ANALYSIS — New district-level analysis confirms what Republicans have been bragging about for months: 2024 was a good year for the GOP.
On the surface, Republicans won the White House, took over the Senate and held the House. But a deeper dive into the results in individual House districts gives more texture to the underlying partisan shifts and geographic success that contributed to President Donald Trump’s edge over Democrat Kamala Harris in the national popular vote.
Using Inside Elections’ Baseline metric as a guide, 24 of the 25 House districts that shifted the most from 2022 to 2024 did so in Republicans’ favor. Unlike the 10 most evenly divided seats at the core of the current House battleground, very few of the seats that shifted the most are particularly competitive, and some of them are among the most partisan in the country.
Inside Elections’ Baseline metric captures a congressional district’s (or state’s) political performance by combining all federal and state election results over the past four election cycles into a single score. This index aims to approximate what share of the vote a “typical” Democrat or Republican might receive in any given district by including elections beyond presidential contests.
Overall, 254 House districts saw a shift in partisan performance toward Republicans, while 166 saw Baseline movement toward Democrats.
The two districts that shifted the most might be the least interesting, but both provide insight into how the Baseline score works.
West Virginia’s 1st and 2nd districts shifted toward Republicans by 16.5 points and 10.3 points respectively. Both are GOP- held: Rep. Carol Miller’s 1st District went from R+17.5 in 2022 to R+34 in 2024; Rep. Riley Moore’s 2nd went from R+23.1 in 2022 to R+33.4 in 2024.
Those shifts were driven by the dropping of the 2016 results, which included then-Democrat Jim Justice’s 7-point win for governor and Democratic wins for state auditor and treasurer, and the addition of the 2024 results. Those 2016 results were the last statewide victories by Democrats not named Joe Manchin.
But many of the other districts that saw large shifts help tell the story of the 2024 elections, and potentially beyond.
Nine of the 24 districts that shifted toward Republicans are in New York, though most of them remain very Democratic. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s 14th District shifted toward the GOP by 8.3 points, according to the Inside Elections Baseline, but Democrats still have more than a 50-point advantage there.
It was a similar trend in other very Democratic seats in the Empire State. Grace Meng’s 6th District saw a shift of 8 points toward Republicans, along with Ritchie Torres’ 15th (7.3 points), Gregory W. Meeks’ 5th (6.9 points), Nydia M. Velázquez’ 7th (5.6 points), Yvette D. Clarke’s 9th (5.4 points), Adriano Espaillat’s 13th (5 points) and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries’ 8th (4.9 points). Republicans also improved by 6.9 points in GOP Rep. Nicole Malliotakis’ 11th District.
These are not competitive seats in the general election but help show how Trump cut his losing margin in New York from 23 points in 2020 to 13 points in 2024 and how he finished ahead of Harris in the national popular vote. Quite simply, Trump lost by less in a lot of Democratic areas around the country.
Two of the biggest pro-Republican shifts came in New Jersey, including the 8th District represented by Democratic Rep. Rob Menendez, which moved by 9.4 points, and the 9th won by Democrat Nellie Pou, which saw an 8.2-point shift. That helps explain how the Garden State, which Harris won by 5.9 points, was nearly as close as Arizona, where Trump won by 5.5 points.
Other shifts from 2022 to 2024 could be a sign of things to come.
In South Florida, a pair of GOP-held seats shifted further Republican: the 26th District represented by Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (5.7 points) and the 28th District held by Rep. Carlos Gimenez (5.6 points), more evidence of Democratic struggles with Hispanic voters in the region. That’s a reason why Democrats aren’t particularly excited about competing in either the Senate or gubernatorial race in the Sunshine State this cycle.
In Texas, Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez’s district, under its current lines, still has a significant 15.7-point Baseline advantage for Democrats even though it shifted 5.7 points toward Republicans. But state Republicans have since redrawn the congressman’s South Texas seat to one with a Democratic Baseline advantage of just a single point.
For years, Republicans have been claiming that Indiana’s 1st District is moving in their direction, even though they haven’t had any success in defeating Democratic Rep. Frank J. Mrvan. But the Inside Elections Baseline backs up the GOP’s optimism with a shift of 5.1 points. While it retains a Democratic edge of 7.2 points, the White House is pressuring state legislators to redraw the district to make it more Republican.
Of the 25 seats with the largest Baseline shift from 2022 to 2024, just one moved in Democrats’ direction. Utah’s 3rd District, represented by GOP Rep. Mike Kennedy, saw a swing of 4.9 points. That seat, and the state’s other three districts, are likely to change ahead of the 2026 elections after a Utah district judge ordered them to be redrawn to come into compliance with state law.
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