Senate Rundown

Today, I just want to run down where things stand in regards to the US Senate. While it seems very probable at this point that Republicans will retake the House of Representatives (which I incidentally believed this time last year when most professional pundits thought the idea was absurd), until recently I didn’t for a second think that the Senate was in play. Now I do.

 

Let’s take a detailed look at the situation:

 

To start with, I will predict now that not a single Republican Senate seat will switch parties. At the beginning of this year, that was not a given: Several incumbents were vulnerable, and several open seats seemed ripe for Democratic takeover as well. But over the course of the year, they’ve all swung decisively back to the GOP. So anyone who’s still mentioning North Carolina , Kentucky , New Hampshire , Missouri , Louisiana , Florida , or Ohio as a possible switch to the Democrats really needs to stop living in January.

 

So, currently, we have 59 Democrats (OK, 57 and two Independents, if you want to get technical) and 41 Republicans. As mentioned above, there will be no current Republican seats lost. So let’s see where they stand to gain.

 

Three Democratic seats are absolutely, positively certain to switch parties: North Dakota , Indiana , and Arkansas . These are states that are very Republican at the national level that nonetheless have been sending Democrats to the Senate. This year, re-election would have been dicey, so the incumbents retired in ND and IN, and Blanche Lincoln in AR is in danger of literally receiving the worst reelection percentage in history at this point.

 

This brings us to 44 Republicans and 56 Democrats.

 

Several other states aren’t quite as certain, but nearly so. Pat Toomey is posting strong leads in Pennsylvania , Ken Buck seems to be gaining strength in Colorado, and (to my great surprise) Ron Johnson seems to have decisively moved ahead of Russ Feingold in Wisconsin . All of these are leading their opponents by at least 5 points in most surveys, so absent a big change in the state of the races, the GOP is poised to pick up these three as well.

 

Brings us to 47 Republicans, 53 Democrats.

 

Now we get to some tighter races. In Illinois , Mark Kirk (R) has led Alexi Giannoulias (D) by a point or two for months, and nothing either of these men do seems able to shake up the race any. Neither of them are very well liked, and both have problems. Kirk has consistently led, but Illinois has been so solidly Democrat for so long it’s hard to say that this one’s locked down. But let’s just say the trend holds and Kirk wins.

 

Next, Nevada . Majority Leader Harry Reid (D) is massively unpopular, but Sharron Angle (R) is a pretty controversial candidate who’s biggest mistake was letting Reid have the airwaves to himself half the summer, which drove up her negatives and now has the race in a complete Toss-up status. They’ve seesawed back and forth for the lead for the last three months, but I think Republican excitement combined with the electorate’s loathing of Reid will carry the day on this one. Angle wins.

 

Finally, we have a sudden barn-burner in West Virginia . Two months ago, virtually no one thought Governor Manchin was going to have a problem coasting to victory to replace Robert Byrd, but suddenly John Raese is posing a real threat of taking this one away. Three of the latest polls have Raese ahead (I saw two and I told myself I wouldn’t believe it until I saw one more, but the third popped up yesterday).

 

Those three go the way they’re headed, and it’s a 50/50 split, with Biden breaking ties for the Democrats.

 

So, bottom line? Watch three other races I haven’t yet mentioned, because if ANY of them go to the GOP, you can bet all of the above did as well. Watch Washington , California , and Connecticut; all of them have Republican challengers behind but within striking distance, as built in Democratic advantages in those states make them very hard to win. But if even one of them falls to the Republicans, so does the Senate.