Polling has taken a beating this year, but you don’t need to look at a single poll to get a sense of how the parties are feeling about this midterm election. All you have to do is study where the leading outside campaign groups are spending money. And an early glimpse at that shows that Republicans are in big trouble, and they know it.
Spending on House races from the leading Republican committees and two of its main outside super PACs shows that the GOP is already playing significant defense. Of the 49 seats receiving at least some cash from these groups, only six were won by Kamala Harris in 2024. Twenty-one of the districts receiving help were won by Trump by nine points or more; eight of them were won by over 13 points.
The contested districts include ten in Texas, Florida, and North Carolina, where Donald Trump’s allies deliberately redrew maps to hand Republicans more districts. If Republicans lose every district receiving some spending in Texas, it would result in Democrats picking up one seat in that state.
This analysis includes spending as of this past weekend by the Congressional Leadership Fund, the primary super PAC run by House Republicans; No Going Back PAC, the super PAC that Trump’s MAGA Inc. is funneling money through; and America PAC, the super PAC funded by Elon Musk. It also takes note of the races where No Going Back PAC has reserved House spending.
Political professionals have access to more real-time information than any outside observer. The House is more interesting to look at right now because the Senate target races are well known. House spending reveals where the parties are worried or where they are playing offense. While some of this spending is small, and much more will come in the final seven weeks, this early sketch of the battleground is an important snapshot of the state of the race.
Any rational observer of the election landscape would expect this. Trump has bungled the nation into another forever war that is spiking energy prices, and his trade wars with the likes of Canada are further spiraling inflation. His vanity convention last week had almost nothing to say about an economy people hate, other than an attempted $5,000 bribe of the electorate when he’s on track to cost every adult more than that. Voters hate the cruelty of mass deportation and the destruction of Washington landmarks. It’s not going to go well.
For the proof, you can follow the money.
ALL 21 TOSS-UP SEATS IDENTIFIED by the Cook Political Report race ratings are represented among the spending, although some aren’t getting much attention. Ohio’s Seventh District, where Max Miller is dealing with domestic abuse allegations in a seat Trump won 55-44 in 2024, is only getting about $25,000 in total support, from America PAC. Likewise in New Jersey’s Seventh District, Tom Kean Jr., who spent months away from Congress dealing with clinical depression, has only managed a token amount of defense ($54,000 from America PAC) in his re-election campaign. This suggests that, if Republicans aren’t cutting these two damaged candidates loose, they’re at least quiet quitting.
Two other toss-ups are a little more surprising. Republican former football placekicker Jay Feely is not drawing much attention ($52,000 from America PAC) in the open-seat race in Arizona’s First District, and neither is challenger Mike Beltran in Florida’s 14th District. The latter is a gerrymandered seat where incumbent Democratic Rep. Kathy Castor decided to run anyway, in a seat that went 55-44 Trump. That’s a pickup Republicans need to offset losses; if it’s not getting much love, things must not be looking so great.
The Castor seat is one of three Florida seats receiving money thus far; all of them were supposed to be gerrymandered out of reach by Republicans, including Rep. Darren Soto’s in Florida’s Ninth District (a Likely Republican seat to Cook that went 58-41 Trump in 2024) and Jared Moskowitz’s in Florida’s 25th (a Tossup that went 54-45 Trump). No Going Back has reserved $6.76 million for adds in the 25th District, the most of any House race, which makes sense only because it’s within range of Mar-a-Lago.
The situation is even starker in Texas. Six seats are receiving funds, all of which Trump took by double digits. Two have Democratic incumbents (Rio Grande Valley stalwarts Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez), and one is a South Texas border-area seat with a Republican incumbent (Rep. Monica De La Cruz) where Democrats are running popular Tejano singer Bobby Pulido. No Going Back PAC has already spent $655,000 in the race, and Musk’s America PAC another $19,000, despite it going for Trump in 2024 by 58-41.
But those seats were expected to be tough. Texas’s 35th District (Likely R, 55-44 Trump) has no incumbent and was specifically gerrymandered for Republicans, but No Going Back PAC has spent nearly $783,000 there already. The 23rd District (Likely R, 57-42 Trump), where gun influencer Brandon Herrera is running after Rep. Tony Gonzales dropped out of the primary after a sexual misconduct scandal, is getting a lesser amount of money from No Going Back and America PAC. And the Ninth District, a Solid Republican seat that went 60-40 Trump, is getting $94,014 in spending from No Going Back PAC.
