Nancy Pelosi’s goal is to win 25 seats. Here’s how she thinks it can happen.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told The Washington Post Tuesday that her goal is to win 25 seats this November — a bold statement given that historical trends suggest that the party of a sitting president usually loses seats in the sixth year of his term.

Political forecasters generally agree that Republicans will expand their majority in November. Even The Washington Post’s Election Lab predicted Tuesday that Republicans have a 99 percent chance of retaining control of the House.

Democrats need to hold on to the seats they currently control and win another 17 in order to win the majority. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, responsible for electing more Democrats to the House, lists about 35 seats they’d like to flip from “red to blue,” so even Pelosi’s goal is more modest than her own campaign committee.

Which seats does Pelosi think Democrats can win? How will Democrats do it? She didn’t name them all, but she named at least 13 races by district or candidate during the interview.

We have a large number of women candidates who are running. Kathleen Rice in Long Island. Across the country a good array of women candidates. I just really have a high degree of respect for all of them.

“For example, in Virginia we have John Foust running. In the Frank Wolf seat. I love Frank Wolf, I’ll miss him terribly, he’s my dear friend. But having said that, he’s not running. John Foust, he’s top-notch.

“I mentioned Kathleen Rice in New York, that’s not a Republican seat, it’s a Democratic seat but it’s a seat we have to hold. Sean Eldridge up there is an important candidate for us. In Staten Island, Domenic Recchia. He’s a New Yorker, a perfect fit for the district. He’s really quite remarkable. We have to hold New England, we have everything in New England, We have to hold New England. We have Martha Robertson in the Seneca Falls area of New York, she’s great. Sean Eldridge, Dominic Recchia, Aaron Woolf. So we have great candidates there.

“Let’s go to New Jersey, Amy Belgard. She’s really terrific. She was in before the current incumbent got out of the race. We have [Bill] Hughes in that race up there against [Rep. Frank] LoBiondo. I don’t know how that one is going. But I’ve been to a number of fundraisers with Aimee Belgard, because she comes over to our events in Philadelphia, where we have a number of good candidates there.

“Virginia, I mentioned. Florida, you know is big for us. We’ll see how it goes. We have a few and we won that [legal] decision. Now we’ll see what the judge says about where we go from here. For now and for the future, but it really was necessary. It was a major involvement all around. But worth it. We have a wonderful candidate in Illinois, running there and she’s a judge. Judge [Ann] Callis. She stepped aside from being a judge in order to run for the seat. I mean, this is a big deal.

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