House Republicans are targeting 26 districts heading into the 2026 midterm elections as the party insists that it is on “offense” to keep and expand its razor-thin majority.
The National Republican Congressional Committee announced its list of congressional districts held by Democrats, including 13 that were won by President Donald Trump in the 2024 election. The list comes as Republicans face a daunting task to keep the majority in the midterm elections, a cycle in which, historically, the House flips to the party opposite the White House.
The last five administrations, including Trump’s first term, began with trifectas, only to have their control of Congress slip away after two years of aggressively pushing their parties’ agendas.
But House Republicans are confident they will control the House throughout Trump’s entire second term.
“House Republicans are in the majority and on offense,” NRCC Chairman Richard Hudson said. “Meanwhile, vulnerable House Democrats have been hard at work demonstrating they are painfully out of touch with hardworking Americans. Republicans are taking the fight straight to these House Democrats in their districts, and we will unseat them next fall.”
Democrats only need a net gain of three seats to retake the majority, and early projections show Democrats defending more vulnerable seats than Republicans. But those same projections, particularly those from Inside Elections, show that Republicans are defending a disproportionately larger number of seats rated “toss-up.”
Seats in Ohio that were considered vulnerable last cycle are not included in Inside Elections’s projections, as the state is likely to undergo redistricting. This could put Reps. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) and Emilia Sykes (D-OH) in more competitive races, while Rep. Greg Landsman’s (D-OH) district is likely to shift slightly more red but remain safe altogether.
Most of the NRCC’s targets are the group’s usual crop from cycles past, including some new Democratic freshmen. Among the seats include the 13 districts won by Trump in 2024, such as those held by Kaptur and Reps. Jared Golden (D-ME) and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-WA).
The GOP campaign arm is also targeting New Jersey’s 9th Congressional District and Texas’s 28th and 34th districts — seats where Trump made significant inroads with Hispanic voters.
Several voting blocs, including Hispanics, trended toward Republicans in 2024 after Democrats missed the mark with working-class voters on issues such as the economy and immigration.
Looking ahead to 2026, Democrats are also significantly investing in lawmakers representing Hispanic-majority districts: Reps. Nellie Pou, who represents New Jersey’s 9th District; Henry Cuellar, who represents Texas’s 28th District; and Vicente Gonzalez, who represents Texas’s 34th District. Other protectees include Reps. George Whitesides (D-CA), Derek Tran (D-CA), Laura Gillen (D-NY), and Josh Riley (D-NY) — all targets of the NRCC.
Cuellar and Gonzalez’s South Texas districts, which are made up heavily of Latino voters, shifted dramatically toward Trump last fall. Pou’s district, a deep-blue stronghold for years, went red for Trump in 2024. Gillen, Riley, Tran, and Whitesides all flipped Republican districts in 2024.
DEMOCRATS SEARCH FOR MESSAGE DISCIPLINE IN FACE OF GOP ‘RIDICULE’
Though Democrats lost the Senate and the White House, the party’s centrist coalition performed well. The New Democrat Coalition defended 85 of 87 seats and brought its membership up to 114, with Chairman Brad Schneider (D-IL) attributing their success to focusing more on “pocketbook issues” and less on “theatrics.”
“House Democrats overperformed across the country in 2024, powered by our battle-tested candidates who won despite the NRCC’s false bravado and these Frontliners will win again in the midterms,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spokesman Viet Shelton said in a statement to the Washington Examiner. “The truth is House Republicans are running scared and refusing to hold town halls because they don’t want to get yelled at for their failure to lower prices, bungling the economy, and cutting Medicaid in order to pay for tax breaks for billionaires like Elon Musk.”