That’s one of two Solid Republican seats receiving funds; the other is in Ohio, where Rep. Bob Latta is in a district Trump took 61-38 in 2024, yet is benefiting from around $23,000 in America PAC spending. These numbers are small, but races rated this way are usually guaranteed victories for their party. The correct amount of spending in a race like this is $0, because it’s simply too blue or red to lose. That Republicans are spending here is a flashing warning sign.
Likely Republican seats shouldn’t really be contested either, yet Republicans are spending in 11 such races, including Montana’s First District, where smokejumper Sam Forstag (D) is running a populist campaign against talk radio host Aaron Flint (R); Wisconsin’s First District, where Republican Rep. Bryan Steil has served four terms in the seat once held by Paul Ryan; Kentucky’s Sixth District, won by Trump 57-42 (Trump’s No Going Back PAC has $536,000 reserved in this seat); Arizona’s Second District, another 57-42 Trump seat; and Alaska’s at-large seat (55-41 Trump), where the main challenger to Rep. Nick Begich (R) is an independent candidate named Bill Hill.
Maine’s Second District (Likely Republican, 54-45 Trump), where Democrat Jared Golden stepped down and State Auditor Matt Dunlap faces former Gov. Paul LePage, is seeing the largest amount of America PAC spending in the early going, at $88,000. And a tiny amount of spending shows that Republicans may grow concerned about Ohio’s Tenth District (Likely Republican, 53-46 Trump), helmed by Republican Rep. Mike Turner. Iowa’s open-seat Second District is considered Lean Republican, but it went 54-44 Trump in 2024.
All in all, the Republican committees studied have already spent $1.79 million in seats that are listed as Likely or Solid Republican, with at least another $536,000 reserved.
There are a couple of Likely and Solid Democratic seats being contested, namely, both districts in New Hampshire (where Kamala Harris won in 2024 by 50-48 and 51-48, respectively), Ohio’s 13th District (51-48 Harris), where Democratic Rep. Emilia Sykes serves, and Michigan’s Eighth District (50-48 Trump), where Democratic Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet serves. But the numbers here are much smaller: some token spending of $13,000 or less in each of those four districts by America PAC, and a $365,000 flyer in Michigan’s Eighth by the Congressional Leadership Fund.
Overall, 33 seats currently held by Republicans are being contested, versus 16 held by Democrats. But seven of those Democratic-held seats were redrawn to benefit Republicans in Florida, Texas, North Carolina, and Ohio. So really, it’s 40 seats Republicans hold now or expected to win, versus nine held by Democrats.
In North Carolina, Rep. Don Davis (D) was supposed to be gerrymandered out after maps were changed to create a district that went 55-44 Trump in 2024. But No Going Back PAC has put almost $40,000 into that district so far. North Carolina’s 11th District, where Rep. Chuck Edwards declined to seek re-election after being accused of making sexual advances at staffers, has gotten $492,000 from No Going Back PAC, with over $1 million more reserved. That seat went 54-45 Trump.
Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) was also supposed to be neutralized this year after her Toledo-area district was redrawn to favor Trump 55-44. But the Congressional Leadership Fund has already invested over $1 million there, and No Going Back PAC has spent there too.
Add to this the fact that Republicans have already given up on New York’s 19th District, held by Rep. Josh Riley (D). The GOP recruited a challenger and put him in their “MAGA Majority” program, but Peter Oberacker was removed from that list, and all ad reservations were canceled. Oberacker was caught up in scandal for praising his Nazi grandfather’s military service.
It’s also notable that Democrats haven’t started spending at all in at least eight of these seats. Republicans are frantic about races that aren’t yet on the Democratic radar.
The midterm battleground is nearly all red, including some surprising deep-red pockets. And it’s only mid-September; we haven’t seen all the surprises emerge. Donald Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) may be confident in public, but their spending patterns reveal their actual mood, and it’s grim.
Below are the data for Republican super PAC spending in the midterms as of this weekend:
