Wave Elections, And Seats No One Thought Would Fall

By most objective analysis, we are headed for what is known in politics as a “wave” election.

The concept shouldn’t be too unfamiliar to us, as we just experienced two successive wave years.

In 2006, largely in response to voter dissatisfaction with the Iraq War as well as a Congress seemingly plagued with ethical problems, the Democrats swept back to the majority in Congress by capturing 31 seats in the House and 6 seats in the Senate.

In 2008 during the sweeping election of President Obama, the Democrats took 21 House seats and 8 Senate seats.  These both represented “waves” (even though 2008 didn’t see a change in Congressional control, it is still widely thought of as a wave) – or large scale election results tilted toward one party as part of a large national trend.

In 1994 we experienced one of our most famous wave elections, popularly called today the Republican Revolution.  In that year, Republicans captured a whopping 54 seats from the Democrats in the House and 8 seats in the Senate.  Prior to 1994 there was a mini-wave in 1980 (and backlash in 1982) with the election of President Reagan – though this is hard to really call a wave, given that control of the House did not change hands.  Then there was the 49 seat post-Watergate slaughterfest of 1974 that saw the virtual destruction of the Republican Party – but again, no control changed hands.

The point here really is that most Congressional elections see changes of only a small handful of seats, and do not represent wholesale change.  1994, 2006 and 2008 are just the three most recent and glaring examples of extremely one sided wave elections.

So since we are in all liklihood about to witness the third consecutive seismic election (!!!), and since both of Maine’s Congressional seats are considered Democrat leaning and “safe” for the incumbents by most national observers, it is only fair to ask, “have seats like this fallen in past wave elections?”

In other words, do elections like this typically sweep in challengers that were not on anyone’s radar?  Are either of Maine’s two districts (Cook PVI of D+3 (ME-2) and D+8 (ME-1), respectively) potentially going to give us an election night surprise?

The short answer to the above questions is, “yes” and “possibly”.  Seats that no one thought would fall invariably do fall in every single wave election.  Seats that were on no one’s radar become the stories of the election which highlight the strength of the wave.  Maine has two credible – if a bit underfunded – Republican challengers who could very well shock conventional wisdom.

Let’s take a quick look at what seats fell in the last two big waves:

2008

First, some vital statistics on what happened in 2008 with the Democrats.  The average Cook PVI (a quick rating of the partisan lean of a district) for each seat the Democrats took over (not counting the few seats they lost) was R+4.63.  They took 19 seats that were in districts which favored Republicans, and they also took eight seats that leaned Democrat.

Thirteen of those seats leaned as much or more Republican than Maine’s 2nd Congressional District leans Democrat.  Three of those seats leaned more Republican than Maine’s 1st Congressional District leans Democrat.

Additionally, the Republicans took five seats even amongst that wave.  Those seats, however were all strong Republican districts, with the exception of Louisiana 2 (D+25), which was a rather unique situation to say the least.

Here is a list of the Democratic takeovers:

• R + 18 – Idaho 1
• R + 16 – Alabama 2
• R + 13 – Maryland 1
• R + 6 – Colorado 4
• R + 6 – Arizona 1st
• R + 6 – New Mexico 2
• R + 5 – New York 29
• R + 5 – Virginia 2nd
• R + 5 – Virginia 5
• R + 4 – Florida 24
• R + 4 – New York 13
• R + 4 – Ohio 16th
• R + 3 – Pennsylvania 3
• R + 2 – Florida 8
• R + 2 – Michigan 7
• R + 2 – North Carolina 8
• R + 1 – Illinois 11
• R + 1 – Maryland 1
• R + 1 – New Jersey 3
• D + 1 – Ohio 1
• D + 1 – Ohio 15
• D + 2 – Michigan 9
• D + 2 – Nevada 3
• D + 2 – Virginia 11
• D + 3 – New York 25
• D + 5 – Connecticut 4
• D + 5 – New Mexico 1

2006

Now, some vital statistics on what happened in 2006 with the Democrats.  The average Cook PVI for each seat the Democrats took over (the Republicans took none) was R+1.48.  They took nineteen seats that were in districts which favored Republicans, one that was split, and they also took eleven seats that leaned Democrat.

Thirteen of those seats leaned as much or more Republican than Maine’s 2nd Congressional District leans Democrat.  Four of those seats leaned as much or more Republican than Maine’s 1st Congressional District leans Democrat.

Interestingly, this year the Republicans took zero Democrat held seats.  None.

Here is a list of the Democratic takeovers:

• R + 13 – Texas 22
• R + 9 – Kansas 2
• R + 8 – Indiana 8
• R + 8 – Pennsylvania 10
• R + 7 – Ohio 18
• R + 6 – Indiana 9
• R + 6 – North Carolina 11
• R + 6 – Pennsylvania 4
• R + 5 – Arizona 1
• R + 5 – Florida 16
• R + 4 – Arizona 8
• R + 4 – Texas 23
• R + 3 – New York 19
• R + 2 – Indiana 2
• R + 2 – New York 20
• R + 2 – New York 24
• R + 2 – Wisconsin 8
• R + 1 – California 11
• R + 1 – Minnesota 1
• EVEN – New Hampshire 1
• D + 1 – Florida 22
• D + 2 – Connecticut 5
• D + 2 – Kentucky 3
• D + 2 – Pennsylvania 8
• D + 3 – New Hampshire 2
• D + 3 – Pennsylvania 7
• D + 4 – Colorado 7
• D + 5 – Iowa 1
• D + 6 – Connecticut 2
• D + 7 – Iowa 2
• D + 13 – Vermont At large

Back To Some Analysis

So what does this mean?  Well, basically it means that when the Democrats retook Congress in 2006 and wiped out Republicans in 2008, they fed on seats that were marginally in control of the Republican Party.

In totality, twenty-six (out of fifty-two) of the seats taken by Democrats leaned as much toward the Republicans as Maine’s second district leans Democratic.  That is exactly half of the House seats taken over.  Seven of the seats taken by Democrats leaned as much toward the Republicans as Maine’s first district leans Democratic.  That is roughly 13% of the House seats taken over.

For the record, the previous wave elections in 1994 and before have very similar statistics.

So what does this mean for Jason Levesque and Dean Scontras?

Essentially it means that a very healthy dose of seats taken over by Democrats in the preceding two election cycles have been in districts exactly like they find themselves running in.  Many of those seats were not on the DCCC’s radar, any national analyst’s radar, or really even within range of anyone’s radar.  Many of those candidates were underfunded, and several of them weren’t even taken seriously until a couple weeks before the election.

That most certainly does not mean that either will win – indeed,  a huge number of candidates in districts exactly like these went down in defeat.  Still, it should be clear that neither of these districts presents some kind of impossible challenge given the right campaign, message, and the size of the wave.

We will see just how strong the wave is – and if these two candidates can ride it to Washington D.C. – this November.

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Editor’s Note:  In the interests of full disclosure, I am working to help the campaigns of both Jason Levesque and Dean Scontras.  The contents of this article, however, are my own analysis of the general prospects of the race in comparison to large national trends in previous elections.  This article was not from, nor authorized by, either candidate or campaign, but I wanted to disclose the relationship none the less.