Free Republic

FiveThirtyEight's election forecaster Nate Silver said Sunday that the House could end up in Democrat or Republican hands in Tuesday's election, though polling predicts that Democrats will flip the chamber. "So in the House we have Democrats with about a 4 in 5 chance of winning," Silver told ABC's "This Week." However, he noted that "polls aren't always right." "The range of outcomes in the House is really wide," he explained. "Our range which covers 80 percent of outcomes goes from, on the low end, about 15 Democratic pickups, all the way to low to mid 50s, 52 or 53."...

The reason it’s counterintuitive is because you can’t really identify 23 districts that are safe bets to flip to Democrats, which is the number they need to take the House. In the Deluxe version of our model (the one I’ll be focusing on here) only 193 seats are considered by our model to be “solid Democratic” (at least a 95 percent chance of a Democratic victory). If Democrats won only those seats and no others, they’d actually lose two seats from the 195 they control now. Another 15 seats are “likely Democratic,” where Democrats have at least a 75 chance...

They haven’t yet reached the US border, but their attorneys have already stormed Washington DC. A dozen migrants in the caravans marching toward the American border have filed a lawsuit accusing Donald Trump et al of violating their Fifth Amendment rights — even though they have yet to set foot in the country: Twelve Honduran nationals, including six children, are listed as plaintiffs in the lawsuit. The suit, which was filed Thursday in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., said it is widely known that Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador are “undergoing a well-documented human rights crisis.” The lawsuit...

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Friday shows that 51% of Likely U.S. Voters approve of President Trump’s job performance. Forty-seven percent (47%) disapprove. The latest figures include 37% who Strongly Approve of the president is performing and 40% who Strongly Disapprove. This gives him a Presidential Approval Index rating of -3. (See trends)

As election day nears, a new poll from Carroll Strategies shows Republican Yvette Herrell leading Democrat Xochitl Torres Small in New Mexico’s 2nd Congressional District race. The poll, which surveyed 1,200 likely New Mexico voters, revealed Herrell with a five-point lead over her challenger. Forty-seven percent of those polled said they will vote for Herrill, while 42 percent said they intend to vote for Small. Last week, Herrell joined SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight to discuss the migrant caravan headed towards the US-Mexico border. Herrell insists that the caravan is an “insult” to those who immigrated legally and puts “our sovereignty...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — With a high-profile debate and a presidential visit still ahead, the U.S. Senate race between incumbent Joe Manchin and challenger Patrick Morrisey is tightening up. The latest version of the MetroNews Dominion Post West Virginia Poll shows Manchin up by 5 percentage points over Morrisey. The poll shows 45 percent of likely voters favoring Manchin, 40 percent favoring Morrisey, 11 percent for Libertarian Rusty Hollen and 5 percent undecided. That’s a smaller gap than the last version of the poll in August, which showed Manchin ahead by 8 points. It’s also closer than some other national polls...

The exclusive ABC15 Arizona and OH Predictive Insights poll shows McSally with a seven-point lead with 52% of the vote compared to Sinema’s 45%. Only 2% are undecided with 1% saying they’ll vote for Green Party candidate Angela Green… “If Kavanaugh didn’t happen I think it’d be an extremely tight race,” said chief pollster Mike Noble. “If not, I’d actually say the edge would go to Sinema but after seeing the polling – seeing the results – everything else – I think that McSally will end up winning coming election night.”

Far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro is heading for a sweeping victory in Brazil's presidential election, according to exit polls. The polls suggest Mr Bolsonaro has 56% of the votes and his rival from the left-wing Workers Party, Fernando Haddad, has 44%. Mr Bolsonaro campaigned on a promise to eradicate corruption and to drive down Brazil's high crime levels. The election campaign has been deeply divisive.

A group of House Democrats penned a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday asking him to condemn far-right Brazilian presidential frontrunner Jair Bolsonaro. The lawmakers, led by Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), cited concerns for "rising threats to democracy, human rights and the rule of law in Brazil" in making their request. “Given the regional repercussions of this sort of development, this is not a threat that our country can take lightly,” they wrote. Bolsonaro and Fernando Haddad of the left-wing Workers’ Party are the two candidates in Sunday's run-off vote to become the new president, and Bolsonaro...

The New Jersey Senate race is now looking like a toss-up, according to the the Cook Political Report — a sign that Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez is in serious troubles after years of questions about his ethics. Why it matters: If Republicans pick up that seat, a Senate majority would be out of reach for the Democrats. Federal prosecutors dropped their corruption charges against Menendez earlier this year, but the Senate Ethics Committee admonished him for accepting gifts from a friend. What the race comes down to is Menendez "and his ethics problems," Cook reports, and if the "voter who...

