With 263 Days until Election Day 2024, welcome to the second edition of Invariant’s Election Update.
Election at a Glance
Presidential: Only a month into the 2024 presidential primary season, the race is shaping up to be the longest general election in American history. Following the upcoming contests on Super Tuesday (March 5), this cycle’s primaries look to be less about delegate counts and more about the looming general election matchup.
Senate: With the 2024 Senate map favoring Republicans and one already anticipated gain for Republicans with Sen. Joe Manchin’s (D-WV) retirement, Democrats cannot afford to lose another seat and keep their majority. To win the majority, Republicans must ensure strong candidates emerge in a few key Senate primaries that will likely determine control of the upper chamber in 2025.
House: Republicans hold a razor-thin majority in the House heading into November. Redistricting decisions and candidate selection in party primaries will play outsized roles in determining House control in 2025. Key congressional primaries on March 5 will give an early indication of how recent redistricting decisions will impact the 2024 congressional elections.
Governors: Although 11 states will vote for new leadership in November, the 2024 gubernatorial map leaves only a few opportunities for a party flip. Primaries in New Hampshire and North Carolina will play a significant role in determining the outcome of the two most competitive gubernatorial races this year.
Presidential
With primary ballots cast in only a handful of states so far and six more months before the party nominating conventions, former President Donald Trump is hitting the campaign trail as if he’s the last Republican candidate standing. Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley says she plans to remain in the race for the Republican nomination through Super Tuesday, and Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) vows to continue his primary challenge against the president. Despite this, Biden and Trump are turning their attention to the general election. Instead of the usual focus on the primary delegate count, election watchers are closely tracking how the primary results could indicate each candidate’s strengths and vulnerabilities in the general election.
Primary Progress
Trump decidedly swept the Iowa Republican Caucus, winning 99 of 100 counties and only losing Johnson County to Haley by one vote. Trump earned 51 percent of the vote, the highest-ever vote share in a contested Iowa Republican Caucus. While he won a plurality of nearly every voting demographic, Trump’s base of rural, white, and evangelical voters cemented his standing as the leading GOP candidate. His Iowa victory was the catalyst for Vivek Ramaswamy and Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) to drop out of the presidential race and immediately endorse Trump.
Trump followed up his Iowa triumph with a decisive victory in New Hampshire, dashing hopes in the Haley camp that the Granite State’s uniquely independent Republican voters could help her forge a long-shot path to the nomination. In New Hampshire, Trump grew his average vote share by double digits in every demographic category compared to 2016, demonstrating significant strength among both Republican and Independent voters.
Two separate contests were held in Nevada due to the Nevada Republican Party’s refusal to abide by a new state law requiring state-run primaries instead of party-run caucuses. Trump won the party-run caucus and all 26 delegates, due in part to Haley’s refusal to participate. However, Haley lost the state-run primary with over 63 percent of primary voters choosing “none of these candidates” instead. Haley did not campaign in the state and is keeping her focus on the South Carolina primary and Super Tuesday. Trump also gained four more delegates after winning the U.S. Virgin Islands Republican Caucus.
Meanwhile, Biden scored decisive and expected primary wins in New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada (although his win in New Hampshire currently will not be counted towards his nomination due to a dispute between the state and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) over the timing of the primary). Biden notched his first win of the primary cycle in New Hampshire with nearly 64 percent of the vote through write-in votes alone, while Phillips trailed with 19.6 percent.
Presidential Vulnerabilities
While Trump and Biden continue to notch clear wins in the early primary contests, both face historically low approval ratings, with Trump at 42.7 percent and Biden at 40.4 percent as of February 13. Biden’s approval rating dropped significantly after his first year in office and remains low; his approval rating during his third year in office was the lowest of any president since President Jimmy Carter.
The early primaries indicate that Trump is still facing challenges with specific demographic groups (urban, suburban, college-educated voters). These groups played a significant role in the underperformance of both Trump and other Republican candidates in the last three election cycles and are expected to be crucial in swing states during the 2024 cycle. In many suburban precincts in Iowa, the former president received less than a quarter of the vote. With such low ratings for Trump and Biden, it’s unsurprising that a significant number of voters still haven’t accepted that 2024 will likely be a Biden-Trump rematch. A recent poll from Echelon Insights showed that 67 percent of likely voters believe Trump will definitely be the GOP nominee, while 59 percent of likely voters said that Biden will be the Democratic nominee.
