republicans.
This year, Lawler is leading his Democratic opponent, Mondaire Jones, by just one point, an Oct. 3 Emerson College poll shows.
Meanwhile, Reps. Marc Molinaro (R-N.Y.) and Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y.)—both of whom represent Biden-voting districts—are also seeking to hold on to their closely contested seats.
Molinaro won by just around a 1.6 percent margin, while D’Esposito enjoyed a more comfortable 3.6 percent.
Current polling results for both candidates lie in the margin of error: The most recent polling of each race has each trailing the Democratic candidate by three points.
However, earlier polling showed D’Esposito in a stronger position, leading by six points.
Although the results in 2022 suggested New York state could be trending Republican, it remains to be seen if the party can maintain that momentum in 2024.
California
Equally important to Republicans’ narrow reclamation of the House in 2022 was California, where Republicans also made gains in districts outside of the blue strongholds that dot the state’s coast.
Now, several GOP incumbents face tight reelection battles to hold on to those districts.
Five California Republicans—Reps. John Duarte, David Valadao, Mike Garcia, Ken Calvert, and Michelle Steel—are in extremely close races. All but one of these districts voted for Biden in 2020, highlighting their competitive nature.
Duarte narrowly won his central California seat in 2022 with 50.2 percent to his Democratic opponent’s 49.8 percent, a difference of just 0.4 percent. Polling this cycle shows them neck and neck, with the latest poll giving the Democrat a one-point edge.
Valadao, who won by a three-point margin in 2022, faces a much closer race this time, with recent polling showing the race tied.
Garcia won by 6.4 points last cycle, but polling shows him trailing by two points in his northern Los Angeles district.
Calvert and Steel both won by more than four points in 2022. This time around, Steel is again ahead by four points, while Calvert is tied with his Democratic opponent.
Holding these seats is vital for the Republicans to maintain or grow their House majority in 2024.
Rust Belt
While Republicans may be on the defensive in blue strongholds like New York state and California, Democrats are similarly on the defensive in two of this election’s most crucial states: Michigan and Pennsylvania.At the presidential level, these two states are expected to play a huge role in determining the ultimate victor in the election.
These states, along with Wisconsin, were once known as the “Blue Wall” for their pattern of backing Democrats. They long formed the backbone of the Democrats’ electoral strategy.
Since Trump, however, Republicans have seen a resurgence in the region as its many white working-class voters move over to the GOP camp.
In both 2016 and 2020, these three states, particularly Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, were decided by razor-thin margins.
In Michigan—generally considered the most liberal of the three—Republicans are vying to flip control of two open seats abandoned by Reps. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) and Dan Kildee (D-Mich.).
While Slotkin won by 5 percent in 2022 and Kildee won by 10 percent, polling shows that the two races are on track to be far more competitive this time.
Republicans lead by four points in Slotkin’s 7th Congressional District, according to polling from early October, and by a single point margin in Kildee’s 8th Congressional District, according to polling from the beginning of August.
Picking up one or both of these seats would represent a major gain for Republicans, who stand to benefit from the loss of the two Democratic incumbents.
Over in Pennsylvania, considered the most consequential swing state this cycle, Reps. Susan Wild (D-Pa.) and Matt Cartwright (D-Pa.) are seeking to hold their seats.
Wild, representing Allentown and its environs, won by a narrow two-point margin in 2022.
Recent polling suggests she’s on track to hold the seat. The most recent poll, which ended Oct. 3, found a six-point lead for Wild.
Arizona
Arizona, another battleground state, is home to some of the most contested races in the 2024 cycle.Two Republican incumbents, Reps. David Schweikert (R-Ariz.) and Juan Ciscomani (R-Ariz.), face tough reelections in districts that narrowly voted for Biden in 2020.
Schweikert won his 1st Congressional District seat in 2022 by less than 1 percent of the vote after the district backed Biden by 1.5 percent in 2020.
