Control of House of Representatives shaping as a “toss up”

WASHINGTON (Gray DC) - The House of Representatives is up for grabs November 5th.

Republicans current razor-thin majority is at risk when voters head to the polls on Election Day.

The non-partisan Cook Political Report believes the current situation in the House of Representatives gives Democrats an opening.

“Republicans have an incredibly narrow control of the House right now,” Cook Political House Editor Erin Covey said. “They only hold four seats, so Democrats would only need to net four seats to win control of the House in 2025.”

But can they do it?

A party needs to control 218 of the 435 seats in the House to control the chamber.

Cook’s model points to the 26 races they deem as true “toss ups” as the key.

“The bulk of it is made up of Republicans who are defending seats that Biden won in 2020,” Covey said. “A lot of those seats are in New York, California, and then we have Democrats who are also defending seats that Trump won, or Biden narrowly won that are also quite vulnerable.”

Covey said it will likely come down to Republicans ability to hold onto areas in California and New York where they overperformed their historical outcomes in 2022.

“So there’s seats on Long Island that Biden won by double digits for example that Republicans were able to flip in 2022, and now Democrats are hoping to flip them back.”

The party that wins the White House will have an advantage in the House.

In 2020, voters in only 16 districts elected a different party’s Congressional candidate than presidential candidate.

“Most folks don’t know who represents them in Congress," Covey said. “And so they’re just voting down the party line. So it’s really difficult for a member of the House to differentiate themselves from the national party.”

The winning party’s majority in Congress has shrunk every year since 2015.

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