Delegating
When securing a party’s presidential nomination, it’s delegates, not votes, that matter. While most states award delegates based on the results of their primaries or caucuses, Democrats and Republicans use different approaches to allocating delegates.
Democrats earn delegates proportionally based on the outcome of each state’s primary. In contrast, Republican primaries allocate delegates one of three ways: proportionally, winner-take-all, or a mix of the two.
To secure their respective party nominations, Trump will need to win 1,215 delegates by the Republican National Convention on July 15–18 in Milwaukee, and Biden will need to win 1,968 delegates by the Democratic National Convention on August 19–22 in Chicago.
Show Me The Money
This month’s Federal Election Commission (FEC) filing deadline provides a fascinating peek into the state of the presidential money race. Between his campaign, the DNC, joint fundraising committees, and allied super PACs, Biden starts 2024 with a combined $140 million war chest after raising a record-breaking $97 million in the last quarter of 2023. While that’s less than Trump and the Republican National Committee (RNC) had going into 2020 ($195 million), it’s more cash than Trump has going into the 2024 campaign.
FEC filings show that Trump remains a strong fundraiser, but his campaign has a unique spending problem: Trump’s legal fees are the campaign’s biggest expenditure. Trump spent nearly $50 million in donor funds on legal expenses in 2023, roughly the same amount Haley raised across her affiliated committees last year (not including her allied super PAC). Haley’s fundraising numbers and support from high-dollar donors give her the ability to stay in the race through Super Tuesday. In Q4 of 2023, her campaign committee raised $17.3 million, and she enters 2024 with a $14.5 million war chest in her official campaign account.
Senate
The 2024 Senate map heavily favors Republicans. Of the 34 Senate seats up for re-election this year, 23 are held by Democrats (or Democrat-aligned Independents), three of which are in states that Trump won in 2020 by a significant margin. Senate Democrats hold a slim two-seat majority and can already count on losing one seat to the Republicans due to Sen. Manchin’s retirement. Democrats cannot lose another seat and keep their majority. Meanwhile, Senate Republicans are not leaving anything to chance. The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) is breaking with standard practice by inserting itself aggressively into Republican primaries in several states with the hopes of selecting general election candidates with as broad appeal as possible. The Cook Political Report lists six Democratic-held Senate seats as Likely or Lean Democrat, two Republican-held seats as Likely Republican, and three Democratic-held seats as Toss-Ups. Additionally, Inside Elections identifies five Democratic-held seats as Likely or Lean Democrat, one Republican-held seat as Likely or Lean Republican, and three Democratic-held seats as Toss-Ups.
Race Spotlights
Primary races in a handful of the most competitive seats in 2024 — all currently held by Democrats — will help determine Senate control. National issues and the top of the ticket will likely play an outsized role in these contests.
California (Solid Democrat): The first Senate primary of 2024 will feature Democrats and Republicans on the same ballot competing against each other to fill the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s (D-CA) seat. Late last year, California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) appointed Sen. Laphonza Butler (D-CA) to finish Feinstein’s term. Butler later announced she will not run for the seat. Three well-known House Members are seeking to fill the Senate spot: Reps. Adam Schiff (D-CA), Barbara Lee (D-CA), and Katie Porter (D-CA). With both parties on the same primary ballot and the top two vote-getters advancing to a general election, Republicans must unite behind one candidate to have any shot. Steve Garvey, former Los Angeles Dodgers legend, is the leading Republican in the race and will compete for the same votes as attorney Eric Early, who has had several unsuccessful runs for political office.
Arizona (Toss-Up): All eyes are on Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ), who has yet to announce whether she will run for reelection in a purple state that turned blue for the first time in decades when it helped elect Biden in 2020. If she decides to run, Sinema, who switched her party registration from Democrat to Independent in 2022, will enter a three-way race with Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) and the probable Republican candidate, Kari Lake, the former television anchor who narrowly lost the Arizona governor’s race in 2022. Lake, who was endorsed by Trump and the NRSC, is popular with the Trump base of the party and is currently leading her primary opponent, Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb (R) in the polls. Recent signs indicate Sinema may not be running, including anemic fundraising in the fourth quarter of 2023 and no signs yet of her collecting by April the more than 42,000 signatures necessary for her name to appear on the ballot.
