StephenCLE’s 2010 House Predictions – Part 11/March Ratings Update

So, after 50 states and 435 districts, we have reached the end of our first journey through the House of Representatives.  In this part, I will provide a summary of everything we’ve seen, and the total big board for 2010 will be unearthed.  But as we all know, things can change rather quickly in politics and virtually everything is fluid.  Indeed, it’s been almost a month and a half since I completed the first section of this series, and many of my ratings are no longer where I put them back then.  So in addition to providing the big board, I’ll have my first update of race ratings changes.  So this will essentially serve as a double post.

Here are the total # of seats I have in each rating category through part 10.  Note that all categories except for “Safe R” and “Safe D” are what I consider to be “On the board”.  Districts in italic text represent pickups.  At present, the national score is Republicans +20 seats.  The Democrats are forecast to pick up 5 seats (PA-6, MD-1, LA-2, IL-10, and CA-3).  The Republicans are forecast to pick up 25 seats (NH-1, NY-24, NY-29, MD-1, PA-11, VA-2, VA-5, TN-4, TN-6, TN-8, MI-7, IN-8, OH-1, AL-2, MS-1, LA-3, TX-17, AR-1, AR-2, IA-3, KS-3, CO-4, NV-3, ID-1, and WA-3).

2010 Big Board:

Safe Dem – 161 seats

Likely Dem – 41 seats

CA-36 (Harman)

CA-47 (Sanchez)

HI-1 (Open)

CO-3 (Salazar)

CO-7 (Perlmutter)

NM-1 (Heinrich)

AZ-1 (Kirkpatrick)

AZ-8 (Giffords)

NV-1 (Berkley)

OR-5 (Schrader)

SD-1 (Herseth-Sandlin)

IL-8 (Bean)

IL-11 (Halvorson)

WI-7 (Obey)

MN-1 (Walz)

MS-4 (Taylor)

LA-2 (Cao)

TX-23 (Rodriguez)

TX-27 (Ortiz)

IN-2 (Donnelly)

OH-6 (Wilson)

OH-10 (Kucinich)

SC-5 (Spratt)

GA-2 (Bishop)

FL-2 (Boyd)

VA-11 (Connolly)

KY-3 (Yarmuth)

NC-11 (Shuler)

NJ-12 (Holt)

DE-1 (Open)

PA-3 (Dahlkemper)

PA-4 (Altmire)

PA-17 (Holden)

MA-4 (Frank)

MA-10 (Open)

RI-1 (Open)

CT-4 (Himes)

NY-4 (McCarthy)

NY-13 (McMahon)

NY-20 (Murphy)

NY-25 (Maffei)

Lean Dem – 24 seats

CA-11 (McNerney)

AZ-5 (Mitchell)

MO-4 (Skelton)

ND-1 (Pomeroy)

IL-14 (Foster)

WI-8 (Kagen)

MI-9 (Peters)

OH-13 (Sutton)

OH-16 (Boccieri)

OH-18 (Space)

GA-8 (Marshall)

FL-8 (Grayson)

FL-24 (Kosmas)

VA-9 (Boucher)

WV-1 (Mollohan)

KY-6 (Chandler)

NC-8 (Kissell)

NJ-3 (Adler)

PA-8 (Murphy)

PA-10 (Carney)

ME-1 (Pingree)

NH-2 (Open)

CT-5 (Murphy)

NY-1 (Bishop)

Toss Up – 31 seats

CA-3 (Lungren)

CO-4 (Markey)

NM-2 (Teague)

NV-3 (Titus)

ID-1 (Minnick)

WA-3 (Open)

WA-8 (Reichert)

IA-3 (Boswell)

AR-1 (Open)

IL-10 (Open)

MS-1 (Childers)

TX-17 (Edwards)

IN-9 (Hill)

MI-7 (Schauer)

OH-1 (Driehaus)

OH-15 (Kilroy)

FL-22 (Klein)

VA-2 (Nye)

VA-5 (Perriello)

TN-4 (Davis)

TN-8 (Open)

MD-1 (Kratovil)

PA-6 (Gerlach)

PA-7 (Open)

PA-11 (Kanjorski)

PA-12 (Open)

NH-1 (Shea-Porter)

NY-19 (Hall)

NY-23 (Owens)

NY-24 (Arcuri)

NY-29 (Open)

Lean Rep – 14 seats

AZ-3 (Open)

KS-3 (Open)

NE-2 (Terry)

MN-6 (Bachmann)

AL-2 (Bright)

LA-3 (Open)

IN-8 (Open)

OH-2 (Schmidt)

OH-12 (Tiberi)

SC-2 (Wilson)

FL-10 (Young)

