Something is happening in the battle for control of Congress, and the left doesn't quite want to admit it. The confident talk from Democratic leaders sounds a lot like bravado — the kind you hear from someone holding a weaker hand than they're letting on. The redistricting wars just delivered a serious blow to their hopes, and the numbers don't lie. So the question isn't whether Democrats are worried. It's whether they can afford to pretend they're not.
It’s been a brutal week for the Democrats; the Virginia gerrymander crashed and burned in the state Supreme Court, just as Florida approved brand new maps favoring the GOP. Democrats gambled on winning the redistricting wars, and it’s not working out for them at all. And, it’s clearly changing momentum for the midterms.
But Democrats don’t want you to know that.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries went on MSNOW Saturday to calm the nerves of his caucus… and it was so desperately obvious he’s panicking. Speaking with Ali Velshi, he declared that Democrats are "going to take back control of the House of Representatives." Bold words. But bold words have a way of sounding hollow when the map keeps moving against you.
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Jeffries laid out his pitch for voters. "We're going to continue to make clear to the American people that we will lower their high cost of living, fix a broken health care system, and clean up the corruption that we're seeing in the country, in the Congress, certainly with the Supreme Court, and deal with the most corrupt administration in American history," Jeffries said. He also outlined a longer-term vision: "Which is why we have to take the House back, take the Senate back, keep pressing forward, and then in 2028, take the presidency back as well."
It's quite a pitch. There's just one problem — Democrats own the very failures they're promising to fix. Four years of Biden-era inflation exploded family budgets across America. The "broken health care system" Jeffries wants to repair is Obamacare, the signature Democratic achievement they spent a decade defending. And the corruption argument is a tough sell from a party that literally tried to put Joe Biden’s political rival in prison.
But I digress.
The redistricting situation tells you everything you need to know about where this fight actually stands. Republicans currently hold a slim majority — 217 seats to the Democrats' 212, with one independent who caucuses with the GOP and 5 seats vacant. That's razor-thin, and Democrats have been counting on the map to help them close that gap. Instead, the map has been closing against them.
Sabato's Crystal Ball, which is hardly a GOP-biased forecaster, just shifted a few races in favor of the GOP following the redistricting developments — giving Republicans a 211 to 208 advantage over the Democrats. There are 16 tossups, yes, but Republicans would only have to win seven of those seats to hold the majority. Very, very doable.
Prediction markets are also seeing a shift in momentum. Over at Kalshi, the odds that Republicans hold the Senate and hold the House have jumped roughly 10 points since last month. Democrats are still favored to win the House, but the margins are tightening.
Jeffries can go on MSNOW every weekend and pretend everything is just fine for the Democrats, but the fact is, they have lost the redistricting wars, and momentum is starting to work against them.
