Democrats overperforming in State House, but are in dead heats in critical State Senate Seats
Democrats are overperforming in Pennsylvania’s state legislative races, just not the chamber they need to be.
Over the weekend, State Navigate conducted six polls in some of the most crucial state legislative races in southeastern Pennsylvania across Bucks, Montgomery, Lehigh, and Berks counties: four in the State House and two in the State Senate. Democrats are overperforming in the State House compared to our forecast just last week: Republicans were favored by a few tenths of a percentage point in Upper Bucks’ HD-143 and western Lehigh’s HD-187. Democrats are up 3 points in HD-187 and 5 in HD-143, and as a result they’re now slight favorites to flip both of these districts in our Pennsylvania Forecast. Instead of having a 3-point lead as our forecast expected in HD-131 last week, Republicans are actually tied with Democrats in HD-131. Their lead in HD-147 is also about 4 points closer than what our forecast had last week for HD-147, with Republicans having just a 1-point lead in this district.
The State House isn’t in play this year, though: Democrats are almost certain to retain their majority and expand it further. The real question is if Democrats can reach 25 seats in the State Senate. Democrats have a 1-point lead in SD-16, which is in line with where our forecast has been for this district. However, they’re significantly underperforming what our forecast’s expectations were in the most Democratic-friendly pickup opportunity in SD-24: our forecast has had Democrats up between 6 and 7 points in this district, but our poll shows them with just a 2-point lead. That’s significantly moved what was supposed to be a layup for them in our forecast.
You can check the full results for each poll below.