Election News

Rep. Mark Walker of North Carolina has announced he won't seek a 4th term in 2020.  As part of a recent court approved redistricting, the boundaries of his 6th district became virtually unwinnable for a Republican. Using the new borders, Hillary Clinton defeated Donald Trump by over 21% in 2016.

The retirement is not a surprise. There had been speculation Walker would challenge Sen. Thom Tillis in the GOP primary, but he said he won't seek any office in 2020.  He did say he would seriously consider running for Senate in 2022, when Republican Richard Burr is expected to retire.

The Road to 270 is a weekly column leading up to the presidential election. Each installment is dedicated to understanding one state’s political landscape and how that might influence which party will win its electoral votes in 2020. We’ll do these roughly in order of expected competitiveness, moving toward the most intensely contested battlegrounds as election day nears. 

The Road to 270 will be published every Monday. The column is written by Seth Moskowitz, a 270toWin elections and politics contributor. Contact Seth at s.k.moskowitz@gmail.com or on Twitter @skmoskowitz.

Hawaii

Each of the past three presidential elections has seen Hawaii give the Democratic nominee their largest margin of victory of any state. The trend started in 2008 when the state’s most famous son, Barack Obama, was the party’s nominee. 

But Hawaii hasn’t always been the Democratic stronghold it is today. In fact, the state was accepted into the Union because it was expected to lean Republican. Before looking at this modern history, it’s important to understand how an island in the Pacific Ocean, 2,000 miles off of the continental U.S., became a state at all.

Freshman Democratic Rep. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey is planning to switch parties and become a Republican. Van Drew, who has been one of the few in his party to consistently oppose impeachment, met with President Trump Friday to secure his blessing for the move. The announcement may be timed to take place just as the articles of impeachment are voted on by the full House.

Van Drew won this open seat South Jersey congressional seat in 2018 by about 7.5% over GOP nominee Seth Grossman, who lost the support of the national party after making racist comments. The incumbent Republican, twelve-term Rep. Frank LoBiondo did not run for reelection that year. 

Rep. Ted Yoho said Tuesday that he will not run for re-election in 2020. He represents Florida's 3rd congressional district, a solidly Republican district in the northern part of the state.  Yoho won his 4th term by 15% in 2018; Donald Trump won here by a similar amount over Hillary Clinton in 2016.

By retiring, Yoho is honoring a pledge - to serve no more than four terms - that he made when first running for Congress in 2012. He is the 32nd current member of the House to announce they will not run in 2020.

Andrew Yang has become the 7th Democrat to qualify for the party's final debate of the year. He received 4% support in a Quinnipiac poll out Tuesday, giving him enough qualifying polls to make it.

Yang will join Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, Bernie Sanders, Tom Steyer and Elizabeth Warren on the debate stage.

The Road to 270 is a weekly column leading up to the presidential election. Each installment is dedicated to understanding one state’s political landscape and how that might influence which party will win its electoral votes in 2020. We’ll do these roughly in order of expected competitiveness, moving toward the most intensely contested battlegrounds as election day nears. 

The Road to 270 will be published every Monday. The column is written by Seth Moskowitz, a 270toWin elections and politics contributor. Contact Seth at s.k.moskowitz@gmail.com or on Twitter @skmoskowitz.

Oklahoma

Small State, Big Impact

Oklahoma, while usually uncompetitive¹ in presidential elections, has shaped American history and contemporary politics. Historical events seem drawn to the flat plains of Oklahoma: The Trail of Tears, the Tulsa Race Massacre, the Oklahoma City Bombing. Considering that it is home to just over 1% of Americans, the Sooner State has had an outsized influence in American politics. 

The road to an uncontested Democratic nomination requires a candidate to earn 1,990 pledged delegates¹ and begins in Iowa on February 3. To that end, the first version of our 2020 Democratic Delegate Calculator is now available.  It is based on available statewide polling.  An interactive version, where you can create your own forecast, will be available in the near future.

As we launch, the display shows all candidates projected to earn delegates based on polling, as well as anyone with a national polling average higher than that of the lowest delegate-qualifying candidate.  As of now, five candidates would earn delegates based on polling: Biden, Warren, Sanders, Buttigieg and Klobuchar.  Also displayed are Bloomberg and Yang, who have a higher national polling average than Klobuchar.

GOP Rep. George Holding of North Carolina has announced he will not seek a 5th term in 2020.

JUST IN: George Holding (R-NC) announces he's leaving Congress after redrawn map leaves him with a heavily Democratic district. pic.twitter.com/yX3tfxK1Sg

— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) December 6, 2019

Holding is the first casualty of North Carolina's new court-approved 2020 congressional map. From the Cook Political Report's Dave Wasserman: "Talk about a 'total makeover:' under the new map, the 2nd CD sheds Republican outer suburbs and picks up all of the city of Raleigh, converting it from a district President Trump carried by 12 points to one Hillary Clinton carried by a massive 24 points - and rendering it unwinnable for any Republican."

Here is a comparison of the old and new maps, from Sabato's Crystal Ball.

Six-term Republican Rep. Tom Graves of Georgia will retire at the end of this term, he announced Thursday. Graves first won election to congress in a 2010 special election in the state's 9th district. In 2012, he ran in the new 14th district, established in redistricting after the state gained a congressional seat from the 2010 Census.  

The 14th district is in the northwest corner of Georgia, and is one of the most heavily Republican in the country. Donald Trump won here by 53 points over Hillary Clinton in 2016, the president's 10th largest margin of victory by congressional district that year.  The district is therefore expected to stay in GOP hands.

Democratic Rep. Denny Heck of Washington announced he will not seek a 5th term in 2020. He serves on the House Intelligence Committee, which most recently conducted a high-profile impeachment inquiry into President Trump. The findings were sent on to the the House Judiciary Committee, which began formal hearings Wednesday morning.

Today, I announce my retirement from a career in public service that began over forty years ago. I wrote a brief note of thanks, explanation and remembrance. I hope you’ll take a minute to read it. https://t.co/85W8cRooKE

— Denny Heck (@RepDennyHeck) December 4, 2019

Heck is the only person to have ever represented Washington's 10th district, created after the 2010 Census gave the state an additional representative in Congress. The district sits in western Washington, encompassing the capital, Olympia and the southern portion of the Seattle Metropolitan Area.

Heck won his 4th term in 2018 by about 23 points, while Hillary Clinton won the district by about 11.5% over Donald Trump in 2016. Democrats are likely to hold the district in 2020 despite the loss of incumbency.