Montana (Toss-Up): NRSC Chair Steve Daines (R-MT) is focused on flipping the Democratic seat in his home state that Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) has held since 2007. The NRSC came out early in strong support of former U.S. Navy SEAL and wealthy businessman Tim Sheehy (R) in an effort to dissuade Representative Matt Rosendale (R-MT), who lost to Tester in 2018, from joining the race. Despite this, Rosendale jumped into the contest, raising concerns from Republicans about spending resources on an ugly primary instead of on Tester, who is popular in the red state despite his party affiliation and has beaten Republican challengers in the past. Rosendale’s hopes were diminished hours after his announcement with Trump’s endorsement of Sheehy.
Ohio (Toss-Up): Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) faces a tough race in a red state to keep a seat he has held since 2007. Once considered a swing state, Ohio trended red in recent elections, supporting Trump in both 2016 and 2020. Still, Brown is a uniquely popular Democrat in Ohio and has amassed a significant war chest to compete in what will be one of the most expensive races in the country in 2024. Several Republican candidates are competing for the nomination to take on Brown, including Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, Ohio State Senator Matt Dolan, and businessman Bernie Moreno, whom Trump endorsed.
West Virginia (Solid Republican): Sen. Manchin’s retirement virtually assures that this seat will turn Republican in 2024. Manchin is the last statewide Democratic elected official in a state that voted overwhelmingly for Trump in both 2016 and 2020. Current WV Governor Jim Justice (R) is the favored frontrunner over Rep. Alex Mooney (R-WV). Justice has the endorsements of Trump, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), and West Virginia’s soon-to-be senior senator, Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV).
Fundraising
With the majority on the line this year, Senate Democrats and Republicans spent last year raising cash: each party’s campaign arm raised over $70 million in 2023. But the funds raised by the party committees and individual campaigns only tell half the story when it comes to the 2024 money race. Outside spending by Senate Democratic and Republican leadership-aligned groups is expected to reach historic levels this year. The Senate Democratic leadership-aligned Senate Majority PAC raised $83.5 million in 2023, the most the group ever raised in an off-year, while two groups affiliated with Senate Republican leadership (Senate Leadership Fund and One Nation) raised a combined $94 million in 2023.
House of Representatives
Republicans hold a razor-thin majority in the House heading into November. Redistricting decisions, a wave of retirements, and candidate selection in party primaries will play outsized roles in determining House control in 2025. District maps are almost finalized, and primary season is upon us. Cook Political Report rates 22 House races as Toss-Ups, while Inside Elections considers 11 seats as Toss-Ups. Democrats hope to hold on to the five Democratic districts carried by President Trump in 2020, while Republicans face the taller task of protecting 17 congressional seats in districts won by President Biden in 2020.
Upcoming Special Elections
NY-03 (Lean D/Toss-Up): Former Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY) won a hotly contested February 13 special election to replace the expelled Rep. George Santos (R-NY) in New York’s third district. Suozzi, who previously represented the district for three terms, beat local Republican legislator Mazi Melesa Pilip by nearly eight points with 93 percent of votes counted. The high stakes race drew national attention, and over $22 million was spent on ads heading into the special election. The race, rated a Toss-Up, was seen as a must-win for both parties — Republicans hoped to maintain their slim majority in the 118th Congress, while Democrats saw this as a bellwether race heading into November. While Biden won the district by eight points in 2020, two years later NY-03 voters elected Santos by an eight point margin and Republican gubernatorial candidate and former Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY) carried the district by 12 points.
National issues like immigration and crime dominated the campaign and were top of mind for NY-03’s voters. The moderate Suozzi focused much of his campaign on his record of working across the aisle and showed a willingness to separate himself from the Democratic party on issues like the border and local criminal laws. Pilip led a lower-profile campaign, opting out of most public candidate forums.
NY-26 (Solid Democrat): New York Governor Kathy Hochul scheduled the special election to fill the vacancy resulting from Rep. Brian Higgins’ (D-NY) resignation to become president and CEO of Shea’s Performing Arts Center for April 30. State Senator Tim Kennedy (D) is likely to win the race to serve out the rest of the term with Higgins’ endorsement. The primary for the 2024 general election will be June 5.
