MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow referenced the “House popular vote” in an effort to explain how the Nov. 6th midterm elections really did represent the “blue wave” many Democrats had been hoping to create.

“As of this morning, the Democratic lead in the US House popular vote is up to 7.3%, from 7.2% yesterday. For comparison purposes, note that in 2010 – which was widely seen as a GOP ‘wave’ cycle – Republicans won the US House popular vote by 6.6%,” Maddow tweeted. (RELATED: Rachel Maddow Equates Trump’s Voter Fraud Tweet To 1922 KKK Leaflets)

“As of this morning, the Democratic lead in the US House popular vote is up to 7.3%, from 7.2% yesterday. For comparison purposes, note that in 2010 – which was widely seen as a GOP “wave” cycle – Republicans won the US House popular vote by 6.6%.”https://t.co/p6HxY6iDwo — Rachel Maddow MSNBC (@maddow) November 16, 2018

What Maddow was saying was that overall, more nationwide votes were cast for Democrats in House seats than for Republicans. She further noted that the Democrats’ total vote advantage — 7.3 percent — was greater than the advantage enjoyed by Republicans — 6.6 percent — in 2010.

Maddow left out the fact that the House popular vote is not actually a metric used to officially determine anything — and that the number of House seats gained by Democrats in 2018 (as many as 40 once the final votes are tallied) is still dwarfed by the record number of seats gained by Republicans in 2010, when President Obama lost 63 House seats and six more in the Senate.

The MSNBC host is not the only one running with the “House popular vote” narrative.

I don’t think people are ready for the crisis that will follow if Democrats win the House popular vote but not the majority. After Kavanaugh, Trump, Garland, Citizens United, Bush v. Gore, etc, the party is on the edge of losing faith in the system (and reasonably so). — Ezra Klein (@ezraklein) November 5, 2018

So here’s an updated map showing House popular vote winners, mapped onto the Electoral College. Dark blue/dark red means the party won by >= 5 points, light blue/pink means it was close. pic.twitter.com/nehg9YEZ6u — Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) November 11, 2018

Per @Redistrict, the Dem lead in the national House vote is now 6.7 pts, 52.5%-45.8% — and it will likely grow as more CA ballots get counted https://t.co/t48ZHQ8BkI For perspective:

’94: R+7pts

’06: D+6.4pts

’10: R+6.6pts https://t.co/CdVTVlFNTa — Mark Murray (@mmurraypolitics) November 12, 2018

Additionally, a number of commentators suggested that Democrats winning the “Senate popular vote” (which also does not exist as a real metric) was an indicator that there is a flaw in the way that Senators are chosen. (RELATED: Imaginary ‘Senate Popular Vote Pushed By Media Elite Who Apparently Forgot High School Civics)

In spite of Maddow’s assertion, a number of news personalities admitted even as the vote tallies were still coming in that the “blue wave” just wasn’t going to happen.

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