How many House seats will Republicans hold after the Midterms?
Classic midterm turnover in the House could upset the new politics.
Knife-Edge House
Prediction markets keep a tight watch on the makeup of Congress, and today we look at the contracts for the number of GOP seats (currently 219) following the 2026 U.S. midterms.
Nearly anything could happen - redistricting lawsuits, retirement cascades, special-election signals, and uneven fundraising could all change the final tally next year. Let’s take a look.
Follow the market: How many House seats will Republicans hold after the Midterms? on Kalshi
Familiar Patterns
Republicans hold a razor-thin House majority with 219 members, 213 with the Democrats, and 3 vacancies. The setup for 2026 is standard midterm gravity: unified party control rarely survives the first midterm. Voters have pulled it back for five consecutive cycles. The battleground is broad: dozens of districts in New York and California plus Biden-to-Trump suburbs and a few rural Democratic holdouts.
Kalshi’s strip clusters in the 208-217 corridor, which tracks with that map. But the payout curve still underprices a midterm penalty under a Republican president, with policy pain that bites hardest when turnout drops.
If We Tilt The Map And Squint
Turnout composition is the fulcrum. Trump’s 2024 win leaned on irregular voters who historically skip midterms. That is the core risk the 2024 mobilization model now poses a challenge for the GOP because those voters fail to show in midterms. Democrats are not surging by any stretch, but the reversion toward habitual voters helps blue-leaning suburbs that punished the GOP brand in 2018 and 2022.