The GOP’s hopes for doing more than just barely retaking the Senate are looking grim.
The GOP’s hopes for doing more than just barely retaking the Senate are looking grim.
E very two years, when I look at the fall polling in Senate races, I use the same basic framework. First, I note that mid-September polls are typically not the last word in these races, which tend to move in a wave direction nationally, either in the direction of reflecting toward the president’s approval rating (in midterm years) or with the presidential race (in presidential years). Second, I look at the RealClearPolitics poll averages with particular attention to how far each candidate is from the magic 50 percent mark and what share of the remaining undecided vote would need to break in the Republican candidate’s direction to get to 50. I typically also flag how robust the data are for each race — how many polls make up each state’s average, and how many of those are relatively recent.
I’ve explained the method and its basis in history before, here.
We have less fresh polling than usual: Only three Senate races (in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin) have more than two polls that concluded on or after September 10. Incumbents are designated in bold. Here’s where things stand:
A few cautions should be on the table before we get to the analysis. One, there’s always a race or two that is weirdly placed because the polling is so thin and/or so stale. Washington is this year’s candidate: I have no reason to believe that Maria Cantwell is in any trouble, but she polled at just 39 percent in May, so her opponent, Raul Garcia, shows up here as being mathematically within striking distance even though he was an unknown polling at 30 percent in a blue state, in a race that hasn’t been polled in four months. Two other races (New Jersey and Tennessee) have not been polled since Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, and in the case of New Jersey, the last poll in the race was taken in April, before incumbent Bob Menendez was convicted and abandoned his independent bid. That’s why I left Washington and New Jersey out of the graph at the top of this column.
The picture for Republicans may not be hopeless, but it is grim. They should win back control of the Senate, because all they need is to gain West Virginia and Montana and lose no seats. West Virginia hasn’t even been polled (neither has an open-seat race in Delaware that Democrats are expected to win), and Tim Sheehy has hit the magic 50 percent already in Montana — not a sure thing, but an optimistic one in a red state. Ted Cruz and Rick Scott, the two Republican incumbents facing any real challenge in holding their seats, are both well-funded, battle-tested in winning close races in the past, and holding respectable poll leads as of early this month. Unless and until there’s a shift against them or the campaigns get really complacent, there’s no reason for alarm in either race.
But only going from 49 to 51 seats would be a deeply disappointing outcome for Republicans this cycle. With open seats in Michigan and Arizona, a red-state Democrat incumbent in Ohio, and Democrats running in presidential battlegrounds in Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, Republicans should be competing to get to 57 seats, and realistically hoping for 53 or 54. That’s even leaving aside Maryland — where a strong Republican candidate is running an uphill race in a blue state — and even after Biden and Menendez departing from the race dashed all but the most pie-eyed prospects for expanding the map to include New Mexico, Minnesota, Virginia, and Maine.
Unfortunately for the party, it’s running terrible candidates in Arizona (Kari Lake) and Minnesota (Royce White), and a weak one in Ohio (Bernie Moreno). Eric Hovde seems to be going nowhere in taking out Tammy Baldwin in Wisconsin. Larry Hogan is finding himself caught in Maryland’s partisan undertow. The two candidates who have tried most to unify traditional and MAGA Republicans and ride the presidential turnout (Dave McCormick in Pennsylvania and Mike Rogers in Michigan) are still polling in the low 40s, no better than where Lake is. Only Ohio still looks seriously competitive; while it would be premature to count out McCormick or Rogers just yet, both need the momentum to shift in Trump’s direction if they have any hope of riding his coattails.
A 51-seat Senate majority would be a major improvement in Republican leverage, especially if the party wins the White House and could win tiebreaking party-line votes with just one defection. But it still means being at the mercy of Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins, as well as other senators who may defect on particular issues. And these seats aren’t up again in a presidential election year until 2036. With Mitch McConnell stepping down, the new leader of the Republican caucus may have some serious introspection to do in examining how the party — if things continue as they are today — blew so many opportunities.