How much of a margin would Clinton have to beat Trump by to change control of The House?

[Tony_FLADEM]

Donald Trump continues to make gaffe after gaffe and I see no chance of that changing and he probably doesn't even want to be President. I'm sure he has enough sense to realize attacking a Gold Star family was not helpful to winning the Presidency so I am assuming Hillary wins by a comfortable margin.

In 2008 Obama won by 7% and this resulted in the Democrats picking up an additional 25 seats if I remember correctly.

The Democrats have more seats they can go after this year since they about 15% fewer than they had in 2008 although the affect of gerrymandering will probably play a greater role this year.

I say if Hillary wins by more than 10% they could win back the House of Representatives. A mere 5% and the Senate is controlled by the Democrats as well.

[davidn3600]

1. The House won't change

The Republicans have so much control in the states and the districts are written in their favor. Those districts don't get rewritten until 2022. The Democrats got spanked in 2010 and 2014 when it came to the states. It's the fault of the DNC for focusing so much on the federal level that the GOP has cemented a rather large majority at the local level.

You can't compare this to the 2008 race because that was a different House district map.

[PSPS]

2. You're right. Gerrymandering locks the house, but the senate will flip for sure.

[backscatter712]

12. What we need to do is get Clinton into the White House...

... and ideally with a decent majority in the Senate. And get a solid progressive majority in the Supreme Court.

Then just in time for the 2020 Census, sue the pants off of all the states that have gerrymandered their Congressional districts for the Republicans, and force them to get their districts redrawn and ungerrymandered.

That should help with the House...

[LonePirate]

3. I think 10 points would flip the House, possibly 8 or 9 if suburban Repubs sit home.

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. You need about a 4% swing from 2012 from Reps to Dems, which the polls are just about managing

http://election.princeton.edu/house-polling-margin/

[cally]

5. I read some article this cycle that it is 9 percent

I think it was on Huffington Post about a month ago but I can't find it again.

[tritsofme]

6. Different eras and dynamics, but Democrats easily held the House in 1972 and 1984 as the GOP won 60%

of the popular vote in the presidential election.

It's hard to say what it will take to dislodge this majority, but under the current map, I think it will still be very difficult.

[JHB]

7. Her margin against The Howler Monkey is irrelevant...

...what matters in the House races. There's no nice mathematical formula for predicting how long the coattails might be, especially with Republican gerrymandering and the wildcards that are in play in this election.

[onecaliberal]

8. Until the next census when maps are redrawn we are stuck with Gerrymandered districts

[surrealAmerican]

9. These two things are not related to each other.

A presidential candidate could, theoretically, win 100% of the vote, and it would still have no effect on the House.

A lot of voters "split their ticket", voting for one party for President, and a different party for Congress.

[Warren DeMontague]

10. Yes, but downballot effects are real.

Starting with the people of one party who are so demoralized they just stay home.

[surrealAmerican]

13. Those demoralized voters would have to be ...

... upset enough to stay home, but not so angry that they show up to vote against their party's presidential nominee.

[Warren DeMontague]

14. Like I said, there is such a thing as downballot impacts. This has been statistically shown time &

again.

That doesn't mean that no one will split their ticket, and it certainly doesn't mean that we're going to win the House. That's a longshot by any metric.

But having a deeply unpopular Republican as the public face of the Republican party going into November? In addition to the effect on GOP voters, a lot of Americans who don't follow politics closely and are independent may walk into the voting booth equating "Donald Trump" with "Republicans".

You bet your bippy it will spill over into other races.

[HereSince1628]

15. sort of, historically straight-ticket voting and a popular 'lead' candidate have tended to

sweep together down-ticket candidates of the same party.

At the beginning of the '90s almost half of states had mechanisms for straight ticket voting by checking a single box. Since the1990's 12 states have abolished that ballot feature. Nine states still have a provision for this type of voting.

In the absence of a straight ticket choice on a ballot, voters can still bring together their party loyalty and awareness of candidates affiliation to guide what is still a straight party choice. But fidelity to party by voters isn't 100%

[MohRokTah]

11. You don't look at the presidential numbers, you look at the generic House numbers.

Tipping point to change the House is about D+8.5%. Last I saw we were sitting right at 8%, so we're close to a tipping point, and Trump at the top is helping to push us over.

That D+8.5% figure accounts for the heavily gerrymandered districts.