We're less than seven weeks out from the elections, and it's around now that some uncertainty begins dropping out of the forecast--mainly because 1) there's more polling out, giving us a more accurate picture of where candidates stand, and 2) there's less time for the underdogs to make up the difference before the election. So a lot of our ratings changes this time will be adjusting for that.
Races where one candidate has been leading considerably for a while and the underdog's chances have only been dropping:
North Carolina hasn't seen massive changes, unless you count Sen. Kay Hagan's slow but steady inroads in polling. What pretty much pollsters have agreed on in this race for the past month is that Sen. Hagan probably has the lead--and while the lead in many polls is within the margin of error, in a few of them it's not. Furthermore, it's not clear whether Libertarian Sean Haugh is spoiling votes for one candidate in particular: fittingly enough, a poll for the Republican Civitas Institute suggests that it's Tillis votes Haugh is stealing, while a poll conducted by Raleigh-based Democratic firm Public Policy Polling seems to indicate that Haugh does not discriminate by which party he's taking votes from. Haugh, for his part, suggests that it's really Sen. Hagan and Speaker Tillis who are stealing votes from him. But no matter how you slice this, it now definitely LEANS DEMOCRATIC.
In Wisconsin, there's very little room for error on either side. Both incumbent Gov. Scott Walker and former Commerce Secretary Mary Burke are polling very close to but not above 50%; just under 4% of voters haven't picked a side according to our average, and of those voters we expect about a third to vote for a third party based on historical data, leaving about 2-3% of voters undecided left for the two to convince. Leans Republican --> TOSS-UP
Red-leaning races that just got redder:
Georgia is the Republican version of North Carolina in that they're both Southern states whose Senate races were wide open four months ago but have since begun to close up. The problem, of course, is that Georgia's closing up in favor of the Republican, David Perdue. Our model suggests that he and Michelle Nunn are of approximately equal quality as candidates go (they've even both got politically admired family members, on top of that), but it's seeming more and more like for all Nunn's advantages, her fundraising and her good name can't overcome Georgia's Republican lean. Toss-up --> LEANS REPUBLICAN
Races where one candidate has been leading considerably for a while and the underdog's chances have only been dropping:
- Minnesota Senate: Sen. Al Franken, despite a razor-thin victory in 2008, maintains a double-digit lead over businessman Mike McFadden. And thanks to his high approval ratings and much larger campaign war chest--plus the fact that Minnesotans don't really dislike President Obama or the health care law as much as people from other states do--it doesn't look like that's going away soon. Likely Democrat --> SAFE DEMOCRAT
- Pennsylvania gubernatorial: Name recognition can mean a bit in elections, but in Pennsylvania it looks like Gov. Tom Corbett's higher name recognition simply means that that many more people hate him. In fact, according to Quinnipiac assistant director Tim Malloy, "Tom Corbett's biggest problem? Tom Corbett." A Wolf 20-point landslide (or even bigger) is probable at this point. Likely Democrat --> SAFE DEMOCRAT
- Kentucky Senate: Whether Alison Lundergan Grimes ever had a chance of knocking off incumbent Sen. Mitch McConnell is a moot point by now. At this point in time the Bluegrass State's Secretary of State is outgunned by pretty much every measure--she's got less money, less experience, lower approvals (although lower disapprovals as well), and her party's president is horridly unpopular, too. Sen. McConnell's lead in the polls hasn't been overwhelming--it's about five points right now--but it's been remarkably consistent. Leans Republican --> LIKELY REPUBLICAN
- New Mexico, Ohio, and South Carolina gubernatorials: I lumped these together because they've all been in sorta the same place for most of the cycle, with double-digit leads by first-term Republican incumbents who won their first election in 2010 by single digits. That hasn't changed--I'm still moving them in tandem. Likely Republican --> SAFE REPUBLICAN
North Carolina hasn't seen massive changes, unless you count Sen. Kay Hagan's slow but steady inroads in polling. What pretty much pollsters have agreed on in this race for the past month is that Sen. Hagan probably has the lead--and while the lead in many polls is within the margin of error, in a few of them it's not. Furthermore, it's not clear whether Libertarian Sean Haugh is spoiling votes for one candidate in particular: fittingly enough, a poll for the Republican Civitas Institute suggests that it's Tillis votes Haugh is stealing, while a poll conducted by Raleigh-based Democratic firm Public Policy Polling seems to indicate that Haugh does not discriminate by which party he's taking votes from. Haugh, for his part, suggests that it's really Sen. Hagan and Speaker Tillis who are stealing votes from him. But no matter how you slice this, it now definitely LEANS DEMOCRATIC.
In Wisconsin, there's very little room for error on either side. Both incumbent Gov. Scott Walker and former Commerce Secretary Mary Burke are polling very close to but not above 50%; just under 4% of voters haven't picked a side according to our average, and of those voters we expect about a third to vote for a third party based on historical data, leaving about 2-3% of voters undecided left for the two to convince. Leans Republican --> TOSS-UP
Red-leaning races that just got redder:
Georgia is the Republican version of North Carolina in that they're both Southern states whose Senate races were wide open four months ago but have since begun to close up. The problem, of course, is that Georgia's closing up in favor of the Republican, David Perdue. Our model suggests that he and Michelle Nunn are of approximately equal quality as candidates go (they've even both got politically admired family members, on top of that), but it's seeming more and more like for all Nunn's advantages, her fundraising and her good name can't overcome Georgia's Republican lean. Toss-up --> LEANS REPUBLICAN
Races where we have no clue what's going on and which we aren't changing (yet):
Kansas has been this twice now this year. "I'm gonna see this thing through to the end," Democrat Chad Taylor said (paraphrasing here) on September 2. "It's quittin' time," he went on to say (paraphrasing again) on September 3. When Secretary of State Kris Kobach told him that no, quitting time would only be on November 5, Taylor filed suit to have quitting time moved up to make room for independent Greg Orman, who was outfundraising Taylor and outpolling him in matchups against incumbent Republican Sen. Pat Roberts. Orman is in fact outpolling Sen. Roberts in both head-to-heads and when both Taylor and Libertarian Randall Batson are listed in the question; however, the reason we're not quite comfortable moving this past "leans Republican" is because the fundamentals--Kansas's ruby-red voting history, Sen. Roberts' fundraising and experience advantages, President Obama's approval ratings--still largely favor the incumbent, and it doesn't look like that's likely to change. (The only things that don't are the candidates' own approval ratings.) Still, time is running out for Sen. Roberts to convert those advantages into a lead. After all, it's not the fundamentals that vote on November 4--it's voters.
