New Fox polling ahead of the November elections reveals Republicans might not win the House after all, despite forecasts in recent months in their favor.
Democrats are favored in forecasts to win the Senate, with polls and fundraising trending the party’s direction in key states like Pennsylvania and Arizona. In other states, like Georgia and Wisconsin, trends including survey data are more mixed, but Democrats clearly have a documented chance. As for the House, alongside redistricting Republicans became favored to win the chamber, potentially placing Kevin McCarthy, whose moral compass seems like whatever Trump says it is, at the helm of the House. But now, polling from Fox shows Democrats ahead by three percentage points among overall respondents when asked their choice for this year’s Congressional races. Dems nabbed 44 percent, while Republicans had 41 percent.
Other recent polling from Fox, which is conducted by a bipartisan team of pollsters, showed the parties tied or the Republicans leading on the question of voters’ support for this year’s Congressional races. This time, it’s different. “The Democrats’ 3-point edge is within the survey’s margin of sampling error – and Fox News modeling suggests it translates into a GOP gain of about one House seat,” according to an article on Fox News. That gain isn’t enough to change control of the chamber, where Democrats’ total seats are currently nine ahead of Republicans. (There are presently two vacancies, with one apiece from both party’s respective columns.) Holding the House would, of course, let any Democratic gains in the Senate prove more substantive in terms of what gets done. Otherwise, the House could — for at least two years — become a center for national threats to reproductive rights, voting rights, rights to free expression, and who knows what else.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) — who sometimes tries and casts himself as a reasonable voice, or something — recently unveiled a proposal for a 15-week abortion ban. Stopping that kind of action at the federal level is at stake in upcoming elections. A majority (meaning a full 75 percent) of the respondents in the new Fox polling who said abortion was the main issue motivating them to vote supported the hypothetical Democratic candidate. Relatedly, public approval of Biden’s job performance is also increasing according to recent polling, which could also help Democrats’ chances.
