Texas State Senate Rankings 2006
Not looking good for Democrats chances to retake the Senate in 2006, despite being a good year nationally. First of all, of the 31 seats in the Texas State Senate, only 16 are up for election. Democrats would have to pick off 4 senate seats to retake control. Seats not listed here are not up for election. Here are the rankings:
Disclaimer #1: Now I want to make sure you all know that I'm a complete amateur at this. I don't have any special information. Just the Texas Secretary of State's website and Quorum Report's candidate list. My methodology is as follows. Freshmen, imcumbents whose last election was close, and incumbents who represent districts of the opposite partisan leaning (using QR's 2002 Dewhurst/Sharp numbers) are three categories of incumbent who might be endangered. Incumbents get one point of vulnerability for each category they belong to. Open seats where the holding party has at least 40% of the vote are tossups. The seat gets a point of safety for each 10% above 50% of partisan imabalance. Example: SD-03 is 57%-43% Republican by the Dewhurst-Sharp numbers. So it's a tossup. SD-07 on the other hand is 72%-28% Republican. It starts as a tossup, loses one point of vulnerability for Republicans for being over 60%, and one more for being over 70%, leaving it at Likely Republican.
Disclaimer #2: This chart represents potential vulnerability. Both parties actually have yet to find challengers for a number of seats held by the opposing party. Obviously, those seats will only become vulnerable if they are contested. I'll update this again later if and when I acquire more information.
Disclaimer #3: Other key bits of information I don't have: district-bounded matchup or approval polling, a good bipartisan scandal list, and biographies of existing challengers. If I can acquire that information, I'll include it. It's certainly all relevant. But I've done the best I could with what I've got.
Safe Democratic
Ellis (SD-13)
Whitmire (SD-15)
Madla (SD-19)
Shapleigh (SD-29)
Likely Democratic
(none)
Leans Democratic
Armbrister (SD-18)
SD-14 Open (Barrientos)
Democratic-held Tossup
(none)
Republican-held Tossup
SD-03 Open (Staples)
Leans Republican
Eltife (SD-01)
Likely Republican
Deuell (SD-02)
Averitt (SD-22)
SD-07 Open (Lindsay)
Solid Republican
Wentworth (SD-25)
Janek (SD-17)
Ogden (SD-05)
Shapiro (SD-08)
Nelson (SD-12)
Disclaimer #1: Now I want to make sure you all know that I'm a complete amateur at this. I don't have any special information. Just the Texas Secretary of State's website and Quorum Report's candidate list. My methodology is as follows. Freshmen, imcumbents whose last election was close, and incumbents who represent districts of the opposite partisan leaning (using QR's 2002 Dewhurst/Sharp numbers) are three categories of incumbent who might be endangered. Incumbents get one point of vulnerability for each category they belong to. Open seats where the holding party has at least 40% of the vote are tossups. The seat gets a point of safety for each 10% above 50% of partisan imabalance. Example: SD-03 is 57%-43% Republican by the Dewhurst-Sharp numbers. So it's a tossup. SD-07 on the other hand is 72%-28% Republican. It starts as a tossup, loses one point of vulnerability for Republicans for being over 60%, and one more for being over 70%, leaving it at Likely Republican.
Disclaimer #2: This chart represents potential vulnerability. Both parties actually have yet to find challengers for a number of seats held by the opposing party. Obviously, those seats will only become vulnerable if they are contested. I'll update this again later if and when I acquire more information.
Disclaimer #3: Other key bits of information I don't have: district-bounded matchup or approval polling, a good bipartisan scandal list, and biographies of existing challengers. If I can acquire that information, I'll include it. It's certainly all relevant. But I've done the best I could with what I've got.
posted by Abram | 6:51 PM
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