Senate seats to watch in 2022
Murky waters for Murkowski, and Dr. Oz needs to find his yellow brick road.
(Photo: Louis Velazquez, Unsplash)
Welcome to The Midterm Report, a newsletter exclusively for our paid subscribers. In The Midterm Report, National Politics Reporter Stephen Wentzell digs deeper at the upcoming U.S. midterm elections in November.
With 34 Class C Senate seats up for grabs this fall—and the fate of Congress in the hands of American voters—Democrats are likely to face an uphill battle to preserve their hold over both Congress and the White House.
A 35th seat—previously held by Vice President Kamala Harris—will also be decided in a special election. The California seat is currently filled by Sen. Alex Padilla—the first Mexican American and Hispanic senator from the state—who has already announced his intention to seek-reelection.
Of the 34 seats in Class C, 14 are Democrats, while 20 are Republicans. Despite the number of Republican Senate seats up for grabs, these are also 20 seats won in 2016, when Donald Trump rose to the presidency.
But the same man who won Republicans the Senate also personally excavated the paved path to a McConnell majority in 2020, allowing Democrats to do the unthinkable and win the Senate back, while Trump dug around for votes in the state with a metal detector.
If the Democrats can’t maintain their leadership in the Senate, it guarantees two more years of Supreme Court justice obstructions, leaving an eight-seated SCOTUS with six of eight members being of right-wing ideology.
Seats and candidates to watch