Where The 2018 Democratic Advantage Came From: 2016 Nonvoters Higher Turnout By Clinton Voters And Vote Switching
Midterm elections consistently experience lower turnout than presidential elections. Yet while the 2018 turnout of 49% did not match turnout in the 2016 presidential election , it was far higher than usual. Midway through President Trump’s first term in office, both Democrats and Republicans were energized. A large majority of people who voted in 2016 also voted in 2018. But somewhat more of Clinton’s 2016 voters than Trump’s 2016 voters turned out in 2018. Overwhelming majorities of both Trump’s and Clinton’s 2016 voters remained loyal to their respective parties in their 2018 U.S. House vote, though Clinton’s 2016 voters who turned out in 2018 were slightly more loyal to Democratic 2018 candidates than Trump’s 2016 voters were to 2018 GOP candidates . Among the share who voted for someone other than Trump or Clinton in 2016, 71% voted in 2018. These voters favored Democratic candidates over Republican candidates by a margin of 49% to 37%.
Voters in 2018 who did not vote in 2016 were a small group but an important part of why the Democratic Party made gains. Among the 2016 nonvoters who voted in 2018, Democratic House candidates led Republican House candidates by a more than a two-to-one margin.
Of everyone eligible by citizenship and age to vote in 2018, 44% voted in both the 2016 and 2018 elections; 36% voted in neither; 14% were drop-off voters and a small share were new voters – voting in 2018 but not in 2016.
Already A Strong Democratic Group Those Unaffiliated With A Religious Tradition Became More So
In 2018, voters were highly politically polarized by religious affiliation and attendance at worship services, as they have been for many years in the U.S. Solid majorities of Protestants supported Republican candidates in 2018, while Catholics were more divided and the less religious were strongly Democratic in their votes.
The Republican Party’s most supportive demographic group were White evangelical Protestants . This margin was very similar to 2016 . A sizable majority of White Catholics also supported Republicans , with White non-evangelical Protestants close behind .
Unaffiliated voters – and especially atheists and agnostics – were even more supportive of Democratic candidates in 2018 than they had been of Hillary Clinton, with at least some of the change coming from those who had supported Gary Johnson or Jill Stein in 2016. The margins among voters who describe their religious affiliation as “nothing in particular” were fairly similar in 2016 and 2018. Atheists supported Democratic candidates by an overwhelming 88% to 9% margin, rivaling Black support for the Democrats. Agnostics were not far behind, supporting Democratic candidates by a 79% to 18% margin.
Us Midterms 2018: Democrats Won The House Republicans Kept The Senate Sessions Is Out What Now
This article was published more than 2 years ago. Some information in it may no longer be current.
At New York’s La Boom nightclub, Mazeda Uddin and Marta Cualotuna celebratre the victory of Democrat Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, the youngest woman ever elected to Congress. She was one of several female Democrats to make gains in the House of Representatives on Wednesday night.
The new balance of power • Winners, losers and toss-ups • Trouble at the polls • Trump’s reaction • What happens now? •
‘the Beast Is Growing’: Republicans Follow A Winning At All Costs Strategy Into The Midterms
Much remains uncertain about the midterm elections more than a year away — including the congressional districts themselves, thanks to the delayed redistricting process. The Senate, meanwhile, looks like more of a toss-up.
House Democrats think voters will reward them for advancing President Joe Biden’s generally popular agenda, which involves showering infrastructure money on virtually every district in the country and sending checks directly to millions of parents. And they think voters will punish Republicans for their rhetoric about the Covid-19 pandemic and the 2020 election.
“Democrats are delivering results, bringing back the economy, getting people back to work, passing the largest middle-class tax cut in history, while Republicans are engaged in frankly violent conspiracy theory rhetoric around lies in service of Donald Trump,” said Tim Persico, executive director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
But the challenges Democrats face are real and numerous.
They knew they would face a tough 2022 immediately after 2020, when massive, unexpected GOP gains whittled the Democratic majority to just a handful of seats.
“House Republicans are in a great position to retake the majority,” said Rep. Tom Emmer, R-Minn., who chairs the National Republican Congressional Committee, “but we are taking nothing for granted.”
His rural district had been trending Republican for years. Kind won re-election last year by just about 10,000 votes.
