Guess what's for dinner?
Posted on 10/15/2014 2:07:10 AM PDT by Din Maker
FiveThirtyEight’s latest Senate forecast gives Democrats a 40 percent chance of maintaining control of the Senate. Still, you’ve probably heard that control might not be known until December (when Louisiana would hold a runoff election) or January (when a Georgia runoff would take place and when Kansas independent Greg Orman, should he win, would have to decide which party to caucus with).
But polling released over the past few days makes clear the most likely path the GOP would have to walk to win a majority Nov. 4 (or the early hours of Nov. 5).
Republicans need to pick up six seats. Let’s leave aside Louisiana, Georgia and Kansas for a moment.
The GOP has a 99 and 97 percent chance of taking back Montana and West Virginia, respectively. That’s two. My colleague Nate Silver wrote last week about South Dakota, where the three-way Senate race was starting to get crazy. A new Harper Polling survey put Republican Mike Rounds up 37 percent to Democrat Rick Weiland’s 33 percent to independent Larry Pressler’s 23 percent. Rounds has never trailed in a poll, and last week’s SurveyUSA survey had Pressler ahead of Weiland. If the anti-Rounds vote continues to split, it’ll be difficult for Rounds to lose. The FiveThirtyEight model still has him with an 87 percent chance of winning.
Those three look fairly solid (though South Dakota is less clear than the others).
Republicans have a 78 chance in Alaska (where a new Hickman Analytics poll put Republican Dan Sullivan up 5 percentage points) and a 74 percent chance of winning Arkansas.
Those two are far less certain, but let’s give them to the GOP. That’s five.
Both Colorado and Iowa appear to be tilting right. Our latest forecast gives the GOP a little under a 65 percent chance in both states.
In Colorado, Republican Cory Gardner has led in seven of the nine independent polls conducted over the past month. On Monday, SurveyUSA released two polls using two different sampling techniques — random digit dialing and registered-based sampling — that showed Gardner up 2 and 4 percentage points, respectively. Its prior poll in the Centennial State had Democratic Sen. Mark Udall up by 4 percentage points. Even if you think the polls are underestimating Udall’s strength because of a strong ground game, it’s hard to deny the trend in Gardner’s direction.
In Iowa, much was made over the weekend of a Des Moines Register survey showing Republican Joni Ernst’s lead dropping to from 6 percentage point, to 1 point, compared to the Register’s previous poll in mid-September. But that prior survey was an outlier. Since the Register’s mid-September survey, Ernst has led by an average of 1.6 percentage points, which matches the current FiveThirtyEight forecast. Ernst has led by a percentage point or more in five of the past eight non-sponsored surveys (including a new Rasmussen Reports poll putting her up 3 points) and only trailed by a point or more in one.
Give Republicans both Iowa and Colorado for the moment. The GOP has gained seven seats. They only need six, but to be guaranteed a Senate majority, we need to be sure Democrats won’t sweep our potential late deciders: Kansas, Georgia and Louisiana. (It’s very unlikely Republicans would win Iowa and Colorado but lose ruby-red states like Kansas and Louisiana, but still.)
So the GOP needs to win one of the three late deciders on election night.
Lousiana is very likely to go to a runoff, in which Republican Bill Cassidy has a 74 percent chance of winning. So an instant-gratification GOP Senate majority will probably require winning in either Kansas or Georgia.
The FiveThirtyEight model currently projects Republican David Perdue to win 50.0 percent of the vote in Georgia. Perdue, who has a 72 percent chance of winning, may not avoid a runoff because of Libertarian Amanda Swafford, as I’ve written about.
In Kansas, Republican Sen. Pat Roberts faces a strong challenge from Orman. Orman, though, may have peaked too soon. Roberts recorded his first lead in two polls released last week, and a new Public Policy Polling (PPP) survey puts Orman only up 3 percentage points. That’s down from a 10 percentage-point lead in PPP’s two prior polls. FiveThirtyEight still gives Orman a 58 percent chance of winning, but the race appears to be trending back toward the fundamentals (i.e. Kansas is a red state), and the GOP has a large advertisement advantage heading into the final few weeks of the campaign.
The most likely scenario in which we know Nov. 5 that Republicans will control the next Senate requires a GOP sweep of Montana, West Virginia, South Dakota, Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado and Iowa, and then a win in either Kansas or Georgia.
That path might be relatively clear. But it’s also relatively unlikely.
