Rothenberg Releases Initial 2016 House Ratings

[publicunofficial]

Here

Crescent Hardy is the only incumbent who starts out as the underdog.

Likely R:
CA-21 (Valadao)
CO-06 (Coffman)
FL-13 (Jolly)
IL-12 (Bost)
NJ-03 (MacArthur)
NV-03 (Heck)
PA-06 (Costello)

Lean R:
AZ-02 (McSally)
MI-01 (Benishek)
NY-01 (Zeldin)
VA-10 (Comstock)

Toss-Up/Tilt R:
FL-26 (Curbelo)
MI-07 (Walberg)
NH-01 (Guinta)
PA-08 (OPEN)

Toss-Up:
FL-18 (OPEN)
IA-01 (Blum)
IA-03 (Young)
IL-10 (Dold)
ME-02 (Poliquin)
NE-02 (Ashford)
NY-19 (OPEN)
NY-24 (Katko)
TX-23 (Hurd)

Toss-Up/Tilt D:
NV-04 (Hardy)

Lean D:
AZ-01 (Kirkpatrick)

Likely D:
CA-07 (Bera)
CA-36 (Ruiz)
FL-02 (Graham)
MN-07 (Peterson)
NY-18 (Maloney)

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

CA-52, NY-21/23/25 and MN-08 should not be in the safe category. Coffman/Jolly should be Lean R, not Likely. McSally should be in Toss-Up, Zeldin/Benishek should only be Tilt R. Rod Blum should be in Tilt D, not Toss-Up. The rest is fine.

[Maxwell]

Eh. I see where he's coming from. But Graham is vulnerable for the sole reason she's in an R+6 district (at least Lean D, if not Tilt D), and Blum is the underdog in his district anyway as is Hurd.

[publicunofficial]

I think Rothenberg likes to hold off on calling seats competitive until he knows who the candidates will be.

[© tweed]

../so an early over/under around D+4

[free my dawg]

No Stefanik?

[publicunofficial]

No Stefanik?

No Democratic candidate declared, none on the horizon.

[free my dawg]

No Stefanik?

No Democratic candidate declared, none on the horizon.

Even then it's an Obama district, and Hillary coattails are going to be big. She's definitely not safe.

[Vosem]

Lots of little quibbles -- many of the same ones as Wulfric (CA-52 shouldn't just not be Safe, it's probably more Leans than Likely; agree about Coffman, Jolly, Benishek, and Blum; actually think McSally should be pretty OK now that she's dislodged Barber -- he's not coming back and this is a McCain-voting district), but it's largely OK.

No Stefanik?

Even with the return to the mean from 2014, which was a very outlier election in Upstate New York, and Hillary coattails it's difficult to see Stefanik losing except in a landslide to a very good candidate. She's successfully united the feuding factions of the GOP in this area, and she's become a national rising-star for becoming the youngest woman ever elected to the House.

Bill Owens was the perfect Democrat for the district, and he basically pulled out three victories -- two by vote-splitting ('09 & '10), and one because of a scandal ('12). Before then, the district has basically been Republican since forever (and I do mean forever -- since the 1850s) and it's still much safer down- than up-ballot. There's also the fact that Gibson's open seat and Katko will have much more attention on them and allow Stefanik to maybe fly under the radar a bit.

In summary, it's really, really hard to see Stefanik losing. Not impossible in a D wave with a good candidate, but Safe is probably the most reasonable ranking right now.

[Senate Minority Leader Lord Voldemort]

CA-52 should not be in the safe category.

Peters will wipe the floor with his opponent during a Presidential year in California after surviving 2014.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

CA-52 should not be in the safe category.

Peters will wipe the floor with his opponent during a Presidential year in California after surviving 2014.

Rothenberg says that CA-36 is not Safe, but that CA-52 is. Let's take a look at the margins:

CA-36: 54-46
CA-52: 52-48

What justification is there for saying that CA-36 is in more danger than CA-52 when Ruiz won by more than Peters did in 2014? These two ratings honestly make no sense.

[Fuzzybigfoot]

Is it me, or is FL-2 not on the rankings?   

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Is it me, or is FL-2 not on the rankings?   

He has it at Likely D, though I think it's more fit to the Lean category.

[Brittain33]

What justification is there for saying that CA-36 is in more danger than CA-52 when Ruiz won by more than Peters did in 2014? These two ratings honestly make no sense.

Possibly because Dem victory in CA-36 relies more on infrequent voters than CA-52 does? Maybe? I don't know, I think you're right... Ruiz led the jungle primary in 2014 with a bare majority while Peters only got 42%. Does Ruiz have a strong declared opponent?

[Senate Minority Leader Lord Voldemort]

CA-52 should not be in the safe category.

Peters will wipe the floor with his opponent during a Presidential year in California after surviving 2014.

Rothenberg says that CA-36 is not Safe, but that CA-52 is. Let's take a look at the margins:

CA-36: 54-46
CA-52: 52-48

What justification is there for saying that CA-36 is in more danger than CA-52 when Ruiz won by more than Peters did in 2014? These two ratings honestly make no sense.

That's true. Ruiz's 2014 election turned out to be a sleeper. Junk ratings!

[Xing]

- CA-52 should be Likely D
- IA-01 should be Tilt D
- I'd switch AZ-02 and FL-26
- I'd also switch NH-01 and IA-03
- Maybe AZ-01 should be Likely D

[publicunofficial]

What justification is there for saying that CA-36 is in more danger than CA-52 when Ruiz won by more than Peters did in 2014? These two ratings honestly make no sense.

