I thought I’d take a one article break from the present and look at the future. The future I want to look at is the way too early shape of the 2022 Senate races. Let’s explore.

Baring resignations or deaths in office there will be 34 seats up in November of 2022. Currently 22 of them are held by Republicans and 12 by Democrats. That very well could change as a result of the 2020 elections. The seats held by Republican placeholders Kelly Loeffler of Georgia and Martha McSally of Arizona are up in 2020 and if they win this November they would have to run again in 2022 for their own full term. Both of those seats are anything but certain with McSally in much more jeopardy than Loeffler.

My current analysis has 13 seats remaining Republican and nine remaining Democratic. The Republicans go into the contest defending six seats in battleground states while the Democrats currently hold three such seats. The remaining three seats are all currently held by Republicans but I have them as complete question marks, (Chuck Grassley of Iowa, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Marco Rubio of Florida).

At first glance you would conclude the Democrats have the advantage; not so fast. I do not see a clear and obvious flip. The reality is that we could come out of the 2022 Senate contests with no net change. More likely we will see one party have a net gain of one or two seats. Another factor to consider is that 2022 is a mid-term and Democrats historically do a poor job of generating voter turnout in mid-term elections, (2018 was an exception). If Trump loses Democrats will have to fight complacency ala 2010 in the wake of Obama’s 2008 election.

Another complicating factor will be retirements. It is always easier to win an open seat than to defeat an incumbent. At this point the only announced retirement to my knowledge is Republican Richard Burr in North Carolina which is a battleground state. I expect others to retire but I don’t expect many announcements until at least after Thanksgiving.

This is a way too early look but it does illustrate the importance of the 2020 Senate elections. If the Democrats want to take back control of the upper chamber they would be well advised to do it this fall.

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