Predicting the Midterms a Year In Advance Is Hard

Amid the dire predictions for Democrats in next year’s midterm elections, Walter Shapiro looks back at what the pundits said for every midterm election since 1994.

“Handicapping off-year congressional elections nearly 400 days in advance has proven about as accurate as an eighteenth-century blunderbuss. Yes, the forerunner of the shotgun could hit its target. But its accuracy was limited, and it carried the risk of misfiring.”