Senate Update - Georgia Georgia Georgia

Yesterday, we received a total of three new polls out of Georgia.  While they all showed that the race is still a close one in the state, they each differed on who had the lead.  The first, from CNN, showed the Democrat, Michelle Nunn, with a three point advantage.  Then, the Atlanta Journal Constitution's poll of the state was released and found David Perdue leading Nunn by two points.  The final poll, released last night, showed the race as a tie.  

The model takes the three polls into account equally, but it has become clear the past couple days that Michelle Nunn is ahead, if only by a small margin.  Her bigger problem is that she is not clearing 50%, which she needs in order to avoid a runoff.  Still her chance of leading on election day is now 53%, up slightly from yesterday at 52%.

Another Democrat received good news yesterday with a new poll showing Senator Jeanne Shaheen leading by three points.  Though her lead has been small, it has been remarkably consistent.  That affects the model in that it is more confident that she is actually ahead. Therefore, her chances rose from 62% to 64%.  

Finally, a new poll from Colorado showed Mark Udall trailing Republican Cory Gardner by five points.  However, this is slightly less than six point deficit Udall saw in the prior poll. Additionally, some of the older polls have become less relevant, and Udall's chances have risen to 30% from 25%.

Overall, the GOP's chances of winning a majority are still moderately strong, at 68.3%, but that is down from 69.4% yesterday.  This marks the first time in the last ten days that the party's chances have decreased rather than increased (or stayed the same).  Stay tuned to see if this is just a fluke or if it is more of a trend.

2014 Senate Forecast

Senate Update - Good (and Bad) News for Democrats

Today brought some new polls from some places we haven't heard from in awhile.  The most consequential of which was a poll from Rasmussen Reports showing Greg Orman leading Kansas Senator Pat Roberts by five points.  This is the first poll to show Orman leading by that large of a margin since the beginning of the month.  Still, Kansas is a very red state, and Orman's chances are only 51%.  

Other polls out today essentially confirmed the status quo.  Iowa's Joni Ernst leads Bruce Braley by two points and Cory Gardner leads Colorado Senator Mark Udall by the same margin.  Their chances are now 64% and 75%, respectively.  

There were also two new polls out of New Hampshire today.  One showed Jeanne Shaheen ahead by two points and the other had her leading by one point against Scott Brown.  The race has no doubt tightened in recent weeks, but Shaheen is holding on to a small but stubborn lead.  Her chances of re-election now stand at 62%, down from 68% yesterday.

Finally, InsiderAdvantage polled Georgia and found what we have been seeing for the past week: Michelle Nunn is ahead, if only by the smallest of margins.  Her chances of winning have increased to 52%, the first time she has been favored to win.  Still, Nunn needs to clear 50% of the vote on November 4th.  Otherwise, she and Perdue will go into a runoff in early January.  

Currently, the Libertarian candidate in Georgia is pulling an average of about 5% of the vote, which means that in order to top 50%, Nunn would need to beat Perdue by that same amount.  At this point, her lead is only about a point or two.  We expect the Libertarian Candidate to only receive about 3 or 4% of the vote on election day (third party candidates typically poll better than they perform), so that lowers the bar a bit for Nunn.  If she continues widening the gap between herself and Perdue, we might not have to wait until January to find out who controls the Senate.

As it stands, Republicans incrementally increased (again) their chances of winning the majority. They now have a 69.4% chance, up from 68.2% yesterday.  You may wonder why the party's fortunes are rising even when Democrats get (mostly) good news.  It is because polls taken more than two weeks ago are given less weight than previously.  As you know, a two weeks ago, Republicans only had a 55% chance of winning (because of some good polling at the time for Democratic candidates.  Still, if new polls come in giving good results for Democrats, the same will happen for Republican-favored polls.  

2014 Doesn't Look Like a Wave

Midterm elections are often 'wave' elections - an election in which one party sweeps nearly all of the competitive races and makes large gains in both houses of Congress.  However, 2014 doesn't look like it will be one of those wave elections, despite what the media is saying.

For this year to be a wave for the GOP, both parts of that definition must hold true.  First, the GOP would need to win most or all of the 'purple' state races and even pick off some of the more traditionally 'safe' Democratic seats.  Further, they would need to do this without taking losses in traditionally 'red' states.

2010 was no doubt a wave election for the GOP (as was 2006 for Democrats).  In that year, Republicans won in Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, North Carolina, and Florida, and even picked up a seat in deep blue Illinois.  Further, they would have also won in Nevada, Colorado, and Delaware had the party not nominated more extreme candidates who couldn't appeal to the independents.   Additionally, Republicans didn't lose a single seat held by an incumbent of their party.

That year, the GOP picked up seven Senate seats and a whopping 63 House seats (we'll talk more about that later).  This year, the party may pick up an additional seven seats, but this time, it's different.  

In 2010, the Senators up for re-election had won their last election in 2004, a moderately good year for Republicans.  Therefore, the party didn't have many incumbents to defend in the more Democratic states.  However, this year, Democrats are defending seats they won in 2008, a banner year for the party.  Now, Democrats have incumbents running for re-election in deep red states such as Alaska, Arkansas, South Dakota, Montana, and West Virginia.  It shouldn't be any surprise that even in a neutral year, Democrats would lose most, if not all of those states, and by fairly large margins.

But here's the rub: most of those states (not including Montana and West Virginia) are still highly competitive this year.  Sure, the GOP may take all of those states, but it won't be by blowout margins.

Additionally, to qualify as a 'wave', Republicans would need to pick off Democratic-held seats in most, if not all of the 'purple' states, and possibly pick up a more traditionally Democratic seat, such as Minnesota , Michigan, or Oregon.  So far, of the purple states, Republicans are ahead in Colorado and Iowa, but behind (slightly) in North Carolina and New Hampshire, and they are being blown out in Virginia.  

