‘I Believe We Will Win the House’: Pelosi Makes Midterm Prediction in Late-Night Interview

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she thinks her party will hold the House despite grim omens for House Democrats’ prospects in the November midterm elections.

During an Oct. 3 appearance on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” Pelosi was asked for her midterm prediction.

“I believe that we will win the House—hold the House,” Pelosi said. “And we will hold the House—by winning more seats.”

Though observers widely expect Republicans to return to the majority in 2023 after four years in the minority, Pelosi has remained adamant that her party will maintain control of the lower chamber.

In 2018, Democrats rode a “blue wave” to retake control of the House from Republicans, but the GOP retained control of the Senate. In 2020, Democrats’ margins shrunk substantially. At the moment, Pelosi can only absorb a handful of defections to avoid a vote failing.

During her appearance on Colbert’s show, Pelosi chalked up Democrats’ net loss of seats in 2020 to the fact that President Donald Trump’s name was on the ballot.

Pelosi continued, “We won the 40 seats [during the 2018 midterms], then we lost some when Trump was on the ballot—we lost some of the Trump districts—but we held enough seats to hold the House with him on the ballot.”

“He’s not on the ballot now,” Pelosi added.

As of the afternoon of Oct. 4, polling firm FiveThirtyEight gave Republicans a 69 in 100 chance of retaking the House after four years in the minority. However, prospects in the Senate are less sanguine for Republicans, and most observers expect that Democrats will retain the upper chamber—forcing Democrats to brace for the possibility of a divided government in 2023.

A Divided Caucus

Though Pelosi promised in 2018 that her stint as speaker in the 116th Congress would be her last as Democrats’

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