The likelihood of Democrats winning the House and the Senate has climbed to an all-time high at 70%, a more than nine percentage point increase from one month ago, according to Kalshi’s event contract on the balance of power in Congress.
The second most likely outcome at 27% is a split in Congress with Democrats taking the House and Republicans retaining the Senate. Meanwhile, a Republican sweep has a 6% chance.
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On Saturday, elections analyst Nate Silver updated his midterm forecast, showing Democrats leading by 9.1 percentage points on the generic ballot, 52.4% to 43.3%. “Democrats remain overwhelming favorites to retake the House and are also clearly favored in the Senate, especially given their excellent state-level polls over the past couple days,” said Silver.
Surging in enthusiasm
“Across the country, in blue states and red, in marquee races and down-ballot contests, Republicans are confronting an unsettling reality: Democrats are showing a surge in enthusiasm their own party has struggled to match,” CNN reported on Friday.
Of the 53.9 million registered voters who cast early ballots by mail or in person, 46% were Democrats and 35% were Republicans, according to NBC News citing data provided by TargetSmart.
“Perhaps the clearest evidence of the enthusiasm gap presenting itself at the ballot box so far is Democrats’ success turning out voters who might otherwise sit out a midterm election,” CNN continued. “In Kansas and North Carolina, for example, Democrats have opened large leads among voters who didn’t vote in one or both of the last two elections.”
Facing a worse position
Politico said in a Friday report, “Top GOP officials and lawmakers have long known the political landscape would be bad, amid voter anger over the cost of living and aspects of Trump’s policy agenda. But they’re facing a worse position than they expected.”
Republicans are concerned young men who voted for Trump, including white and Hispanic working class voters, will skip the election in part due to “disillusionment with high costs and the Iran war,” per Politico. “That alone could allow Democrats to overperform in some areas after they hemorrhaged support among that voting bloc in 2024.”
Chris Matthews, a political commentator and former presidential speechwriter, told The Guardian in a Sunday report, “It’s much more macro than Maga. No matter what he [Trump] does for Maga people, the power of macroeconomics is much stronger and people are going to vote against him.”
Midterm elections are often viewed as a referendum on the sitting president’s performance: Odds of a Democratic sweep in Congress rising to an all-time high come after President Donald Trump received “the lowest approval rating for any president before a midterm election since Harry Truman and the Democrats were routed in 1946 at the dawn of modern polling,” The New York Times reported earlier this month.
Democrats have a 93.2% chance of winning control of the House, and for the Senate, the party is favored to win with an odds of 71%. In the Senate races for Texas, Michigan, Maine, and Ohio, the Democratic candidate leads against the respective Republican opponent, according to Kalshi’s event contracts.
The takeaway:
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