CA-20 (Solid Republican): Former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) resigned from Congress on December 31. While the seat previously held by McCarthy will remain red, the competitive Republican primary is indicative of the party fractures that led to McCarthy’s demise as Speaker. On March 19, three Republican standouts will compete in the special primary for the seat: Trump-aligned business owner David Giglio, McCarthy-endorsed State Assemblyman Vince Fong, and Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux. The special election to fill the seat will take place on May 21.
OH-06 (Solid Republican): Rep. Bill Johnson (R-OH) retired on January 21 to take the post of President of Youngstown State University. Running in the March 19 Republican primary for the special election in this Trump +28 seat are State Sen. Michael Rulli, State Rep. Reggie Stoltzfus, and chiropractor Rick Tsai. The general election for the remainder of the term in this safely Republican seat will be held on June 11. Neither Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) nor former President Trump have made an endorsement in the primary.
Key Map Changes
More than half a dozen states will have new congressional maps in November due to litigation over racial or partisan gerrymandering. While Republicans are pleased that new maps in North Carolina and Georgia have tilted things in their favor, revisions in Alabama and Louisiana could cost them seats. Barring any additional litigation in other states, New York is the only remaining state that has not settled its redistricting process.
New York: In December, the New York State Court of Appeals ruled that the state must redraw its congressional lines. The state’s Democratic supermajority could be empowered to draw their own lines should the plan put forth by the Independent Redistricting Commission fail to gather consensus both internally and in the state legislature. New York’s map played an outsize role in winning the majority for Republicans in 2022. Current map changes could shift five or six competitive New York House races in favor of Democrats, significantly impacting which party will control the House after 2024. The New York State Independent Redistricting Commission will meet on Thursday, February 15 to vote on the final map proposal and submit it to the legislature. The map will be released publicly following the commission’s vote.
Louisiana: In January, Louisiana’s recently inaugurated Republican Governor Jeff Landry signed legislation all but assuring Democrats will pick up an additional seat in the Louisiana delegation. The state’s delegation has consisted of five Republicans and one Democrat since 2010, but a lawsuit alleging the congressional map impermissibly placed too many Black voters into Louisiana’s second congressional district was ultimately successful.
Louisiana Republicans carved up Rep. Garrett Graves’ (R-LA) district, splitting his suburban Baton Rouge base of support between the first, fifth, and the redrawn sixth congressional districts. With the new lines, the district is now 54 percent Black. President Biden would have carried it by a hefty 20-point margin. Graves said he will still run for re-election. State Senator Cleo Fields, who previously represented Louisiana’s fourth congressional district in the 1990s, is the likely Democratic candidate in the race.
Race Spotlights
The below key congressional primary elections are set for March 5 in Alabama, California, North Carolina, and Texas and will help determine control of the House in 2024.
AL-01 (Solid Republican): Alabama’s court-ordered congressional map forced Reps. Jerry Carl (R-AL) and Barry Moore (R-AL) into the only Member versus Member primary in the country. Carl, a conservative Southern appropriator, and Moore, a Freedom Caucus firebrand, face off in what is now the sixth-most conservative district in the country. With former President Trump seemingly staying out of this primary, spending and local issues will be at the forefront of this race. The winner of the March 5 primary will face Democrat Tom Holmes in November for this safe Republican seat.
AL-02 (Likely Democrat): Alabama’s newly drawn second congressional district is a wide-open race. The new majority-Black district stretches from Mobile to Montgomery and picks up parts of Alabama’s rural Black Belt. President Biden would have won this new district by 12 points in 2020, but with Alabama’s racial polarization in voting, the general election will be more about turnout than persuasion. Five state legislators are running for the seat on the Democratic side, with the early favorite being State House Minority Leader Anthony Daniels. The early Republican to beat is former State Senator Dick Brewbaker.
CA-47 (Lean Democrat): Last January, Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) announced her candidacy for late Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s (D-CA) Senate seat, leaving her Orange County district as a competitive open seat. President Biden outperformed in this D+3 district with an 11-point margin in 2020, but the congressional race figures to be close in 2024. In the top-two primary race, which lists both parties on the same ballot, Republicans have largely coalesced around former state Assemblyman Scott Baugh, who previously ran for the seat in 2018 and again versus Porter in 2022. Democratic support is split between state Senator Dave Min and attorney Joanna Weiss. Porter endorsed Min early in 2023, but his arrest in May for driving under the influence gave Weiss’ campaign new momentum.
