Yahoo News Explains: Midterms 2018

The midterm elections look like they’re going to be hotly contested.

Republicans now control both houses of Congress. All 435 seats in the House of Representatives and 35 seats in the Senate are up for grabs, so both parties are putting up the fight of a lifetime.

The Senate now consists of 51 Republicans and 49 Democrats. Dems need to win 28 of the 35 seats in play in 2018 to take control of the Senate, but is that feasible?

According to FiveThirtyEight’s forecast, Dems have a 1 in 7 chance of flipping the Senate and grabbing the gavel out of Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s hands.

GOP Sen. Ted Cruz is seen with a lead in his race with Democrat Rep. Beto O’Rourke in Texas. President Trump even weighed in on their close contest.

So for Dems, Senate odds look gray, but in the House they could see bright sunshine. Another poll prediction from FiveThirtyEight gives Democrats an 84% chance of seizing control of that chamber.

70 House seats are considered hotly contested, and Democrats only need to flip 23 to win. Of course, the party that controls the White House usually has little need for victory parties in the midterms.

Presidents Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush all saw their parties lose House seats in the midterms.

Trump’s relatively low approval rating could prove to be a problem for Republicans in this election cycle.

Despite that, he’s been doing a massive campaign sweep for candidates in tight local races, such as Kentucky incumbent Rep. Andy Barr.

And with the Center for Responsive Politics reporting that this is going to be the first midterm to hit $5 billion in spending, it looks like these politicians are putting their money where their mouths are.