Midterms coverage
2 pieces so far. The rail is not padded with loosely-related politics coverage: a hub that pads reads as a hub with nothing to say.
Becerra Leads California's 2026 Governor Market on Polymarket
Polymarket's California governor contract has one clear leader and a long tail of sub-1% names. What the structure of the market actually tells you.
Polymarket's Republican retirement count sits at 36 to 39, with a non-trivial tail above 44
A Polymarket contract on how many House Republicans skip 2026 has settled on a clear favourite band, but the long tail is doing something interesting.
Races by state
This table is Senate races only. Governor races are priced state by state on the same venue and are not shown here.
50 states; 33 appear here. 16 have no Senate market we could find, and this table does not tell you whether that means no contest or a contest nobody is pricing: the roster it would be checked against is not filled, so "no market" is a claim we can make and "no race" is not. Oregon has a market, but under $10,000 has changed hands in it since it opened, which is our floor for treating a price as readable at all.
Trading in the seven days to 12 August 2026
15 races, ordered by volume in that window rather than by lifetime totals. A market's whole history says where interest has been; that week says where it was.
Lifetime and 24 hour volumes are shown on wider screens.
| State | Lifetime | 7 days | 24 hours | Share traded this week |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Michigan42.2% most of its trading has happened this week | $319,750 | $135,003 | $26,099 | 42.2%most of its trading has happened this week |
| Texas10.1% actively traded this week | $734,585 | $74,459 | $48,187 | 10.1%actively traded this week |
| Maine2.1% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $1,133,644 | $24,070 | $1,018 | 2.1%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| Alaska3.4% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $391,657 | $13,376 | $6,434 | 3.4%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| Georgia11.5% actively traded this week | $106,827 | $12,327 | $3,468 | 11.5%actively traded this week |
| Montana5.9% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $106,875 | $6,310 | $1,523 | 5.9%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| Ohio special3.8% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $133,154 | $5,126 | $4,168 | 3.8%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| Florida special6.3% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $67,151 | $4,201 | $2,298 | 6.3%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| New Hampshire9.6% actively traded this week | $42,386 | $4,074 | $995 | 9.6%actively traded this week |
| Minnesota10.1% actively traded this week | $38,499 | $3,904 | $3,233 | 10.1%actively traded this week |
| Iowa1.1% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $172,532 | $1,976 | $53 | 1.1%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| Kansas4.3% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $39,593 | $1,705 | $253 | 4.3%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| South Carolina1.1% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $119,134 | $1,310 | $60 | 1.1%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| New Mexico6% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $18,688 | $1,126 | $200 | 6%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
| Idaho2.1% mostly traded earlier in the cycle | $28,635 | $587 | $582 | 2.1%mostly traded earlier in the cycle |
No trading in that window
In most of these the price already says why.
Some races price a named candidate, others price a party. That is the market's own framing, not ours: where a leg names a party rather than a person, it usually means no candidate has been settled on yet. We show whichever the market uses.
Lifetime volume is shown on wider screens.
| State | Market leader | Lifetime |
|---|---|---|
| North Carolina | Roy Cooper (D) 91% | $88,676 |
| Colorado | Democrat 96% | $47,965 |
| Mississippi | Republican 92% | $35,153 |
| Illinois | Juliana Stratton (D) 94.6% | $29,054 |
| Tennessee | Republican 95.7% | $24,669 |
| Massachusetts | Democrat 96.7% | $24,225 |
| Louisiana | Republican 93% | $23,581 |
| New Jersey | Democrat 95.5% | $19,909 |
| Oklahoma | Republican 94.5% | $19,316 |
| Wyoming | Republican 96.3% | $16,713 |
| Delaware | Democrat 95.5% | $15,954 |
| Kentucky | Andy Barr (R) 92.3% | $15,679 |
| Virginia | Democrat 93.5% | $14,427 |
| Arkansas | Republican 93.5% | $13,775 |
| West Virginia | Republican 95.1% | $12,477 |
| Alabama | Republican 94.5% | $12,205 |
| Rhode Island | Democrat 95.5% | $10,302 |
| South Dakota | Republican 94.1% | $10,184 |