The Gop Has Yet To Land A Single Top Recruit To Run For The Senate Anywhere In The Country
The surest way that Republicans can stop whatever legislative agenda President Biden has in mind after the 2022 midterm elections is to win a majority in the US Senate.
Even more than the House, a simple majority in the Senate could let Republicans gum up everything from gun control legislation to Supreme Court nominations.
On paper, it seems easy enough. Republicans need to win just a single seat in order to flip the 50-50 Senate and possibilities for doing so are all over the map. Given that midterm elections often benefit the party out of power, and Democrats control two out of three levers of the federal government, Republicans wouldn’t be overly optimistic in assuming Mitch McConnell might soon rule the Senate again.
But here is the thing about the GOP’s chances: At this early stage, they are having problems getting good candidates to sign up. And while the historical trends look good for Republicans you can’t win something with nothing.
Republicans have yet to land a single top recruit to run for the Senate anywhere in the country — even in places where they have an opportunity to flip a seat — and a good candidate could make all the difference.
In Nevada, Republicans are pinning their hopes on getting former state attorney general Adam Laxalt in the race to challenge Masto, who won in 2016 by just 3 percentage points. So far, Laxalt has not announced plans to run and he comes with baggage: he lost a bid for governor in 2018.
Renewable Energy And Health Care Among The Sectors That Could Get Shakeup Due To Midterms
The 2022 midterm elections are already affecting Washington, and the results could shake up sectors such as renewable energy, health care and finance.
As Democrats in Washington work to deliver on infrastructure spending and other priorities, they’re trying to make progress in large part because of a key event that’s still more than a year away.
That event is the midterm elections on Nov. 8, 2022, when Republicans will aim to take back control of the House and Senate and become a more powerful check on the priorities of President Joe Biden and his fellow Democrats.
“What leaders are thinking about, particularly since we have unified party control, is that these midterm elections are inevitably a referendum on the governing party,” said Sarah Binder, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution and a professor of political science at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
“In that sense, shrinking time coupled with ‘What is it that Democrats want to run on?’ — it adds pressure on Democrats to get their priorities through the door.”
Time is growing short, Binder said, because party leaders often avoid making their members vote on tough issues in the same calendar year as an election, since that can hurt incumbents in tight races. “Party leaders often think primarily about what they can get done in the first year of a Congress, as opposed to counting on the second year,” she said.
Sectors that could win or lose
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Races worth watching
Who Won The Midterms Donald Trump Democrats Both Claim Victory In Contentious Elections
Democrats, Republicans and the president all claimed victory after Tuesday’s midterm elections, despite each coupling victories with some big losses.
Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, who is expected to make a play to retake the House majority leader role, celebrated her victory and that of Democrats for winning back the House.
“Tomorrow will be a new day in America,” Pelosi told supporters at a party after it became clear that Democrats would wrangle back the House from Republicans for the first time since 2010. Pelosi said the country wanted “peace,” and that the election was about “restoring the Constitution’s checks and balances to the Trump administration” while defending citizens’ health care.
Winning back the House affords Pelosi and Democrats the ability to investigate the Trump administration and potentially hold back the president’s most aggressive policies on immigration, such as building his proposed border wall.
On the other side, President Donald Trump declared the midterms a resounding victory for Republicans, who strengthened their hold on the Senate.
“Tremendous success tonight. Thank you to all!” Trump tweeted late Tuesday evening.
Tremendous success tonight. Thank you to all!
— Donald J. Trump November 7, 2018
Early Wednesday morning, Trump proclaimed a “Big Victory” and said he received calls of congratulations, including from foreign leaders.
Rising Violent Crime Is Likely To Present A Political Challenge For Democrats In 2022
But there are roadblocks to fully enacting Democrats’ agenda. Their thin majorities in both chambers of Congress mean nearly all Democrats have to get on board with every agenda item in order to push through major legislative priorities. And without adjusting or eliminating the legislative filibuster in the Senate, Democrats need 10 Republicans to join them for various legislation — a near-impossible task.
The Justice Department Puts States On Notice About Election Audits And Voting Changes
“If they’re going to try to rely on rigging this game, because they don’t have a plan for the future and they can’t talk to the voters about their ideas and their vision, well, I think that makes me proud to be a Democrat.”