Michigan was once thought to be a competitive swing state, but the Democrat, Gary Peters, is now way ahead of his Republican rival.  Minnesota and Oregon are also not even close.  

To further drive the point, Republicans would need to easily hold on to their seats in red states.  But that isn't happening either.  The Independent candidate (who will probably caucus with Democrats, if he wins) Greg Orman is neck and neck with Pat Roberts in Kentucky; Democrat Michelle Nunn is leading her Georgian rival, and Kentucky's Alison Lundergan Grimes is only a couple points behind Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. These red state races will be close, indicating there's not going to be even a small wave for Republicans this year.  

Finally, with respect to the House of Representatives, the GOP is expected to pick up between 5-10 seats, but that isn't especially surprising given that most of those seats are in districts that have been gerrymandered by Republican state legislatures in order to help the GOP candidates.  

Could a small wave still form?  Yes.  It would require Democrats losing in (at least) Colorado, Iowa, North Carolina, and New Hampshire, as well as Republicans winning by larger than expected margins in Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, and the remainder of the red states.  Further, the party would need to pick up close to twenty seats in the House.  

Until evidence of that begins to appear, however, let's stop calling this a wave election.

Senate Update - The Georgia Firewall

Not too long ago, it was once thought that if Democrats were to have any electoral success in 2014 in Georgia, it would be because President Jimmy Carter's grandson, Jason Carter, was able to defeat the Republican incumbent.  However, it now seems Michelle Nunn may be the candidate to ignite the hopes of Democrats for turning Georgia blue (or at least purple-ish).

Nunn has now led in every poll over the past two weeks.  While her lead is within the margin of error, it's perhaps a bigger deal because Perdue's lead before the 'outsourcing' scandal was between three and four points.  That represents a 5-7 point swing in just a couple weeks.  

With this new lead, Georgia is making up what Democrats hope will be a 'firewall' to save

their Senate majority.  Here's how it works.  The GOP need to pick up a net six seats in order to have the majority.  If they get MT, SD, WV, AR, AK, and LA, they are already there (all of those states are either safe or likely GOP pickups now).  Plus, Republicans are strongly favored in Colorado.  That would mean the GOP would have seven seats, one more than needed.  

Democrats, however, see Georgia and Kansas as their two possible pickup opportunities.  If Dems can hold on to Iowa (which is currently a near-tie), North Carolina (leaning towards Hagan), and New Hampshire, along with pickup up Georgia and Kansas from the GOP (Orman would have to caucus with the Democrats), the party will keep the majority.  

That's a lot of 'ifs', certainly more than the GOP needs to pull off at this point.  The electoral calculus is always changing, but it seems this is the most likely scenario to a Democratic-controlled Senate in 2015.  As it stands, Republicans now have a 68.2% chance of making that not happen.

Gubernatorial Update - Incumbents Watch Out

Sometimes, it's difficult to make sense of what the polls are really telling us.  There were many new polls, and most of them showed that the 'tossup' races are moving away from the incumbents (or incumbent party, as is the case in Massachusetts).  

Let's begin there.  Though the Democrat, Martha Coakley, is not the incumbent, her party is. Today, a WBUR poll found the Republican leading by a point.  What is more significant is that the same polling agency had found Coakley leading by three points just two weeks ago. While Massachusetts is a very liberal state, Baker now has the advantage, with a 52% chance of victory.

There were actually two new polls out from Colorado today; one showing the Republican with a two point advantage and the other showing the incumbent Governor with a whopping seven point lead.  This is one case in which the incumbent now has slightly improved odds of winning.  Hickenlooper's chances are now also at 52%.

On to Florida, where we have yet another 'tie' result between Governor Rick Scott and former Governor Charlie Crist.  Despite Scott not leading in any polls, the model actually shifted towards him by 1% (now at 46% chance of re-election) due to some prior polls having less weight.  The state is certainly earning its swing state status this year and promises to come down to the wire.

The final two polls of note were in Georgia and Wisconsin.  In Georgia, Governor Nathan Deal is fighting for his political life against Jason Carter, who is only two points behind in the latest SurveyUSA poll.  The firm's previous poll had the race tied, but again, due to older polls dropping out, Deal's lead has actually decreased.  He now only has a 60% chance of winning, down from 63% yesterday.

And in Wisconsin, Rasmussen Reports has found Mary Burke to be leading Governor Scott Walker by one point.  While the poll is obviously within the margin of error, it represents a three point shift in Burke's direction since last month.  Burke now has a 54% chance of beating the incumbent Governor, up from 49% yesterday.

Gubernatorial Update - Movement Towards the GOP

Like in the Senate, we finally got some new polling for Gubernatorial races today.  We'll start with the two from Michigan.

Governor Snyder is in a better position today than when this forecast launched last week. He now has a 71% chance of winning, up from 66% before the two new polls came out. Those polls showed him with a two and eight point lead.  It's likely his actual lead is somewhere in between, but either way, Schauer's path to victory is getting much narrower.  

As in the Senate, PPP also released a poll showing Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper tied with Bob Beauprez, his Republican opponent.  This race is still very much a tossup, but our model now has Beauprez leading, if only slightly.  The Republican's chances now stand at 52%.

Finally, we have a new poll in Arizona, which has been sparsely polled, probably due to its lack of Senate race this year.  The Republican, Doug Ducey, has a five point lead in PPP's poll.  The most recent poll before this one was a month ago, and it showed Ducey with an eleven point lead, so most of the weight was put on this most recent one.  Ducey now has a 95% chance of winning.  

Overall, Democrats are still favored to pick up at least one seat, and possibly two.  There are still too many tossup races to narrow down where things will fall.