Topsy Turvy
Apr 25th, 2006 at 11:13 am by Susie
And so the pendulum swings:
In its polling, Democracy Corps “uses the actual candidate names in each congressional race (and generic language in cases where there is no clear nominee), providing a level of specificity lacking from any other national measure of the congressional contest.”
Here are the striking results:
In contests where a Democratic incumbent is running for re-election (199 House seats in this database), the Democratic candidates enjoy a 26-point advantage and claim a strong majority of the votes (57 to 31 percent)
In open seats with no incumbent running in this cycle (20 House seats), the Democratic advantage is even higher — a remarkable 63 to 28 percent
Most importantly, in races where a Republican incumbent is running for re-election (217 House seats), the Republican candidate leads by just 4 points (42 to 46 percent) and fails to claim majority support — a sharp contrast from the strong position of Democratic incumbents.
