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WASHINGTON (AP) -- Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell won a hard-fought sixth term Tuesday, putting him a step closer to his lifelong dream of becoming majority leader and getting the GOP off to a good start in its goal of taking control of the Senate. Helping his chances was Republican Rep. Shelley Moore Capito's capture of the West Virginia seat of retiring Democratic Sen. Jay Rockefeller. Her victory, while not a surprise, gave Republicans the first of six new seats they will need to control the Senate for the first time in eight years...

LOUISVILLE, Ky. —As Kentucky and Indiana vote in the Nov. 4, 2014 General Election, get ongoing coverage and election results as returns come in from the polls. Kentucky - 38 of 3702 Precincts Reporting - 1% Name Party Votes Vote % McConnell, Mitch (i) GOP 18,351 59% Grimes, Alison Lundergan Dem 11,890 38% Patterson, David Lib 767 2%

Back when Wisconsin and western Russia once shared an address south of the equator, a violent collision in the asteroid belt blasted Earth with meteorites. The space rock smashup showered Earth with up to 100 times more meteorites than today's rate (a rock the size of a football field hits the planet about every 10,000 years). Yet, only a dozen or so impact craters have been found from the ancient bombardment 470 million years ago, during the Ordovician Period. Most are in North America, Sweden and western Russia. There are only about 185 known impact craters on Earth of any...

A Franklin Circuit Court judge denied a request from Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes to stop the Republican Party of Kentucky and the campaign for U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell from sending mailers that Grimes called a bullying tactic. On Monday morning Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd denied Grimes’ request to halt the mailing of the fliers which say “the information enclosed contains facts related to a possible fraud perpetrated on citizens across Kentucky.” Within the mailer it refers to statements in Grimes’ ads media fact checkers have criticized, such as a claim that U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell didn’t...

"I am not opposed to birth control," he said. After a pause, he elaborated. "That's basically what Plan B is. Plan B is taking two birth control pills in the morning and two in the evening, and I am not opposed to that." ... Another student here pressed him on "the drug war," asking if Paul would support legalizing marijuana, cocaine and heroin. He said he wasn't supportive of drug use, explaining that pot "is not that great," but said drug laws should be left up to states. Colorado and Washington are experimenting with legalized marijuana, he said, and we...

The campaign of Kentucky Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes has filed a lawsuit to stop Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell's campaign from distributing a mailer that it says amounts to illegal voter intimidation tactics. The Grimes campaign on Friday said it had filed for an immediate injunction with the state court in Franklin County, which is where the state capital is located. The campaign is calling for a state and federal investigation of the mailers that say they're authorized by the Kentucky Republican Party and the McConnell Senate campaign. The legal filing by the Grimes campaign can be read below, first reported...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Saturday urged progressive activists to get out the vote for Bruce Braley, calling Iowa crucial to Democratic hopes to keep the Senate. “If we win Iowa, we’re going to do just fine,” Reid said on a call organized by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. “Iowa is a key for what we do.” During the call, Reid said Joni Ernst, the GOP Senate nominee in Iowa, would be a disaster for issues key to progressives, like protecting Social Security and raising the minimum wage. Ernst, a state senator, and Braley, a four-term congressman, are...

New Polls Show Republicans Pulling Away In Key Senate Races November 02, 2014 Republican Senate candidates are pulling away in the final days of key races, according to polls released this weekend. Republicans are either leading in Georgia, Kentucky and Louisiana or will likely win runoff elections, according to a NBC/Marist poll released Sunday. In addition, the Republican nominee in Iowa, Joni Ernst, now has a 7-point lead over Democratic challenger Rep Bruce Braley, according to a Des Moines Register poll released Saturday. Most polls have shown until now that the four races have essentially been deadlocked in the closing...

Hillary Clinton Sprinkles Her Stardust On Grimes Campaign In Kentucky The former US secretary of state’s eyes may be on 2016 but she is lending her weight to the Democrat push to unseat Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell Megan Carpentier Sunday 2 November 2014 Around 1,200 people braved cold temperatures and northern Kentucky’s first snowfall of the season on Saturday morning to see former secretary of state – and presumptive 2016 presidential candidate – Hillary Clinton implore them to help elect Alison Lundergan Grimes to the US senate. In the 7,000-person city of Highland Heights, that’s an impressive turnout –...

