2017-2018 Governors' Races: Where Power Is Most and Least Likely to Flip

With elections in dozens of states, the leading parties have reason to worry in almost half of them.

It may be a bit on the early side to be handicapping the upcoming governors' races when all but two are basically two years away. But with Democrats now shut out of the White House and Congress, the large crop of gubernatorial races on tap in 2017 and 2018 has become crucial to the party’s survival as a significant player in American politics.

Unsurprisingly, the Democrats have a lot of ground to make up. Currently, the GOP holds a historically wide edge of 33-16 in gubernatorial offices, with one governor -- Alaska’s Bill Walker -- an independent.

The gubernatorial battleground in 2018 will be especially important because it offers Democrats the biggest potential haul of governorships in advance of the once-every-decade legislative and congressional redistricting process that will begin after the 2020 Census. In most states, governors play a role in redistricting, and with the Republicans currently controlling the majority of legislatures, the Democrats will need a seat at the table to avoid being drawn out of most of the maps.

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