Heard on the Hill
Decision Day 2022
“It is almost certain Republicans will take the House, and the likelihood of Republicans taking the Senate was already high and is getting even higher.”
- Charlie Cook, Total Spectrum Spotlight interview of June 1, 2022
National Republicans are going into the last two weeks of the campaign feeling good and sensing that the political winds are at their back.
Republicans started the 2021-2022 cycle with high expectations. The first off-year Congressional election after a Presidential victory is traditionally good for the party out of power. The real question has been how good it may turn out to be.
Momentum was building for Republicans, but the Supreme Court’s June reversal of Roe vs. Wade brought that momentum to a halt. The ruling gave new energy to Democrats and pro-choice Americans, and caught Republicans and members of the pro-life community without a clear message or a coordinated plan.
Since Labor Day, momentum has swung back to Republicans. Part of the problem for Democrat incumbents and challengers is that they are running while President Biden’s popularity is under 50%. But the biggest problem for Democrats is that America’s mood has turned sour.
The stock market is down, the economy is cooling off, interest rates are jumping up, and most experts predict a recession next year. Housing starts have historically been an excellent barometer of the economy because it is a leading indicator: one of the first sectors to slow down before a recession and one of the first to pick up steam on the other side. Housing starts in the U.S. slumped 8.1% last month.
Inflation is the worst economic problem because it impacts everyone and almost everything. My accountant and financial advisor explained it to me this way. “Use 100 as a base. Divide 100 by 12, which gives you 8.33 – which means that you spend an average of 8.33% of your annual income each month. If inflation is at least 8.33%, that means inflation is costing people one month of income each year. Many people are going to be looking for their wages to increase to make up for that loss, and those wage increases will be passed on by companies to their customers and consumers – so the cycle continues.”
A CNN poll released on October 12th showed that 78% of Americans thought our economy was either somewhat poor or very poor. NBC News released a poll on October 23rd which showed that 71% of Americans think America is on the wrong track.
Add a huge spike in crime and a significant increase in illegal immigration to the economic problems and it’s no wonder Americans are feeling sour.
Republicans are seeing red
I started my career in politics 44 years ago, and I remember when candidates won by big margins. Blowouts are now mostly a thing of the past because of our polarized society. We’re equally divided between Republicans and Democrats, so turnout and independents have an oversized hand in picking the winner. As Charlie Cook said in his Spotlight interview, most campaigns are now won with narrow margins “because our divided country guarantees high floors and low ceilings.”
Almost every reasonable political observer has predicted that Republicans will likely take back the House next month. The parlor game in Washington, D.C. has been to guess how big the House majority will be. The bigger the majority the better chance Republicans will have to govern effectively.
Leader McConnell said recently that Republicans have a 50-50 chance of retaking the Senate. The battlegrounds are in seven states: Arizona, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Nevada, and Georgia.
Republicans need to reelect Senator Ron Johnson in Wisconsin, elect Congressman Ted Budd to replace the retiring Senator Richard Burr in North Carolina, and elect Dr. Mehmet Oz in Pennsylvania to replace the retiring Senator Patrick Toomey. Holding those three seats would assure Republicans of at least retaining a 50-50 Senate.
Now the challengers: Blake Masters is challenging Senator Mark Kelly in Arizona, Adam Laxalt is challenging Senator Catherine Cortez Masto in Nevada, and Herschel Walker is challenging Senator Raphael Warnock in Georgia.
Each of these seven races are very close and within the margin of error. We have nationalized much of the content and direction of senatorial and congressional campaigns, so if this is truly going to be a wave election, it makes sense that most of these seven races will be won by Republicans.
Pollsters and strategists watch the ‘generic question’ in polls (“are you inclined to support a generic republican or a generic democratic in this election”) to measure waves – which is why last week’s poll from the New York Times/Siena College got everyone’s attention. Their September poll showed that generic Democratic candidates had a one-point advantage over Republicans among likely voters. But the same poll released on October 17th gave Republicans an edge among likely voters of over four points on enthusiasm – 49% to 45% – a five-point turnaround.
Another way to determine the possibility of a potential wave is to gauge the intensity of interest in the election, and that’s off the charts. An October 23 NBC News poll showed “…70% of all registered voters expressing high interest in the election… the highest percentage ever in the survey for a midterm election at this same point in time.” By party, “78% of Republicans have a high interest in the midterms, compared with 69% of Democrats.”
Anything can happen in two weeks, but the conditions seem to be coming together for a red wave.