Barely two days after Democrat Andrew Gillum was leading in most polls for governor of Florida, a Strategic Research Associates poll conducted for Gray Television and released Wednesday showed Republican and former Rep. Ron DeSantis pulling into the lead, 48 to 45 percent. The margin of error was +/-3.46 percent. The poll is the first since the primaries last month to put the conservative DeSantis ahead of Bernie Sanders supporter Gillum. Virtually every expert who spoke to Newsmax agreed that Gillun was damaged by recent revelations Gillun had misstated that he reimbursed a lobbyist for a ticket to the Broadway...

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) announced Thursday that he is referring Julie Swetnick and her lawyer Michael Avenatti to the Justice Department for a potential criminal investigation into whether they made false statements to Congress about Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. "The law prohibits such false statements to Congress and obstruction of congressional committee investigations. For the law to work, we can’t just brush aside potential violations. I don’t take lightly making a referral of this nature, but ignoring this behavior will just invite more of it in the future," Grassley said in a statement. Grassley added in...

‘Megyn Kelly is done. She is not ever coming back,’ said an NBC executive with knowledge of the situation. ‘We are just working out timing of the announcement but mark my word – she is gone and will never be seen on NBC live again.’ The source then added: ‘Here’s the worst part – her deal is a non-break deal – so she walks away with all that money. It’s disgusting and heads should roll here because of it.’… A network news insider tells DailyMail.com that there are tentative conversations underway about Kelly returning to Fox News, whose viewers despise...

Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D) now holds just a single-digit lead over her GOP challenger in a poll released Thursday that just last month showed her ahead by more than 20 points. An EPIC-MRA survey commissioned by the Detroit Free Press found that Stabenow now leads John James (R), an Army veteran and first-time political candidate, by 7 points. James previously trailed by 23 points in the poll, which was in line with others from the race that mostly show Stabenow with a double-digit lead. Just two polls recorded by RealClearPolitics over the course of the Michigan campaign show a...

Tuesday’s release of private emails and text messages by a former friend detailing the mayor’s trips to Central America with lobbyists and to New York with federal investigators couldn’t have come at a worse time for Gillum. Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum has gotten pretty good at answering questions about whether he accepted favors from lobbyists and gifts from undercover FBI agents. It's a skill he's going to need more than ever during the next two weeks if he wants to become Florida governor. Tuesday's release of private emails and text messages by a former friend detailing the mayor's trips to...

The Indiana Senate race continues to trend towards Hoosier businessman and Republican candidate Mike Braun over Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-IN), according to a poll released on Tuesday. An Indy Politics & Mason Strategies poll released on Tuesday found that Braun leads Donnelly by four points—47 to 43 percent—with Libertarian Lucy Brenton capturing three percent and seven percent of Hoosiers remain undecided. Josh Kelley, a campaign spokesman for Braun, said in a statement that Braun has the momentum on his side two weeks ahead of the November midterm election. “Mike Braun has all the momentum in this race because Hoosiers are...

Sure, there’s probably some Kavanaugh effect at work here. Plus a little red-state effect. Plus a little “Heidi Heitkamp’s campaign committed one of the great unforced errors in recent political history” effect. Either way, it’s ballgame in North Dakota. In an exclusive poll by KVLY, KFYR and Strategic Research Associates of 650 likely voters in North Dakota conducted between October 12 – 19, 2018, Republican challenger Kevin Cramer leads incumbent Democratic Senator Heidi Heitkamp 56% to 40%, increasing his lead since Gray Television’s September poll, in which Cramer held a 10-point advantage. Heitkamp’s support appears relatively fixed. Only 5% of...

This looks like another sign that the highly-anticipated blue wave could disappoint next month if it arrives at all. NBC News has looked at early voting data (provided by a company called TargetSmart) in eight states and found that GOP-affiliated voters are outpacing Democratic voters in seven of those. GOP-affiliated voters have surpassed Democratic-affiliated ones in early voting in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Montana, Tennessee and Texas, the data showed. Only in Nevada have Democratic-affiliated voters exceeded Republican-affiliated voters so far in early voting, according to the data… The latest data suggests robust enthusiasm among early Republican voters that could...

Remember when Donald Trump’s widespread unpopularity would fuel a blue wave in the midterms? Trump’s still underwater on job approval, but a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll puts Trump at his best rating as president yet, 47/49. Republican interest in the election continues to rise, with both parties hitting a new record for midterm engagement: The Kavanaugh effect seems pretty well established now. Not only did it provide a catalyst for GOP enthusiasm, that burst hasn’t subsided with Kavanaugh’s confirmation, either. On top of that, Republicans now have a +15 advantage on the economy, the highest level ever for...

Hoosier businessman and Senate Republican candidate Mike Braun has surged in the Indiana Senate race only two weeks before the November election, according to a poll released on Monday. Sen. Joe Donnelly’s popularity has continued to plummet ever since he decided to vote against Judge Brett Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court. Since the Senate confirmation vote, the incumbent Democrat’s favorability and his polling has bottomed out. According to a recent poll conducted by the Braun campaign from October 14-17, Braun leads Donnelly by 44 to 40 percent, with seven percent backing Lucy Brenton, and five percent of voters remain undecided....