Days after the U.S. midterm elections began, the vote counting continues, all with control of the Senate and House still in the air.
Yesterday Democrats took the lead in Maryland's 6th congressional district, and now they only have to flip four more contests to maintain control of the House of Representatives, assuming the Republicans don't flip any outstanding seats the Democrats currently lead in.
Here are seven examples of house elections Republicans currently lead but may flip to Democrats as the vote counting concludes.
California 13th congressional district (Cook Partisan Voting Index = D+4)
Republican John Duarte leads Democrat Adam Gray by 84 votes, with 44% counted. This race has no incumbent and should be the Democrats' most likely flip moving forward.
California 22nd congressional district (Cook Partisan Voting Index = D+5)
Incumbent Republican David Valadao leads Democrat Rudy Salas by 3900 votes, with only 32% counted. However, the largest county, favouring Democrats, has only 22% of its vote counted.
New York 22nd congressional district (Cook Partisan Voting Index = R+1)
Republican Brandon Williams leads Democrat Francis Conole by 3900 votes, with 94% counted. This race has no incumbent and contains the cities of Utica and Syracuse. It is unclear who is favoured by the outstanding votes, but Conole leads in the largest county with 56% of the vote.
California 41st congressional district (Cook Partisan Voting Index = R+3)
Incumbent Republican Ken Calvert leads Democrat Will Rollins by 1600 votes, with 47% counted. It is unclear who the remaining vote favours, considering the district only exists in one county.
Arizona 6th congressional district (Cook Partisan Voting Index = R+3)
Republican Juan Ciscomani leads Democrat Kirsten Engel by 2,900 votes, with 82% counted. Is the outstanding vote in Arizona Democrat or Republican? Folks watching the senate races have been wondering that for days. This race has no incumbent, and the vote seems to be narrowing.
Oregon 5th congressional district (Cook Partisan Voting Index = D+2)
The incumbent Democrat Kurt Schrader lost his primary to Jamie McLeod-Skinner, who trails Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer by 6800 votes with 86% counted. It is unclear who is favoured in the outstanding vote. The largest county, Clackamas, has about 30% of the vote left to count and is currently Democrat.
Colorado 3rd congressional district (Cook Partisan Voting Index = R+7)
MAGA firebrand Republican Lauren Boebert only leads Democrat challenger Adam Frisch by 1100 votes with 99% counted. The outstanding vote appears mostly in Democrat counties, but there may not be enough left to overcome Boeberts lead.
There is a district with a D+4 PVI, California 27th, and Biden carried it by about 10 points in 2020. However, the Republican incumbent Mike Garcia is comfortably beating the Democrat challenger Christy Smith with 50% of the votes counted.
This election was indeed profoundly local. Democrats and Republicans are under-performing and over-performing to different degrees in districts all over the country because priorities, demographics and candidate quality varies everywhere.