There weren't 43 House retirements in 2018 "fearing a wave".
Just 23 House Republicans "fled" politics and retired. But of those just 8 seats flipped to the Democrats, or 35%. 65% were Republican holds.
Republicans lost CA-39, CA-49, FL-27, MI-11, NJ-2, NJ-11, PA-06 and WA-8. If you want to blame these losses on Republican retirements, you might as well credit Republican retirements for keeping the remaining 15 seats Republican: FL-15, FL-17, KS-2, MS-03, PA-13, SC-04, TN-02, TX-02, TX-03, TX-05, TX-06, TX-21, VA-05, VA-06 and WI-01 (Paul Ryan's seat). Which will it be?
The whole idea is stupid and vindictive, especially when considering that Republicans still allocated big bucks trying to retain control of retired seats even as Republican incumbents went down to defeat in six of the ten costliest races in the nation: CA-25, CA-48, CO-6, FL-26, MN-3 and NY-19.
Reuters ranked the retired Republican WA-8 loss the second most expensive House race in the country. Another analysis put the retired Republican losses in CA-39 and CA-49 fourth and third among the ten costliest House races in the country, with the GOP-retained seat in retired TX-02 the ninth most expensive House race.
The fact of the matter is Democrats outraised and outspent Republicans in this cycle in order to repudiate the 2016 Trump victory. Considering that it was by far the most expensive midterm ever, it's a wonder Democrats didn't do better than they did.
