Notes & Sources

• Analysis includes only the House districts rated as “Toss-up” by at least two of three of the following:  Cook Political Report; Sabato’s Crystal Ball; Inside Elections.  Our analysis is updated as these ratings change up to November 2026.

• For purpose of donation recommendations, only races with a Democratic candidate selected are included in the target analysis, so more races will be encompassed after the 2026 primaries.

• House race spending is tracked for both 2024 actual spending (by the campaigns as reported to the FEC, and by outside sources as reported on OpenSecrets.com) and reported 2026 funds raised per the FEC.

• Rankings of Affordability combine 2024 total spending and 2026 funds raised, then rank districts among “Toss-up” subset by share of total “Toss-up” race costs for 2024 plus 2026.

• Actual 2024 House race votes are as reported on Ballotpedia.  As the campaign cycle progresses, the margin of 2024 will be combined with the polling of 2026 candidates once each district has an identified Democratic candidate, and third-party polling is available.  Initially, without 2026 race polling, Tightness is measured by the margin of the 2024 district election among these 2026 “Toss-up” districts.

• The Impact Index is calculated and updated using the ratio of Tightness and Affordability, with the Index value driven higher by both Tightness and Affordability in each district.  The rankings and recommendation for donations is based on those races where incremental donations have the potential to affect outcomes due to impacting the tightest, lowest-cost House races in the country.