This started as a top ten list.Let's face it, with President Obama's awful approval ratings and the unfortunate consequences of Obamacare felt like a sting around the country, Democrats were already vulnerable in this year's midterm elections. These gaffes certainly won't help. Let's take a look at some of the worst mistakes Dems have made on the campaign trail so far:1.) That awful/insensitive/shameful and now infamous ad from the Wendy Davis (D-TX) gubernatorial campaign. 2.) Those colorful campaign memos from Michelle Nunn’s (D-GA) campaign, in which her own campaign referred to her as a “lightweight.” 3.) Sen. Mark Udall (D-CO) saying he was...

McConnell 50%, Grimes 42% Full internals at the link.

Governor Steve Beshear says Kentucky risks running off the “progressive path” it’s on if voters give the GOP a majority of state House seats. Beshear made the comments in Barren County Thursday. Democrats currently hold a 54-to-46 advantage in the chamber, but Republicans have made a major push to win control of the House for the first time in more than 90 years. To help Democratic incumbents, Beshear has been on the road this week, announcing funding for infrastructure projects in districts where these members are facing competitive challenges by Republican candidates. Beshear said if the GOP does gain control...

Rand Paul, the heretofore libertarian senator from Kentucky, gave a foreign policy speech to Republican grandees in New York last week with a clear message: I'm not an isolationist like my dad.. The senator's peppery father, the thoroughly libertarian former Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, hardly ever saw a U.S. military intervention he liked. He said George W. Bush's war in Iraq was nuts, suggested that the United States could live with a nuclear Iran and thought stationing U.S. troops overseas was just an expensive way to invite trouble. On Thursday evening in a Manhattan ballroom, Sen. Paul, a probable...

The target was Hillary Clinton. Calling the famously liberal former Secretary of State “a war hawk,” Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) added in a recent Meet the Press appearance: “You know what? We are tired of war.… We’re worried that Hillary Clinton will get us involved in another Middle Eastern war, because she’s so gung-ho.” ADVERTISEMENT One has to wonder. Was Rand Paul’s real target Hillary Clinton? Whom he correctly blames for the Benghazi fiasco? Or was it, as it strikes… Ronald Reagan? Not to mention conservatism and the timeless idea of what Reagan termed “peace through strength.” Reagan’s formulation long...

Edging closer to his lifelong dream of leading a Republican majority in the U.S. Senate, Sen. Mitch McConnell has been largely quiet about what specific agenda his potential new majority would pursue. "This is not the time to lay out an agenda," McConnell told reporters Friday after an event in Lexington. "But I will say this: Divided government in the past has been pretty effective." "It's never a good idea to tell the other side what the first play is going to be, but I think it's safe to say we'll have a very different direction for the country," McConnell...

LOUISVILLE — On a stage late Thursday morning before several hundred people outside the Muhammad Ali Center, former President Bill Clinton tried to deliver a knockout punch against Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on behalf of Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes. Clinton, making his fourth visit to Kentucky for Grimes' bid to oust the Republican incumbent from his 30-year tenure, painted Grimes as a champion for working people. He said Kentucky, which he won both times he ran for president, has not had a champion for the working people in the U.S. Senate since Democrat Wendell Ford left in 1999. Grimes...

Tuesday on MSNBC's "Hardball," host Chris Matthews compared Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to Saddam Hussein by saying, "remember the picture of Saddam Hussein patting that kid's head," after running the Republican minority leaders latest ad in his reelection bid against Democrat Alison Lundergan Grimes.

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes began her one-week sprint to Election Day flanked by one of the most popular members of her party. Before the week’s up, she’ll be joined again by a former president and his wife, whom many believe will be the Democratic nominee for president in 2016 if she decides to run. Grimes was joined by U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., before about 400 supporters at the Copper and Kings Distillery in Louisville Tuesday, and the two hemmed close to Grimes’ primary talking points on the campaign trail. In Warren, who made her second appearance...

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Alison Grimes's campaign says Hillary Clinton will return to Kentucky on November first for a last minute push before Election Day. Grimes will also be welcoming Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren as well. Warren will be at a Grimes rally at Copper and Kings distillery in Butchertown on Tuesday evening. Over the weekend, Grimes will join Clinton at campaign events in Northern Kentucky and Lexington, just a few weeks after Hillary Clinton appeared in Louisville to speak on behalf of Grimes. Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren will be at an Alison Lundergan Grimes rally at Copper and Kings...

Fall is in the air. The leaves are changing colors, football season is in full swing and people in battleground states are being inundated by candidates and commercials. In Washington, the GOP is already breaking out the champagne. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is already measuring the drapes in the majority leader’s office. The anticipation is that the Republican Party will sweep the midterm elections. The common wisdom is that the GOP will gain seats in the House of Representatives and more importantly take control of the Senate. But not so fast. Right now there are 45 Republicans in the...