Maloney also posits that GOP turnout will be depressed in an election that doesn’t feature former President Donald Trump himself.
“There’s no evidence that this toxic Trump message will motivate voters without Trump on the ballot,” he says. “If the other side is making one big mistake, I think that might be it, which is a doubling down on this toxic Trump message of division and anger and racism and yet there’s no evidence they can pull out voters with the message without the messenger.”
He points to Texas Republican Jake Ellzey as a recent example. Ellzey was sworn in to the House on Friday, days after winning a special election that saw him defeat a Trump-backed candidate.
Maloney underscores: “It seems like the Trump endorsement’s not what it used to be.”
Here are more highlights from his conversation with NPR’s Susan Davis.
On polarization in Congress:
On the Republican Party:
On his own reelection in 2022:
Republicans ‘won’ The Midterm Elections Nearly Half Of Gop Respondents Say In Poll
U.S.RepublicansElectionsGOPPoll
Most political observers would call the 2018 midterm elections a victory for the Democrats. But most Republicans would disagree.
A poll from YouGov/The Economist, released Wednesday, asked: “From what you know now, which party did better, or ‘won,’ the midterm elections?” Respondents were able to choose among the Republican Party, the Democratic Party, “about the same” and “not sure.”
A plurality of Republican respondents—46 percent—said the GOP won the 2018 midterms. Just 18 percent said Democrats won. Twenty-nine percent said “about the same” and 6 percent were not sure.
Among Democrats, the numbers were predictably different. Seventy percent of Democratic respondents said they thought their party won while just 5 percent said the GOP won. Sixteen percent of Democratic respondents said the results were “about the same” for both parties and 9 percent were not sure.
Among all respondents, 40 percent said the Democratic Party won, 18 percent said the Republican Party, 27 percent said “about the same” and 16 percent were not sure.
The poll from YouGov/The Economist surveyed 1,500 U.S. adults from November 11 through November 13. It had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
How Will We Determine Whether Republicans Or Democrats Won The Midterm Elections
One of the many ways midterm elections are different from presidential elections is that there’s an element of subjectivity to determining which party won. In a presidential election year, whichever party captures the White House is seen as the winner, but in a midterm election cycle, it isn’t as clear — a lot depends on the context and on expectations.
In 1998, for instance, Republicans maintained control of both chambers of Congress, losing just five seats in the House to Democrats. If that were to happen this year, it would be considered an incredible triumph for Republicans. But 1998 was the sixth year of Bill Clinton’s presidency, an election cycle typically associated with major gains for the opposition party — and that year, Clinton was enduring the fallout from the revelation of his lying about an affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. The GOP performance was seen as so dismal it helped force Newt Gingrich to resign as House Speaker.
As we look toward Tuesday’s elections, it’s worth setting down some markers, and exploring the question: How do we determine whether Republicans or Democrats won?
For instance, let’s say Democrats gain around 30 seats in the House, providing them with control of the chamber by a relatively narrow margin, but that Republicans add three seats in the Senate, to get to 54. Suddenly, that becomes a disappointing result for Democrats.
I Do Not Buy That A Social Media Ban Hurts Trumps 2024 Aspirations: Nate Silver
sarah: Yeah, Democrats might not have their worst Senate map in 2022, but it will by no means be easy, and how they fare will have a lot to do with the national environment. And as we touched on earlier, Biden’s overall approval rating will also make a big difference in Democrats’ midterm chances.
nrakich: Yeah, if the national environment is even a bit Republican-leaning, that could be enough to allow solid Republican recruits to flip even Nevada and New Hampshire. And then it wouldn’t even matter if Democrats win Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
One thing is for sure, though — whichever party wins the Senate will have only a narrow majority, so I think we’re stuck in this era of moderates like Sens. Joe Manchin and Lisa Murkowski controlling every bill’s fate for at least a while longer.
sarah: Let’s talk about big picture strategy, then, and where that leaves us moving forward. It’s still early and far too easy to prescribe election narratives that aren’t grounded in anything, but one gambit the Republican Party seems to be making at this point is that attacking the Democratic Party for being too progressive or “woke” will help them win.
What do we make of that playbook headed into 2022? Likewise, as the party in charge, what are Democrats planning for?
With that being said, the GOP’s strategies could still gin up turnout among its base, in particular, but it’s hard to separate that from general dissatisfaction with Biden.
