Calif. GOP rep: We’ll win a dozen seats

MODESTO, Calif. — Rep. Jeff Denham (R-Calif.) is predicting his party will pick up a dozen seats in the House and regain control of the Senate. 

“I think we’ll get to 245; I think we get 12” new House Republicans, which he said could include picking off vulnerable Golden State Democratic incumbents Rep. Ami Bera and Scott Peters, the lawmaker told The Hill in an exclusive interview.

{mosads}”I think we are going to pick up seats [the National Republican Congressional Committee] didn’t plan on initially, in California, Illinois and New York,” the candidate said following a Chamber of Commerce luncheon here, the heart of his 10th District. 

Bera, Denham’s Democratic colleague to the north, disagreed with the GOP lawmaker’s assessment. 

“I think Jeff’s not paying close attention. … I think we’re going to win a lot of those races,” Bera predicted in an interview with The Hill from his campaign headquarters. 

“For folks like Scott Peters, myself, [Illinois Democratic Rep.] Brad Schneider — we’ve all known we were going to have tough elections because we won by small margins, so we’ve been working from day one knowing that the best way to get through the election is through your constituents,” the Sacramento Democrat explained. 

Nonpartisan political handicappers, however, predict that Republicans will pick up between four and 10 House seats on Nov. 4. 

On the trail in his own district, Denham was confident about his chances of getting reelected.

The Turlock almond farmer, a target of Democrats because his district voted for President Obama in 2012, was in positive spirits in the final days of the midterm campaign.

Across his agriculture-heavy district, the lack of large campaign signs for Denham and his opponent, fellow farmer and beekeeper Mike Eggman, was noticeably different than the campaign brawl happening in the nearby 7th District. 

Bera’s GOP opponent, former three-term Rep. Doug Ose, loaned his campaign $700,000 in the first two weeks of October, money that sources tell The Hill will be invested in additional television ads in the last week of the campaign.