Polarization Seems to Be Helping Republicans in Run-Up to Midterms

One big question looms over the fight for control of Congress: Will strong Democratic candidates ride a blue wave to victories on Nov. 6 in the long list of Republican-leaning areas they’ve put into play? Or will partisan polarization carry Republicans to a closer than expected midterm result?

The fight over Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court seems to have contributed to polarizing the electorate, helping Republicans gain in red states and districts even as Democrats cement their strong position elsewhere. The trend might fade, but if it holds it will be an abrupt change from earlier polls and last year’s special election results, which indicated that Democrats were highly competitive in red areas.

Instead, the district and state polling raises the possibility of an election more like last year’s Virginia elections or the 2010 midterm elections. Both were strong results for the party out of power — but the big numbers came mainly on home turf. A similar result this year would tend to lock the Democrats into their single biggest disadvantage: the map.

The Democratic geographic disadvantage is so severe that it gives the Republicans a chance to survive a so-called wave election, like the 1994, 2006 and 2010 elections that flipped control of the House.

National polls continue to show all the conditions for a wave in place. The president’s approval rating is in the low 40s. It’s a midterm election year, when the president’s party usually takes big losses. Democrats lead on the generic ballot by 8 to 9 points. These indicators have remained relatively stable throughout the Kavanaugh controversy, but the president’s approval rating has ticked up, most likely in the conservative areas where Republicans show newfound strength.

And if Republicans can take advantage of their underlying geographic advantages, they can hold down their losses and gain seats in the Senate, even in a Democratic wave.

The playing field is most favorable to Republicans in the Senate: They would be all but assured to retain control if they won just three of seven competitive seats where Donald Trump won by at least 9 points in 2016. Recent polls, including those by The New York Times Upshot/Siena College, show Republicans ahead in at least the three they need — North Dakota, Tennessee and Texas — and there are rumblings that private polls show Democrats more vulnerable in several of the rest.

The House of Representatives is also stacked against Democrats because of partisan gerrymandering and the tendency for Democrats to win by lopsided margins in urban areas — and thus “waste” votes. But the House picture is not so bleak for Democrats because Republicans are defending 25 seats that Hillary Clinton won in 2016 and many more districts that Trump won narrowly.

Here, polarization is taking a toll on both parties. Even the strongest Republican incumbents appear to have fallen behind in most of the relatively white and well-educated suburban districts ringing the United States’ major cities. In the suburbs of Washington, New York, Denver, Philadelphia and Kansas City, Missouri, recently completed or continuing Times/Siena polls show Democrats well-positioned to flip Republican seats, even against battle-tested Republican incumbents who won easily in 2016.

Democratic prospects in these suburban areas are bolstered by the expectation of strong turnout among college-educated voters, who typically represent a larger share of the electorate in midterm elections and this year are poised to back Democrats by a wide margin.

Strength by Democrats in moderate suburbs makes them favorites to retake the House, even if Republicans dodge Democratic breakthroughs in conservative and less-educated areas, where there’s tentative evidence that Democrats are struggling.

As in our recent Senate polls, Times/Siena House polls show Democrats struggling in rural, conservative districts like those in northern Minnesota, South Texas, southern North Carolina and western Pennsylvania.

It should be emphasized that these districts are only a small sample of the dozens of conservative districts where Democrats are thought to have a realistic chance to compete. And Democrats would need to break through in only a handful of them to be very well positioned to take control. But the overall trend in both the House and Senate polling is fairly clear.

The view that Democrats are overwhelming favorites to take control in the House hinges on the assumption that they will break through in a meaningful number of the conservative districts they’ve put into play. But the difference between Democratic breakthroughs or defeat could come down to just a few percentage points in many of these contests.

Republicans can reasonably hope that these last few percentage points will be very challenging for Democrats in conservative districts. But Democrats can hope to muscle their way over the top with strong turnout, especially from young and nonwhite voters who so far do not appear especially enthusiastic about voting. If that changes over the final weeks, it could be decisive in a long list of closely fought contests. As a result, a wide range of possible outcomes is still realistic in the fight for the House. If Democrats recover in Trump Country, you could easily imagine a 40-plus seat gain. But if Republicans hold the line in conservative areas, they could force a district-by-district battle for control that lasts late on election night or beyond.

Something similar happened to Democrats in last year’s Virginia state legislative elections. Democrats swept Republicans in well-educated areas but fell just short of taking control in recounts of several districts carried by the president. A Virginia-like outcome probably wouldn’t be enough for the Republicans to hold onto the House this November, given the number of Republican retirements. But it would keep it close.

A more polarized electoral outcome would also further the trend toward polarization in Congress. It could mean an expanded Republican majority in the Senate, providing a more comfortable margin for the majority leader, Mitch McConnell, after nearly two years of closely fought votes that came down to just one or two moderate Republican senators.

And a narrow Democratic House majority would have fewer relatively moderate Democrats from red districts — the sort who have often said they wouldn’t support Nancy Pelosi for speaker. It could also end the careers of moderate Republicans from competitive suburban districts, on top of the many moderate members who have already decided not to run for re-election. Of the 20 House Republicans who voted “no” on the health care bill, half have either decided not to seek re-election or are underdogs to return to Congress.

The post-Kavanaugh polling effect could prove to be fleeting, especially if highly energized partisans are responding to polls in unusual numbers. But over the last few decades, U.S. electoral results have generally moved toward greater polarization. It would not be a surprise if the midterms left the nation even more divided.