On The Eve Of Midterm Election Democrats Republicans Make Their Final Pitches
Speaking at a rally in Fort Wayne, Ind., Trump criticized Rep. Maxine Waters and, without offering evidence, said Democrats would allow immigrants to “overwhelm your schools, your hospitals and your communities” if the party took control of Congress.
At his final stop in Cape Girardeau, Mo., Trump showcased his close ties to Fox News personalities, giving Sean Hannity a live interview before the event, praising Laura Ingraham as she began her 10 p.m. show and calling Hannity and Jeanine Pirro to the stage to praise him. He said Democrats want to make the United States a “giant sanctuary for gang members and MS-13 killers,” referring to the criminal gang.
Trump’s final swing through Ohio, Indiana and Missouri focused on states that will be key to the new Senate majority. The president has acknowledged that Democrats could win the House, where they need a net gain of 23 seats. GOP officials and strategists voiced cautious optimism Monday about keeping the Senate, where Democrats need a net gain of two seats, but were less confident about keeping the Republican majority in the House.
At stake Tuesday is control of Congress, 36 governorships and hundreds of down-ballot races nationwide.
Both parties spent the day delivering their final message to voters and closely monitoring the handful of battleground races that will determine control of the House and Senate.
With no early-voting option in the state, the outcome will be decided by how voters feel Tuesday.
Cops Fired For Guarding Defund The Police Squad Member Without Permission
The House Democrat in charge of making sure the party retains control of the chamber after next year’s midterm elections is warning that a course correction is needed or they could find themselves the minority again — with current polling showing the Democrats would lose the majority if elections were held now.
Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, told a closed-door lunch last week that if the midterms were held now, Republicans would win control of the House, Politico reported Tuesday.
Maloney advised the gathering that Democrats have to embrace and promote President Biden’s agenda because it registers with swing voters.
“We are not afraid of this data … We’re not trying to hide this,” Tim Persico, executive director of the Maloney-chaired DCC, ?told Politico in an interview.
“If use it, we’re going to hold the House. That’s what this data tells us, but we gotta get in action,” ?Persico said.
M?aloney, in an interview with NPR, said ?issues like climate change, infrastructure, the expanded child tax credits, immigration policies and election reforms will attract voters next fall.
“We’re making a bet on substance,” Maloney said. “What’s the old saying — any jackass can kick down a barn, it takes a carpenter to build one. It’s harder to build it than to kick it down. And so we’re the party that’s going to build the future.”
M?aloney’s dire warning failed to surprise some Democrats who have been sounding similar alarms. ?
Democrats Got Millions More Votes So How Did Republicans Win The Senate
Senate electoral process means although Democrats received more overall votes for the Senate than Republicans, that does not translate to more seats
The 2018 midterm elections brought , who retook the House of Representatives and snatched several governorships from the grip of Republicans.
But some were left questioning why Democrats suffered a series of setbacks that prevented the party from picking up even more seats and, perhaps most consequentially, left the US Senate in Republican hands.
Among the most eye-catching was a statistic showing Democrats led Republicans by more than 12 million votes in Senate races, and yet still suffered losses on the night and failed to win a majority of seats in the chamber.
Constitutional experts said the discrepancy between votes cast and seats won was the result of misplaced ire that ignored the Senate electoral process.
Because each state gets two senators, irrespective of population, states such as Wyoming have as many seats as California, despite the latter having more than 60 times the population. The smaller states also tend to be the more rural, and rural areas traditionally favor Republicans.
This year, because Democrats were defending more seats, including California, they received more overall votes for the Senate than Republicans, but that does not translate to more seats.
However, some expressed frustration with a system they suggest gives an advantage to conservative-leaning states.
Midterm Elections: Democrats Win Control Of House In Blow To Trump Live
Here’s a summary of the big events of election day and the undecided races we are still closely watching.
- In the House, Democrats secured the 218 seats needed to regain control.
- Democrats won Republican-held seats in Colorado, Florida, Kansas, Minnesota, New York, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
- In the Senate, Republicans have expanded their majority, and Trump declared the night a “tremendous success”.
- Missouri Democratic senator Claire McCaskill lost to a Republican challenger.
