The 10 key bellwether House races
10/12/11 | Politico

The battle for control of the House is still in its early stages, but a crop of contests have emerged as barometers for the national environment. How they develop will provide clues to whether Democrats will be positioned to retake the House or whether the conservative tide that thrust Republicans into the majority will keep rolling into 2012.

Whether Democrats can make inroads in a Midwest region that dealt the party a stunning blow in the midterms or whether Republicans can make lasting gains in the Northeast, which once overwhelmingly favored Democrats, could be foretold by just a few races. Another contest will offer a glimpse at which direction Hispanics - one of the fastest-growing voting blocs in the country - are moving politically.

Here are POLITICO's top 10 House bellwethers.

Ohio's 6th and 16th districts

Incumbents: GOP Reps. Bill Johnson and Jim Renacci

There are few states that move as consistently with the national tide as Ohio, and the races for these two districts will provide a trove of information about the national environment. Both northern Ohio districts lean slightly Republican, both favored Democrats in the Obama-led 2008 Democratic wave and both are now represented by freshman Republicans. Democrats lost a swath of seats across the industrial Midwest, and if Republicans can retain these two districts, they could very well hold down a critical part of the country whose support helped to propel them into the majority. It's no accident that Johnson and Renacci were among the first members inducted into the National Republican Congressional Committee's Patriot Program to protect incumbents.

Pennsylvania's 8th District

Incumbent: GOP Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick

Bucks County had been Democratic-friendly in recent years - backing Barack Obama and John Kerry and electing Democrat Patrick Murphy in 2006. But Democrats had a rude awakening in 2010, when the suburban Philadelphia-based 8th District went sharply for Fitzpatrick, who just four years earlier had lost the seat he had held for a term. Fitzpatrick's reelection bid will test whether Democrats can win back some of the suburban voters who supported them in 2006 and 2008 but broke away last year. Obama won 54 percent of the vote here in 2008, and if he can replicate that success, it will suggest Democrats have regained strength with that key voting bloc.

see the rest of Politico's 10 Key Bellweather Houses Races »