Possibly because Dem victory in CA-36 relies more on infrequent voters than CA-52 does? Maybe? I don't know, I think you're right... Ruiz led the jungle primary in 2014 with a bare majority while Peters only got 42%. Does Ruiz have a strong declared opponent?

None of the competitive California seats have any strong declared challengers right now.

I suppose the logic Rothenberg has for rating CA-52 safe is that Peters has fended off two extremely strong challenges, there doesn't appear to be any other strong contenders for the seat, and if Peters can survive 2014 against Carl DeMaio he can almost certainly survive 2016 against a nobody. That makes sense to me, but all of these reasons can also be applied to CA-36 so I don't know what Rothenberg is doing.

[Donerail]

Not sure about Jolly being anything less than likely - the likely Dem candidate is rumored to be Eric Lynn, currently a Pentagon official. Smart guy, but not a lot of name rec and untested on the campaign trail, facing an incumbent who's played to the peculiarities of this district quite well and who'll have a lot of resources to defend his position. Graham, meanwhile, should be fine - the problem with the district is that whoever the Republicans nominate will have the challenge of both appealing to the wealthy/educated Rs in Tally, and the rural Rs in the rest of the district. Pretty big divide between the two groups, and if the latter win out in a primary then Graham should be okay (Tally Rs won't go heavily for someone like, say, Charles Van Zant - he's not in the district, but a candidate like him).

[free my dawg]

Not sure about Jolly being anything less than likely - the likely Dem candidate is rumored to be Eric Lynn, currently a Pentagon official. Smart guy, but not a lot of name rec and untested on the campaign trail, facing an incumbent who's played to the peculiarities of this district quite well and who'll have a lot of resources to defend his position. Graham, meanwhile, should be fine - the problem with the district is that whoever the Republicans nominate will have the challenge of both appealing to the wealthy/educated Rs in Tally, and the rural Rs in the rest of the district. Pretty big divide between the two groups, and if the latter win out in a primary then Graham should be okay (Tally Rs won't go heavily for someone like, say, Charles Van Zant - he's not in the district, but a candidate like him).

vom

[Devils30]

FL-2 seems bad for Dems but you can't forget that Hillary has a floor of 46-47% there. It's very inelastic at the Presidential level and Graham will benefit from higher black turnout than 2014 and a better year for Dems.

FL-26 should be a tossup, it went from McCain 51-49 in 2008 to 53-46 Obama in 2012. That is a clear trend, even Crist won it by over 4 points. Districts like FL 26,27 will become for the GOP what PA-12 became for Dems.

[free my dawg]

No Stefanik?

Even with the return to the mean from 2014, which was a very outlier election in Upstate New York, and Hillary coattails it's difficult to see Stefanik losing except in a landslide to a very good candidate. She's successfully united the feuding factions of the GOP in this area, and she's become a national rising-star for becoming the youngest woman ever elected to the House.

Bill Owens was the perfect Democrat for the district, and he basically pulled out three victories -- two by vote-splitting ('09 & '10), and one because of a scandal ('12). Before then, the district has basically been Republican since forever (and I do mean forever -- since the 1850s) and it's still much safer down- than up-ballot. There's also the fact that Gibson's open seat and Katko will have much more attention on them and allow Stefanik to maybe fly under the radar a bit.

In summary, it's really, really hard to see Stefanik losing. Not impossible in a D wave with a good candidate, but Safe is probably the most reasonable ranking right now.

Points taken. However, this is probably the best year for New York Democrats (especially considering Hillary seemed to do better here in the primary than the other upstate districts), so she's probably beatable with a good candidate. If she wins, it's very likely she becomes entrenched.

You've convinced me enough to move it from Leans to Likely, but I'm not budging until there's a decent candidate on the horizon.

[bobloblaw]

No Stefanik?

No Democratic candidate declared, none on the horizon.

Even then it's an Obama district, and Hillary coattails are going to be big. She's definitely not safe.

Hillary's coattails are not going to be big, they will be smaller than Obama's. Obama drove up minority and young people turn out in a way Hillary cannot. Hillary's strength is seen with moderate and GOP leaning women and blue collar workers. They wont automatically vote Dem in the way Those who came out to vote for Obama did.

[free my dawg]

No Stefanik?

No Democratic candidate declared, none on the horizon.

Even then it's an Obama district, and Hillary coattails are going to be big. She's definitely not safe.

Hillary's coattails are not going to be big, they will be smaller than Obama's. Obama drove up minority and young people turn out in a way Hillary cannot. Hillary's strength is seen with moderate and GOP leaning women and blue collar workers. They wont automatically vote Dem in the way Those who came out to vote for Obama did.

We're talking about the state she represented in the Senate in one of her best districts in the state in 2008. To say that coattails won't be a factor in New York's downballot races is downright hackish.

[bobloblaw]

No Stefanik?

No Democratic candidate declared, none on the horizon.

Even then it's an Obama district, and Hillary coattails are going to be big. She's definitely not safe.

Hillary's coattails are not going to be big, they will be smaller than Obama's. Obama drove up minority and young people turn out in a way Hillary cannot. Hillary's strength is seen with moderate and GOP leaning women and blue collar workers. They wont automatically vote Dem in the way Those who came out to vote for Obama did.

We're talking about the state she represented in the Senate in one of her best districts in the state in 2008. To say that coattails won't be a factor in New York's downballot races is downright hackish.

No I mean overall in 2016. Yeah she could have an effect in NY.