Meanwhile, Alaska's gubernatorial race was not expected to get any attention this year, firstly because it's Alaska, and secondly because the much higher-profile race there this year is one that could decide control of the U.S. Senate. There are no self-incriminating lawsuits being filed here, but it's still pretty surreal: much like in Kansas, the Democrat has dropped out in favor of an independent who has a better shot at knocking off a Republican incumbent. In this case, however, Democratic former Juneau mayor Byron Mallott hasn't dropped out entirely; instead, he's joining the campaign of Republican-turned-independent-as-of-September-this-year former mayor of Valdez Bill Walker as the latter's running mate. Usually this wouldn't raise too many red flags, but only one poll has come out since the two announced their campaigns would be merging--and it shows Walker up against incumbent Gov. Sean Parnell 37-31. Unfortunately, we don't want to draw too many conclusions from this because 1) it was conducted for a decidedly Democratic interest group, the AFL-CIO, and 2) it was conducted by Hays Research, a firm that found similar results in a poll in August conducted for the Walker campaign. It's not enough to make me change the rating from SAFE REPUBLICAN--but it is enough for me to make a new spreadsheet for it. Which is saying something.
Arizona's gubernatorial has kept a pretty low profile, especially since the two candidates are people who don't get much attention in the first place (a state Treasurer on the Republican side vs. a former University of Arizona Board of Regents member on the Democratic side). The reason we have no idea what's going on here is because independent pollsters seem adamant about not polling the state for some reason. It's also not all too clear that the state's fundamentals lean as heavily Republican as presidential election results would have you believe--it almost elected a Democrat to the Senate in 2012, and in 2012 it was the only state that both voted for Mitt Romney and for a majority of its House delegation to be Democratic (5-4). In the meantime, we'll go with the story the polls are telling right now, which are of a total TOSS-UP.
Arizona's gubernatorial has kept a pretty low profile, especially since the two candidates are people who don't get much attention in the first place (a state Treasurer on the Republican side vs. a former University of Arizona Board of Regents member on the Democratic side). The reason we have no idea what's going on here is because independent pollsters seem adamant about not polling the state for some reason. It's also not all too clear that the state's fundamentals lean as heavily Republican as presidential election results would have you believe--it almost elected a Democrat to the Senate in 2012, and in 2012 it was the only state that both voted for Mitt Romney and for a majority of its House delegation to be Democratic (5-4). In the meantime, we'll go with the story the polls are telling right now, which are of a total TOSS-UP.
One race where we do know what's going on but which we're still not changing (for now)
Quinnipiac University just released their poll for the Colorado gubernatorial election showing former Rep. Bob Beauprez leading Gov. John Hickenlooper 50-40. This brings him from a two-point deficit in our average to a two-point lead. Several things make us wary of changing the rating here, though: first, while it's not impossible that Beauprez has suddenly pulled ten points ahead of Gov. Hickenlooper, it's pretty much nearly impossible. (The Quinnipiac poll was also conducted around the same time that a Suffolk poll showing Gov. Hickenlooper up 43-41 was released.) At the moment, our model happens to be relatively sensitive to large swings in polling, which is why we won't make too much of that one poll. If more come in, though....
Finally, in Hawaii's gubernatorial what's probably going on is a sort of reversion to the mean. Former Lt. Gov. Duke Aiona won the Republican primary without a hitch, while state senator David Ige defeated an unpopular incumbent for the Democratic nomination. In the weeks immediately after the primary, Aiona had tiny leads in polling in the bluest state in the Union. But all of this looks consistent with Hawaiians doing their best to shake off the stench of Gov. Neil Abercrombie--see also a rise in support for the independent candidacy of former Honolulu mayor Mufi Hannemann. Continuing that narrative, it's plausible that by now Hawaiians have shaken most of it off, are satisfied with Ige, and are settling back into the normal partisan routine. It's still important to keep an eye out, though. Toss-up --> LEANS DEMOCRATIC
Finally, in Hawaii's gubernatorial what's probably going on is a sort of reversion to the mean. Former Lt. Gov. Duke Aiona won the Republican primary without a hitch, while state senator David Ige defeated an unpopular incumbent for the Democratic nomination. In the weeks immediately after the primary, Aiona had tiny leads in polling in the bluest state in the Union. But all of this looks consistent with Hawaiians doing their best to shake off the stench of Gov. Neil Abercrombie--see also a rise in support for the independent candidacy of former Honolulu mayor Mufi Hannemann. Continuing that narrative, it's plausible that by now Hawaiians have shaken most of it off, are satisfied with Ige, and are settling back into the normal partisan routine. It's still important to keep an eye out, though. Toss-up --> LEANS DEMOCRATIC
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