The Trump train seems to be destroying the GOP’s hopes of maintaining control of the Senate — and it all started when the Republican candidate decided to pick an unnecessary fight with the Gold Star family. The farcical spectacle showed the GOP candidate painfully unaware that he would never win this fight because voters, including the immense majority of Republican voters, disagreed with the way he handled the situation. The Khan family, who lost their son, Army Captain Humayun Khan, in Iraq twelve years ago, spoke at the Democratic National Convention and slammed Trump for his ignorance of their religion, the fact that the Khans are Muslims, and his lack of dedication. A brutal attack — but Trump should stay away from him because he must know that there are many people who hate him. He can’t launch a counterattack on everyone, and one against the Gold Star family with his temperament would be disastrous. It was an ongoing train wreck, albeit one that made a lot of money.
Trump has more or less closed the fundraising gap he had with Clinton, even though he hasn’t spent a dime on TV ads. There’s no field game. Down the list, as his vote share has plummeted, so have Republicans’ chances of holding the Senate. Democrats need only four seats to retake the chamber, and a vast number of Republicans defending their seats come from states Obama won (in some cases by significant margins). Before the convention, GOP Senate candidates were able to insulate themselves from their candidate. A week after the Democratic convention, there was a brief increased confidence because Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio looks like he might be able to fend off a challenge from former Gov. Ted Strickland. And that’s about the only good news that’s come since then. Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) is facing a very different constituency in the Granite State. She won in a landslide in 2010. Now, Gov. Maggie Hassan could easily unseat her. She’s down 10 points, and I’m sure Trump’s endorsement of her at a rally in Green Bay earlier this month didn’t make things any easier for her. She’s trying to operate her support for the Obama administration’s horrific Clean Power Plan as a way to put some distance between Trump/GOP and voters in her state.
In Pennsylvania, Sen. Pat Toomey is indeed under fire. He also beat former Rep. Joe Sestak in 2010, but he faces a reelection campaign in a state that should lean Republican but is dominated by Democratic strongholds: Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. In addition, Philadelphia’s suburbs and their corresponding counties around the city often play a huge role in deciding the state. Toomey won the midterms, now he faces increased turnout from voters who are generally not conservative — with Hillary Clinton leading the ticket. Before Trump, Toomey seemed in a powerful position to win reelection. He polled strongly against Sestak, who gave him another chance this year, only to lose to Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf’s former chief of staff, Katie McGinty. McGinty followed Toomeyuntil weeks after the Republican Convention. The Republican incumbent is trailing McGinty within the margin of error, and Trump is trailing Clinton in the state by 10 points.
Toomey has tried to distance himself somewhat from the rest of his Republican colleagues in order to play nicely with these suburban voters. For starters, these people support gun control. Toomey supported the doomed 2013 Manchin-Toomey bill that would have expanded background checks and proudly accepted an award from Everytown for Gun Safety, an anti-gun advocacy group that is part of former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s consortium of pro-gun control groups that have yet to win a major legislative victory. Bloomberg has endorsed Clinton, but he has also endorsed Toomey. The Republican senator is likely counting on trying to win Bucks County, which he won in 2010, to boost his chances of survival. The problem is that the county is also key to Trump, someone Toomey wants to stay away from for as long as possible. Still, the hurdles Toomey and Ayotte face may be too great, and with Wisconsin and Illinois looking like Democratic acquisitions, a miracle is bound to happen (via FiveThirtyEight):
Before the conventions, polls in the 10 states most likely to flip Senate seats between the parties in November showed a fairly close race. The Democratic candidates were leading in Illinois and Wisconsin, which would be acquisitions for their party. The Republican candidate was leading in Nevada (a seat that Democrats currently control). I didn’t include Indiana in my pre-convention analysis because of Democrat Evan Bayh’s slow entry into the race—we only had one party poll that included Bayh—but the Democrats’ chances seemed good there (it would be another acquisition for the Democrats). And Republicans were leading in other competitive Senate races, all of which are currently held by the GOP, so it looked like the Democrats could net a two-seat win if all else remained the same and the poll leaders in each state won.
But Trump’s poll numbers have fallen since the convention—overall and in states with key Senate races. In eight states with competitive Senate races and polls both before and after the conventions,2 Trump had previously been down about 6 percentage points on average; he’s now down an average of 9 points.3 And while Republican Senate candidates were gaining just over 1 percentage point on average before the conventions in those eight states, they’re now down just over 1 point. That means Republican Senate candidates still have a lead in key states, but that lead may no longer be enough to win now that Trump’s fortunes have taken a turn for the worse.
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Democrats now hold a lead in enough states to retake the Senate—assuming Clinton maintains her vast lead. If the polling favorites win, Democrats will reverse course and pick up seats in Illinois, Indiana, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. Republicans will take Nevada and hold Florida, North Carolina, and Ohio. Of course, many of these races are close, and there’s still plenty of time before Election Day. The fight for the Senate isn’t over yet. Republicans and Trump—or Republicans without Trump—could bounce back.
Now we have a complex night in November ahead of us.
One last note:In 2012, Obama won most of the states that Republicans are defending this year. This is the other side of the argument – and it’s not an outrageous side.