- A Republican also ousted senator Joe Donnelly, Indiana’s only Democratic statewide officeholder.
- Republican senator Dean Heller also lost his seat in Nevada to a Democratic challenger.
- In the governor’s races, Democrats gained seven new seats.
- Andrew Gillum, Democratic candidate for governor in Florida, lost to Republican Ron DeSantis.
- The governor’s race in Georgia was too close to call, with Democrat Stacey Abrams saying she would not concede to Republican Brian Kemp, the state’s secretary of state. It could result in a runoff.
- A record number of women won races across the country, and candidates of color and LGBT people have also broken barriers.
- Voters passed ballot measures across the country with new laws on voting rights, marijuana, taxes and more.
‘democrats Won The House But Trump Won The Election’ And 2020 Is Next
The president came out fighting and experts agree he isn’t yet down for the count. The Democrats’ next choice will be vital
Last modified on Thu 7 Jan 2021 00.00 GMT
Rebuked if not repudiated by the American people, Donald Trump was asked an unexpected question.
“A lot of people are going to be rushing to Iowa, rushing to New Hampshire,” a reporter began. “You know that the Democrats are already looking ahead to 2020. Do you want to lock down your ticket right now, sir? Will the vice-president be your running mate in 2020?”
The president was surprised to be put on the spot.
“Well,” he said, “I haven’t asked him but I hope so.” He looked around the crowded East Room of the White House. “Where are you? Mike, will you be my running mate? Stand up, Mike, please. Raise your right hand.”
It was like an awkward, very public, wedding proposal. Mike Pence, hardly known for his joie de vivre, had to play along. As the room erupted in laughter, he mustered a smile, stood up and half-raised his hand.
Trump asked: “Will you? Thank you, OK good. The answer is ‘Yes’. OK?”
The on-the-hoof declaration at a typically helter-skelter press conference on Wednesday seemed as fitting a way as any to draw a line under the midterm elections and look ahead to the race for the presidency.
“That was unexpected,” Trump admitted. “But I feel very fine.”
. Democrats won the House of Representatives but Republicans tightened their grip on the Senate – as Trump tightened his grip on the party.
Trump Pick Wins Us House Special Republican Primary Election In Ohio
Vehicles are parked outside the U.S. Capitol building the morning the Senate returned to session in Washington, DC, U.S., July 31, 2021. REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz/File Photo
WASHINGTON, Aug 3 – Mike Carey, a coal lobbyist endorsed by former President Donald Trump, won a crowded primary contest on Tuesday for the Republican nomination to a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives from Ohio’s 15th district.
With 96.5% of precincts reporting, Carey was ahead of his closest contender, state representative Jeff LaRe, by 37% to 13.3%, results from the Ohio secretary of state’s office showed.
The outcome in Ohio’s traditionally Republican 15th District south of Columbus was being closely watched as a measure of Trump’s clout in the Republican Party, coming just a week after a Trump-backed candidate for the U.S. Congress suffered a surprise loss to a fellow Republican in north Texas.
“Tonight, Republicans across Ohio’s 15th Congressional District sent a clear message to the nation that President Donald J. Trump is, without a doubt, the leader of our party,” Carey declared in a statement after his victory.
Trump also issued a statement thanking Ohio voters and praising the “Great Republican win for Mike Carey. Big numbers!”
“We have looked across the promised land, but … we will not cross the river,” Turner told supporters at an election night watch party outside Cleveland.
Democrats currently have a narrow 220-212 majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.
The Demographic Profile Of Voters And Nonvoters Is Very Different
The roughly half of Americans who voted in 2018 differ from the voting-eligible adult population in some key respects. There were sizeable, if familiar, demographic and political differences in who did and did not turn out.
Compared with citizens who did not vote, voters were older, more likely to be college educated, better off financially, more likely to be White Protestants or Catholics and more Republican in party affiliation and candidate preference. These differences are regular features of U.S. elections, as a comparison with voters and nonvoters in 2016 makes clear.
All citizen panelists – whether voters or nonvoters – were asked which U.S. House candidate they supported in the general election. Nonvoters tend to express more uncertainty about the choice, owing in large part to the fact that many of them pay little attention to politics. But among those who did express a preference, Democratic candidates led Republican candidates by 14 percentage points a larger margin than among voters .