I would love to see democrats lose in a ‘bloodbath’ but that’s only because I hate them and they deserve it. The republicans have done very little to instill any confidence in themselves.
The only reason this is even being discussed is that the American electorate is an enormous gaggle of imbeciles.
Meanwhile, every sane person in the nation despairs of the political future.
If republicans have a 97% chance if retaking West Virginia, Senator Joe Manchin should take note. Repubs should go after him hard to switch parties if demos still control the senate after the elections.
If there are any upsets, it will probably be in New Hampshire, Michigan (where Land frankly SHOULD be leading now), North Carolina (a subpar candidate where we also should be leading). Less likely but not out of the question are Minnesota & Virginia.
A possible upset may occur in MS, especially if Thad the Cad isn’t tossed off the ballot as he should be, since his approvals amongst GOP voters are in the toilet (probably the only party candidate in the nation whose approvals are higher with the opposition party than their own party - indicative of the fact he used Democrat fraud to steal the runoff). Graham in SC may only win with a plurality with Ravenel votes taking a chunk from him.
Manchin may indeed switch, but he still is quite liberal (a 74% leftist rating for the duration of his time in the Senate). The GOP’s most left-wing Senator is ME’s Susan Collins (and her lifetime rating is 52% leftist, though she has scored 72% leftist in 2013 and 80% in 2012). There’s also talk he may leave the Senate entirely to run for Governor again in 2016 (which would force a special election that the GOP would almost surely win).
Add to that, Maine’s “Independent” Angus King, a very left-wing member (87% leftist) has indicated he wants to serve in the majority, and hence would vote to organize with the GOP, so there’s 2 gains numerically (though certainly not ideologically).
The real question is, if the Republicans do take the Senate, will anything actually change?
What will election night look like if Republicans win?
Massive lawsuits in every state won, for.... something.
If republicans win the Senate the problem is the GOP Establishment will think their strategy and tactics are validated and it will be more difficult to remove them.
Even if their winning margins are razor thin and they have only 51 Senate seats, they will still continue to push their progressive agenda.
Mitch McConnell will ram Comprehensive Immigration Reform down the throat of Americans after going through motions of compromise and border security first etc. In the end the ten million or more illegals will have amnesty and border security provisions will be abandoned just as in the past.
The GOP Establishment is not our party and they are enemies to conservatives. So all this talk about who wins is no win for America.
“If republicans win the Senate the problem is the GOP Establishment will think their strategy and tactics are validated and it will be more difficult to remove them.”
Boy, are you ever right! That’s the real issue this year. And will the GOPE piss away the next two years and hand the Senate back over to the RATs in 2016 when they begin to have more seats to defend. Just peachy if Hitlary wins the Presidency.
I see us holding all of our Senate seats and picking up 8 seats.
Ideologically, the GOPe is more aligned with King than Cruz. The lily-livered quislings running the GOP had better learn how to lead. It will take a seriously long and bloody fight to get any conservative legislation through and even then, Obama is going to veto everything.
Reince Preibus has already said that of Orman wins the GOP won't work with him. So even if Orman was being honest about wanting to caucus with the GOP, which I doubt, that door's been closed.
I can see Tillis eaking out a win in NC.
Recent revelations about Hagan’s (husband) pocketing stimulus money is significant enough to keep a few thousand democrats at home and influence a few thousand fence-sitters for Tillis.
“If republicans have a 97% chance if retaking West Virginia, Senator Joe Manchin should take note. Repubs should go after him hard to switch parties if demos still control the senate after the elections.”
Agree. Depending on the scenario that plays out as a result of this election, I think Joe is flippable. Naturally, he would have to be offered some goodies to do so. But, we shall see....
If Chris McDaniel’s supporters just stay home or skip the Senate race on the ballot, Thad will be in trouble. If McDaniel’s supporter should vote for Travis Childers (who is a Conservative Democrat) Thad would lose and it would be an election night “shocker”.
“If republicans win the Senate the problem is the GOP Establishment will think their strategy and tactics are validated and it will be more difficult to remove them.”
Boy, are you ever right! That’s the real issue this year. And will the GOPE piss away the next two years and hand the Senate back over to the RATs in 201
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I’m on board with the two of you. If all of Chris McDaniel’s supporters would vote for Travis Childers who is a Conservative Democrat (more than Joe Manchin) Thad Cockroach would lose.
A lot of Northeast liberals have migrated to N.C. And still vote Dem. I know many of them!
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