Representative Mike Coffman, Republican of Colorado, right, and his opponent, Andrew Romanoff, a Democrat and the speaker of the Colorado House of Representatives, in a debate last Thursday.
After countless dire emails and months of fading bravado, national Democrats in recent days have signaled with their money what they have been loath to acknowledge out loud: They will not win back the House and they will most likely lose additional seats in November.
Since last week, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has essentially given up efforts to unseat Republicans in several races, pulling advertising money from a dozen campaigns in Republican-held districts to focus on protecting its embattled incumbents.
Democrats need 17 Republican seats to win back the majority, but of the 25 races still on the campaign committee’s battlefield, only seven currently belong to Republicans. That means Democrats are playing defense in 18 districts and offense in seven.
“This is shaping up to be the quintessential sixth year of a president’s term, and a referendum on this president,” said Representative Greg Walden of Oregon, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, the campaign committee’s Republican counterpart.
Representative Steve Israel of New York, chairman of the Democratic campaign committee, refused on Tuesday to admit the basic math that had put control of the House out of reach.
“I haven’t even conceded the Mets aren’t in the World Series this year,” he said.
But campaign committee aides now say they never really expected to win the majority, and had not been able to gain traction because of President Obama’s stubbornly low approval ratings, Senate races that have gone poorly for the Democrats in states like Colorado and Iowa, and governors races that went sour (Illinois) or never really developed (California, New York.)
They called the retrenchment a “fine-tuning” of the battlefield.
“I absolutely would not say we’re in triage mode,” Mr. Israel insisted. “There’s a difference between triage and making strategic decisions.”
No matter what they call it, the moves over the past week have been drastic. The campaign committee has withdrawn from races once seen as the most promising in the country.
“The mystery for many Democratic consultants is, ‘Where is all the money? Where did it go?’ ” said David Wasserman, a House political analyst at the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, who pronounced himself “flabbergasted” by the committee’s move. “The general feeling had been they had more money than they had winnable races. Now the feeling is they don’t have enough money to counter Republican outside group spending. It’s a surprise.”
Representative Mike Coffman of Colorado, once seen as one of the most vulnerable Republicans in the country, will no longer face advertising by the campaign committee. His opponent, Andrew Romanoff, the speaker of the Colorado House of Representatives, was considered one of the Democratic Party’s best recruits for 2014. But the money that was supposed to take Mr. Romanoff to the finish line was hastily shifted to California to save Representative Ami Bera, who Democrats feared was being buried in an avalanche of Republican spending.
The Romanoff campaign, eager to show the Democrat was not out of the race, released an internal poll Tuesday night showing he was down just a point.
“This remains one of the closest races in the country,” said Denise Baron, a Romanoff spokeswoman. Democrats spent months painting Barbara Comstock, a Virginia state delegate, as too conservative for her suburban Washington district, which has an open seat because Representative Frank Wolf, a Republican, is retiring. Last week, the campaign committee left her opponent, John Foust, a Fairfax County supervisor, to fend for himself.
“The net effect of the decision is there is no effect,” said Shaun Daniels, Mr. Foust’s campaign manager, who maintained that Mr. Foust remained poised for victory.
In California, Representatives Jeff Denham and David Valadeo, Republicans in districts carried by Mr. Obama, were supposed to be doomed by their party’s refusal to embrace immigration reform. A year ago, Washington Democrats hailed their recruits as rising stars.
Two years ago, Rodney Davis, a Republican, won his Southern Illinois House seat by a mere 1,000 votes, and Democrats saw former Circuit Judge Ann Callis as a candidate who was tough enough to knock him off. The Democratic campaign committee even invited her to Mr. Obama’s inauguration in 2013 as they wooed her into the race. Last week, the committee also took its money from her.
“That is such a death blow to a campaign, when the national party pulls out their money,” said Andrea Bozek, the Republican campaign committee’s spokeswoman. “It’s ‘see you later.’ ”
The Republican committee, by contrast, remains in pursuit of 16 House districts held by Democrats, from Maine to California to Florida. Of those, 13 were won by Mr. Obama in 2012.
Republicans set out to win what House leaders called a “governing majority” of 245 seats — 12 more than they hold now. Three weeks before Election Day that appears to be difficult, but not impossible. Mr. Wasserman said the Cook Political Report projected the election would net Republicans from two to 12 seats, with the range likely to fall from five to 10.
“I think we’ll get close if we don’t” reach 245, Mr. Walden said, noting the Republican high-water mark was 246 during Harry Truman’s presidency.
Democratic Party officials say that despite a political environment shifting against them, a blowout is not coming. The Democrats should still win the Southern California seat of retiring Republican Gary G. Miller, a seat held by a Republican in a district dominated by Democrats.
But they are also making strong plays for more Republican seats in Arkansas, the panhandle of Florida, and in Iowa. They are still in the running even in Nebraska’s 2nd House district, where Representative Lee Terry is struggling. And Republicans are making odd moves of their own, rushing to shore up Representatives Lynn Jenkins and Kevin Yoder, in reliably red Kansas.
“What has surprised me,” Mr. Israel said, “is the unconventional has become conventional.”