Question: Are there more TP Repubs up for reelection or more Repubs in purple districts?

[trublu992]

[JHB]

1. In the House, they're all up for election...

...and if they won't break with the TPers, then they have made themselves one of them.

[Cirque du So-What]

2. They're all up for reelection next year

That's the way it is in the House, where all seats are up for grabs every two years. Senate elections are statewide.

[HooptieWagon]

3. About 90% of GOP seats are safely gerrymandered.

I don't know the breakdown of Teabaggers and moderate GOP....but its reasonable to assume most of the Teabaggers are in safely gerrymandered districts, since they had to win a GE. More competitive districts probably elect a more moderate Congressperson, since the winner has to garner more swing votes. Exceptions to the rule might be where the Dems fielded a really poor candidate allowing a more extreme republican to win; or a long time incumbent who latched on to the teabaggers, who got reelected solely on incumbency/name recognition.

[trublu992]

4. But if we need 21 seats for take control aren't there 21 purple disticts we could get?

[HooptieWagon]

7. Yes and no.

My district is purple, but our rep is a longtime incumbent (Bill Young) who continues get reelected on past good job and name recognition. Hes done a rather poor job lately....he might be beatable now, but the state Dem party isn't interested in trying.
Dems could win the House, but it would take winning nearly every competitive seat, or a few surprises from seats not considered winnable.
Best expectation would be picking up a few more House seats, and as many state legislature seats as possible. Success in state elections gives us a "farm team" to groom for US Congress seats as they become competitive.

[YoungDemCA]

5. Michele Bachmann's district is storngly GOP by MN standards, but not nearly as much as some others

She has come close to losing her seat a few times.

[jberryhill]

6. The entire House is up every two years

[Tx4obama]

10. Below is a link with some info regarding House 2014 - pre-election analysis

Here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_house_elections#Pre-election_analysis_and_selected_results