The campaign of Nebraska senator Deb Fischer writes in, sharing the results of a new survey commissioned by the campaign:
Fischer now holds a six point lead over Dan Osborn, which is outside the margin of error. 48 percent went to Fischer, 42 percent to Osborn, with 10 percent undecided.
The survey, conducted by pollster John Rogers of Torchlight Strategies, was completed over a three day period, October 5 – 8, 2024. The margin of error on the survey at a 95 percent confidence level is +/-4 percent.
Now, here’s the thing: Donald Trump’s going to win the state of Nebraska by a lot. The last three statewide polls conducted by the two major Senate campaigns all have Trump ahead by 20 percentage points. Last time around, Trump won the state by 19 percentage points, which added up to more than 182,000 votes.
You’re telling me that something in the ballpark of 180,000 Nebraskans — about a fifth of all voters in the state — are going to vote for Trump and then in one of the state’s two Senate races, vote for a guy who’s a Bernie Sanders fan?
When GOP Maine senator Susan Collins defied all the polls — and I mean all the polls — and won her reelection bid in 2020, Joe Biden was winning her state by nine percentage points. In every other Senate race in the past two cycles, if Trump won the state, the GOP senator won the Senate race.
If this is such a competitive race, why is the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee throwing money into Florida and Texas, but not here?
On Election Night in Nebraska, one of two things will be true. Either Osborn will have pulled off the most astonishing upset since Dave Brat beat Eric Cantor . . . or this will be another case of Democrats talking themselves — and certain corners of the media — into believing in a longshot underdog in a deep-red state, a Midwestern variant of the Great Southern Democratic Hopes like Beto O’Rourke and Jaime Harrison. (Notice you almost never see many news organizations asking themselves after Election Day, “Were we a little too eager to fall for the hype? Did we buy the spin from Democrats that they had a shot in this race, and choose to ignore the counter-evidence?”)
Finally, why is it we can get all these independent polls of Nebraska’s second congressional district — which looks like Harris will win — but we can’t get an independent poll of the Nebraska Senate race? You’re already calling Nebraskans, why is it such a hassle to call a few more outside of that district?