Things have changed a bit since I last weighed in on the Senate races in 2024.  Things will change again.  However, here’s my current snapshot:

The above table is sorted by the likelihood that the seat will be held by a Democrat in 2024. I was frankly surprised that my current model turned out to as favorable to Democrats as it is.  Almost all professional pundits put the Senate completely out of reach for Democrats in 2024.  My model says it’s a VERY tough road, but Democrats at least have a fighting chance to maintain a 50/50 split and, if Biden/Harris wins the Presidency, a 50/50 Senate is good enough.  By “tough”, I mean that Democrats would have to run the table on all Senate contests in which my model says they are slightly favored AND win both contests that my model says are Toss Ups.

There’s even an outside chance of Democrats maintaining their current 51/49 majority.  By “outside chance”, I mean “tough” plus Democrats would also need to win the one race that my model says is Lean R.

Here are brief, subjective looks at each state contest above:

• California:  Democrat Adam Schiff will beat Republican Steve Garvey in the general election.  The problem is that two House Democrats in addition to Schiff resigned to run for this Senate seat.  Katie Porter will be sorely missed in the House and her district is now in-play to be flipped Republican.  Barbara Lee’s district isn’t at risk, but we lost a competent legislator. Sigh.
• Maryland:  This is an open 2024 seat.  Larry Hogan, the popular former Governor of Maryland, unfortunately changed his mind about running and will be the Republican nominee.  David Trone, the founder of Total Wine & More, could mostly self-fund his campaign and has a slight polling lead for the Democratic nomination.  Given a competent campaign, Trone should be able to defeat Hogan in deep-blue Maryland, even given Hogan’s name recognition advantage.  Hogan’s popularity is mostly related to state issues that likely won’t apply as well to the national stage.  In a sense, it’s sad.  Hogan is actually a sane Republican – a rare breed these days.  However, Democrats cannot afford to lose this seat and they’ll be forced to spend some money here.
• Pennsylvania:  Current Democratic Sen. Bob Casey is well-liked in PA and should win re-election.  However, the likely Republican nominee, David McCormick, is a former Army Ranger and hedge-fund CEO who will put up a good, well-funded fight.
• Michigan:  This is an open seat in a purple state.  U.S. Rep Elissa Slotkin is the presumptive Democratic nominee but there are about a dozen candidates competing in what could be an ugly GOP primary that won’t be resolved until August. The Orange Guy recently waded into this race by endorsing former Rep. Mike Rogers, immediately making him the current favorite.  Rogers has been out of politics for about a decade and it’s unclear at this point how competitive he will be against Slotkin’s popularity and formidable fundraising abilities.
• Wisconsin:  Current Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin is popular in WI but this purple state is never a sure thing.  Likely Republican nominee Eric Hovde, the multi-millionaire CEO of Sunwest Bank, certainly has the bankroll to make this a competitive race.  He has the endorsement of the Orange Guy – which might prove to be mixed bag in Wisconsin.  Already, Hovde is trying to walk a tightrope that could well backfire with both the MAGA crowd and the anti-MAGA crowd.  Also, while both Baldwin and Hovde were born and raised in Wisconsin, only Baldwin can claim continuous residency.  Hovde lived in Washington, DC for most of his adult life, works for a Utah company without a presence in Wisconsin, and owns a $7M California estate.  He moved back to Wisconsin just to run for the Senate and Wisconsinites aren’t generally fond of carpetbaggers.
• Ohio:  Current Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown has been the rare Democrat to win state-wide in red-leaning Ohio over the last decade.  Brown is popular in OH but a good GOP candidate would have made this a very competitive race.  Thankfully, Republicans settled on Bernie Moreno, the Orange Guy’s favorite candidate, who has wasted no time sucking up.  State Sen. Matt Dolan would have been a much tougher opponent for Brown but he didn’t sufficiently genuflect to the MAGA gods to appease the GOP base.  That said, this race is most certainly not a slam dunk given Ohio’s demographics.
• Arizona:  Current independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema decided against running in 2024, leaving this race a likely contest between Democrat Ruben Gallego and Republican Kari Lake.  Lake is a far-right conspiracy theorist who has alienated pretty much everyone in Arizona except for the fire-breathing MAGA crowd.  Unfortunately, Gallego is a unapologetic progressive who doesn’t have a stellar history of playing well with the center, either.  This race will be narrowly won by whoever is most successful at rebranding between now and November.  My money’s on Gallego. Lake’s ego will make this all about her past grievances and Arizona is very tired of that story.
• Nevada:  First-term Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen is in for a tough re-election contest in a purple state.  Republicans haven’t quite settled on a challenger yet, but it looks like Sam Brown will win the GOP nomination over far-right nut-job Jim Marchant.  That’s not good news for Democrats. Brown is a retired Army officer and a purple heart recipient for severe injuries in Afghanistan.
• Montana:  Current Democratic Sen. Jon Tester has survived since 2007 in deep-red Montana and he still has a powerful brand.  However, Democratic hopes of a repeat contest against far-right idiot Rep. Matt Rosendale have been dashed and retired Navy SEAL Tim Sheehy will be his opponent.  Sheehy is wealthy enough to self-fund his campaign and has proven himself to be a competent politician. Crap.
• Florida:  Current Republican Sen. Rick Scott isn’t particularly well-liked nor is he a particularly talented politician.  However, Scott is a rich incumbent in an increasingly red state.  The current surprise is just how well Democrat Debbie Mucarsel-Powell is doing at the moment.  Even with almost no statewide name recognition, she’s polling well.  While Florida is one of the most expensive states in which to run an insurgent campaign, Democrats should spend some money here.
• Texas:  As a Texan, I’d love to declare that current Republican Sen. Ted Cruz can be beaten.  However, while U.S. Rep. Colin Allred might get within low single digits of Cruz and could easily do better than Beto O’Rourke did against Cruz, I unfortunately see no reasonable path to an actual win.  I’ll admit that I considered tweaking my Democratic turnout projections in Texas to make this race closer. I just can’t force myself to believe that possibility.  I’ll still be writing a check, though, just to make me feel better.  And miracles do happen!
• West Virginia:  With current Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin deciding against a run, this seat is a slam-dunk pickup for the GOP.  Anyone with an (R) beside their name would beat any Democrat in this race.  The fact that Republican Jim Justice is popular will just make the margins larger.