FL-12 (Open)

FL-25 (Open)

PA-15 (Dent)

Likely Rep – 24 seats

CA-19 (Open)

CA-25 (McKeon)

CA-44 (Calvert)

CA-45 (Bono Mack)

CA-48 (Campbell)

CA-50 (Bilbray)

AK-1 (Young)

MO-8 (Emerson)

AR-2 (Open)

KS-2 (Jenkins)

KS-4 (Open)

IL-13 (Biggert)

MN-3 (Paulsen)

AL-3 (Rogers)

AL-5 (Griffith)

TX-32 (Sessions)

MI-3 (Open)

MI-11 (McCotter)

SC-1 (Open)

VA-1 (Wittman)

KY-2 (Guthrie)

TN-6 (Open)

NJ-7 (Lance)

NY-26 (Lee)

Solid Rep – 140 seats

If you do the math, the Republicans currently have 178 seats on their side of the ledger, meaning that the Democrats would need to sweep all the toss ups to retain their current amount of 257 seats.  Either that, or they would have to pick up some seats from the Republican side of the ledger in exchange for losing some toss ups.  Obviously, the chances of Democrats retaining a 257 seat majority is very minute.   On the flip side, if the Democrats were to lose all 31 toss up seats, they would be dropped to 226 seats to the Republicans’ 209, meaning that they Republicans would still need to pick off 9 seats on the Democratic side of the ledger while losing none of their own in order to regain the House majority.  My gut instinct tells me that this outcome isn’t very likely either.

The point is that even in a situation where a vast majority of the toss ups break one way or the other, the balance of power in the House is not likely to change all that much except perhaps on major/controversial legislation such as health care reform.

Changing gears now, here is the list of ratings changes that I’m making for the second half of February/first half of March:

New York-29 – from Toss Up to Lean Republican

Utah-2 – from Safe Democrat to Likely Democrat

Ohio-13 – from Lean Democrat to Likely Democrat

Kansas-3 – from Lean Republican to Likely Republican

Florida-10 – from Lean Republican to Likely Republican

Alabama-2 – from Lean Republican to Toss Up

North Carolina-8 – from Lean Democrat to Likely Democrat

New Hampshire-2 – from Lean Democrat to Toss Up

Massachusetts-10 – from Likely Democrat to Lean Democrat

New York-13 – from Likely Democrat to Lean Democrat

Florida-8 – from Lean Democrat to Toss Up

Explanations – NY-29 & MA-10 have opened up since the time we last ran through those districts, as Eric Massa and William Delahunt have moved on.  NY-29 now looks like a good pickup opportunity for Team Red, and though they are also optimistic about MA-10, I give pause there because of how dominant the democrats have been in congressional elections there outside of Scott Brown’s shocking upset win for Senate two months ago.  AL-2 produced a shockingly good poll result for Bobby Bright a few weeks ago, so that rating changes in the democratic direction.  However, I’m not willing to pull the seat back into democratic control without some corroborating evidence.  North Carolina-8 also produced some strong polling for Larry Kissell, changing its rating.  

With it looking more likely that Charlie Justice just doesn’t have it, and that Bill Young is sticking around, FL-10 moves in the republican direction.  The democrats still don’t have a qualified challenger in KS-3, so that one moves right.  I think I overreacted somewhat upon hearing about Tom Ganley’s entry into the OH-13 race, really I don’t think an incumbent as popular as Betty Sutton , in a district this democratic has much to worry about.  With the virtual certainty that Mike McMahon will lose the WFP ballot line in his November race, the chance of a republican pickup there increases marginally.  In NH-2, the odds are growing that Charlie Bass will win the republican primary, increasing the chances of a pickup there, though I’m not moving the seat yet.  It’s becoming increasingly obvious that Alan Grayson won’t be able to stay out of the news, or stop saying controversial things before November.  I’m starting to fear that independents could turn against him en masse, and a right-wing Some Dude could pull off an upset, so his race is now a Toss Up.  

And lastly, a procedural move in UT-2.  As a rule, I always keep on the board races in which the incumbent is in a district that (according to the PVI) favors the opposing party by +10 points or more.  According to that standard, Jim Matheson’s race is now Likely D.  If you were wondering why I have Gene Taylor’s MS-4 on the Big Board, that’s the reason.  

For now, I’m not going to flip any seats from one party to another, so the score remains Republicans +20.  There were some seats I considered changing, but I’ll leave them be for now, especially with health care reform on the precipice of passing, which could change the dynamics of a LOT of races.  Beginning in April I will be updating the national score twice a month, and then I’ll probably do it once a week in the final 4-5 weeks before the election.

And so, the journey begins…