Demographically, the contrast between voters and nonvoters is most stark on age, race, education and income. Voters in 2018 were considerably older than nonvoters: 31% of voters but just 10% of nonvoters were ages 65 and older. At the other end of the age spectrum, just 11% of voters were under 30 years of age; 30% of nonvoters fell into this category. These gaps are quite similar to those seen in 2016.
An Examination Of The 2018 Electorate Based On Validated Voters
Pew Research Center conducted this study to understand how Americans voted in 2018 and how their turnout and vote choices differed from 2016. For this analysis, we surveyed U.S. adults online and verified their turnout in the two elections using commercial voter files that aggregate official state turnout records.
We surveyed 10,640 U.S. adults online in November 2018 and 4,183 adults in November and December 2016. Everyone who took part is a member of Pew Research Center’s American Trends Panel , an online survey panel recruited through national, random sampling of telephone numbers or, since 2018, residential addresses. This way nearly all U.S. adults have a chance of selection. The surveys are weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and many other characteristics. Read more about the ATP’s methodology. Verification of voter turnout involved matching the panelists to two or more commercial voter files. Panelists for whom a record of voting was located are considered validated voters; all others are presumed not to have voted.
Here are the questions used for this report and its methodology.
Given their relatively lower turnout, midterm elections are not necessarily predictive of what will happen in the next presidential election, when many more American voters will take part.
Democrats Did Better In 2018 Than 2016 Among Men Young Voters
Among most groups, voting patterns in 2018 were generally similar to those in 2016, albeit with most reflecting somewhat greater support for Democratic candidates for the U.S. House compared with Hillary Clinton. Men, young people and secular voters were notably more supportive of Democratic candidates in 2018 than these groups had been in 2016.
Democratic gains among men resulted in some narrowing of the gender gap. In the 2016 election, Donald Trump won men by 11 points and Hillary Clinton won women by 15 , for a difference of 26 points. In 2018, women supported Democratic candidates by a similar margin but the GOP advantage among men vanished . Trump carried White men by 30 points in 2016 , a Republican advantage that shrank to just 12 points in 2018 .
Much as the gender gap shrank from 2016 to 2018, so did the marriage gap. Married voters in 2016 voted for Trump by a 55% to 39% margin but supported GOP House candidates in 2018 by only a 6-point margin, 52% to 46%. Unmarried voters were strongly Democratic in both years . Much of the decline in the marriage gap came from men. Trump won married men by a 30-point margin in 2016, but this group backed GOP House candidates by 12 points in 2018. Married women were evenly divided between the parties in both elections. Among unmarried voters, women were more supportive of Democratic candidates in 2018 than they had been of Hillary Clinton in 2016.
They Predicted A Trump Coup Attempt Hear What They Say Now
The midterm elections are still 18 months away, but the fight for control of the Senate is already shaping what gets done in the nation’s capital this year.
President Joe Bidennow his infrastructure and jobs proposals rankingis not running for reelectionInside Elections with Nathan L. Gonzalesunwillingness to establish a commissionCheri BeasleyRep. Val Demings
Republicans Win Fewer Votes But More Seats Than Democrats
Republicans controlled the post–2010 redistricting process in the four states, and drew new lines that helped the GOP win the bulk of the House delegation in each. Republicans captured 13 of 18 seats in Pennsylvania, 12 of 16 in Ohio, nine of 14 in Michigan, and five of eight in Wisconsin. Added together, that was 39 seats for the Republicans and 17 seats for the Democrats in the four pro–Obama states.
The key to GOP congressional success was to cluster the Democratic vote into a handful of districts, while spreading out the Republican vote elsewhere. In Pennsylvania, for example, Republicans won nine of their 13 House seats with less than 60% of the vote, while Democrats carried three of their five with more than 75%.
One of the latter was the Philadelphia–based 2nd District, where 356,386 votes for Congress were tallied. Not only was it the highest number of ballots cast in any district in the state, but Democratic Rep. Chaka Fattah won 318,176 of the votes. It was the largest number received by any House candidate in the country in 2012, Democrat or Republican. If some of these Democratic votes had been “unclustered” and distributed to other districts nearby, the party might have won a couple more seats in the Philadelphia area alone.
The Closest House Races of 2012
NARROW DEMOCRATIC WINNERS