NC-01 (Toss-Up): After North Carolina’s Supreme Court tossed the 2022 map, the state’s GOP-led legislature approved new lines that favor Republicans in ten districts, favor Democrats in three, and create one swing district. Democratic Reps. Jeff Jackson, Wiley Nickel, and Kathy Manning all announced they would not seek reelection in their newly configured districts drawn to heavily favor Republicans. The sole remaining swing district in the state is NC-01, currently held by Rep. Don Davis (D-NC). The new map creates a more competitive first district. While President Biden would have carried the existing district by seven points, Biden’s lead shrinks to just one percent under the new lines.
The March 5 Republican primary will determine Davis’ general election opponent. Two candidates are vying for the Republican nomination: Laurie Buckhout, a retired U.S. Army colonel and defense contractor, and Sandy Smith, a businesswoman and military mom who previously ran unsuccessfully in 2020 and 2022.
TX-34 (Lean/Likely Democrat): After 2022 redistricting, Texas’ 34th congressional district is the only competitive seat in the state. The incumbent, Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (D-TX), will likely face former Rep. Mayra Flores (R-TX), who represented this seat briefly after winning a special election and then losing to Gonzalez in 2022. Success among Hispanics in the Rio Grande Valley was one of Republicans’ biggest surprises during the 2020 election. If this trend continues, Flores could be heading back to Washington. However, Democrats are confident about their chances in this district that Biden would have won by 15 points in 2020.
Fundraising Numbers
When House Republicans ousted former Speaker McCarthy, a prolific fundraiser, many questioned new Speaker Johnson’s ability to raise money on the national stage. Republicans were relieved when Johnson announced a strong fourth quarter with $10.6 million raised.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) outraised the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) by $30 million in 2023, with the DCCC bringing in $121 million compared to the NRCC’s $91 million. However, Republicans have consistently outraised Democrats in outside spending.
Governors
Although there will be many new faces in governor’s offices come January, this year’s gubernatorial cycle offers few opportunities for party turnover. Of the 11 gubernatorial elections in November, eight contests have no incumbent running. Govs. Greg Gianforte (R-MT) and Spencer Cox (R-UT) are the only incumbents currently pursuing reelection, and Vermont Governor Phil Scott (R-VT) has until May 30 to determine whether he will retire, which would bring the number of open races to nine.
Republicans will be looking to pick up North Carolina following term-limited Democratic Governor Roy Cooper, while Democrats see New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu’s (R) retirement as a potential pick-up opportunity. Democrats may be able to flip the governor’s mansion in Vermont if Scott chooses to retire; however, Scott’s 76 percent approval rating and landslide win in the 2022 election suggest he is almost certain to win if he runs for re-election.
It remains to be seen how the top of the 2024 ticket and national issues will impact these races. Over half of the gubernatorial primaries occur after their respective state’s presidential primary, raising questions about how the timing will impact enthusiasm and turnout.
Race Spotlights
North Carolina (Lean Democrat/Toss-Up): North Carolina will hold the first gubernatorial primary of the cycle on March 5, the same day as the state’s presidential primary. Term-limited incumbent Roy Cooper (D) has endorsed Attorney General Josh Stein (D), giving him a significant edge over four other Democratic candidates. The Republican field is more contentious, pitting Trump-endorsed Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson against more traditional Republicans Bill Graham and Dale Folwell.
New Hampshire (Toss-Up): While the primary to replace retiring Governor Chris Sununu (R) is not until September 10, several strong candidates with vast political experience have emerged on both sides of the aisle in a race rated a Toss-Up by both the Cook Political Report and Inside Elections. The Democratic field includes former Manchester Mayor Joyce Craig and New Hampshire Executive Councilmember Cinde Warmington. Last month’s win by former President Trump in the state’s presidential primary could play a role in the Republican gubernatorial primary. This contest features former state Senate President Chuck Morse, who officially endorsed Trump in December, and former U.S. Senator Kelly Ayotte, who withdrew her support for Trump in 2016. She has since indicated she will support the eventual GOP nominee, but Ayotte’s previous stance may undercut her chances of winning the primary if she does not receive the former president’s endorsement.