Polling shows a slight edge for Democrats, who led by 1 percent in a poll that concluded on Aug. 13, though two earlier polls showed a tie. More recent polling isn’t available.
Ciscomani won his 6th District seat by similarly thin margins in 2022, securing 50 percent to Democrats’ 49 percent. Like Schweikert, his district backed Biden in 2020 by around 1.1 percent.
There’s no recent polling available for Ciscomani’s race.
Iowa
Once considered the quintessential swing state, along with Ohio, Iowa has become vastly more favorable to Republicans over the past decade.In 2016 and 2020, Trump won the state’s six electoral votes by a nearly double-digit margin. He’s expected to emulate the result in 2024.
Some House races in the state, however, are expected to be much closer, with Reps. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa) and Zach Nunn (R-Iowa) facing tough reelection bids.
While Miller-Meeks won by a seven-point margin in 2022, polling conducted in August and September shows the race for Iowa’s 1st Congressional District to be a dead heat this cycle, with the most recent poll showing a four-point edge for Democrats.
Nunn, meanwhile, represents much of central southern Iowa.
In 2022, Nunn won his bid by less than 1 percent.
September polling shows between a three- and four-point lead for Democrats, though earlier polling found a tie.
While the state’s vote at the presidential level is almost certain to favor Trump, the loss of either of these House seats would represent a huge blow to Republicans.
Nebraska’s 2nd District
Finally, Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) is facing the political fight of his life in his blue-trending 2nd District, which encompasses large swaths of Omaha and its suburbs.In 2020, the district backed Biden by 6.6 percent. Two years later, Bacon was able to fend off a challenge from Democrat Tony Vargas, winning 51 percent to Vargas’s 48 percent.
Things look tighter this time in the district, with recent polling showing a consistent lead for Vargas, who’s running again.
Like other Republicans in blue-heavy districts, Bacon has sought to distance himself from his party’s conservative flank, a posture that assisted his reelection bid in 2022.
Still, the district has veered left in recent years.
Despite Bacon’s past victories, this race is expected to come down to the wire, particularly as polls show a consistent lead for Harris at the presidential level.
Red-District Democrats
Several Democrats currently represent otherwise red districts that voted for Trump in 2020.Rep. Mary Peltola’s (D-Alaska) surprise victory in Alaska’s 2022 special election was a significant political upset in a state that has voted for a Democrat at the presidential level only once, in 1964, since it joined the United States in 1959.
Republicans attributed her victory over former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin in large part to the state’s recently adopted ranked-choice voting system.
In the final round, Peltola won Alaska’s sole House seat by a 10 percent margin.
Republicans hope the seat will be a pickup this time due to Alaska’s deep Republican roots.
Recent polling sponsored by Republican contender Nick Begich shows a close race, with one poll showing a one-point lead for Peltola, while a more recent poll found a four-point lead for Begich.
In spite of the state’s GOP heritage, ranked-choice voting makes it harder to predict the final outcome.
Still, Republicans are unified behind Begich this time, increasing their odds of reclaiming the seat.
Just south of the Last Frontier, Republicans also see a pickup opportunity in Washington’s 3rd Congressional District.
The ancestrally red district was flipped in 2022 by Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-Wash.), who defeated Joe Kent by less than 1 percent in 2022.
Current polling places the race, again between Perez and Kent, in a dead heat.
Finally, Republicans also see a strong pickup opportunity in Maine’s 2nd Congressional District, currently represented by Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine).
Golden’s district, encompassing the northeastern border with Canada, is overwhelmingly rural.
In 2020, it backed Trump by seven points. Golden himself is one of the most conservative Democrats: He’s a proponent of gun rights and has sought to distance himself from Harris, refusing to endorse her presidential bid.
Still, the most recent polling of the district shows that he’s trailing his Republican challenger by three points. With the district’s strong GOP leanings, Republicans seem well-positioned to take the seat.
