Dem
51
GOP
49
On Monday, we had the DCCC's high-priority list of seats to defend. Those representatives will get extra money and support (unless they fall way behind in the polls, in which case they'll be put on an ice floe and allowed to drift off into the open ocean, so nature can take its course). On Tuesday, the NRCC released its list of high-priority targets. Whoever ends up as the GOP nominee for these seats will likewise get extra money and support (again, unless they fall behind in polls, or turn out to be some sort of nutter). We combined the two lists; an "X" in the "D" column means the seat is on the Democrats' defend list, and an "X" in the "R" column means the seat is on the Republicans' attack list:
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As you can see, the Republicans are currently more ambitious to the Democrats. The blue team's list has 29 seats on it, including just one (IL-13) that is not on the Republican list. The red team's list has 37 seats on it, including 9 that are not on the Democratic list. The lists will certainly evolve over the next year, but GOP leadership is making clear they want to be very, very aggressive and expand their House majority. And maybe it will work for them. Or maybe it won't. Everyone remembers what happened to Icarus when he flew too close to the sun, and some of the Republican targets are real longshots (e.g., Harder, Soto and Jackson, each of whom won in 2022 by a dozen points or more).
Eventually, the Democrats will release an "attack" list and the Republicans will release a "defense" list. But they have not done so yet. We wonder if the order in which these things are being announced says something about the cultures of the respective parties. (Z)