Lest anyone thinks I’m being a Pollyanna (in which case we’ve never actually met), allow me to be clear.  At the moment, it’s more likely than not that Democrats will come up slightly short of maintaining a Senate majority.  It’s just not quite time to panic about it.

So what can we do now? If you feel strongly about individual states, I suggest finding your candidate’s campaign website and donating directly to their campaign.  Sadly, the DSCC, the independent Blue Senate PAC, and numerous other groups appear to be way too egalitarian – spreading money evenly across Senate races that matter, races that don’t need help, and races that aren’t winnable.  Democrats.  Geez.  Don’t waste your money.  If you want a one-stop donation site to help maintain a Democratic Senate majority, here’s my recommendation:

• Senate Majority PAC:  This is an independent group associated with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.  Schumer really wants to remain the Majority Leader and he has excellent political instincts.  The PAC has a ton of money already and they seem to be using it wisely in states where the money will be put to the best use.

While predictive analysis is fun, prescriptive analysis is more useful.  To that end, I again focused on identifying which races might be the most important to a Democratic effort to retake the House.

As before, I first identified the House races that were even worthy of further analysis.  That pass eliminated those seats that are safely Democratic or Republican in 2024.  I next ignored those races that are likely to be won by whoever wins either the Democratic or Republican nomination.  While a few of these races could turn out to be important, limited resources should be directed toward those races in swing districts that appear to be somewhat close.

At the moment, that leaves only 39 races of interest for the 435 House seats.  Of the rest, my analysis is not particularly good news for Democrats. Republicans are likely to win 203 seats; Democrats are likely to win 193 seats.  In the 39 interesting races, Democrats are also defending more seats than Republicans and thus have a steeper climb than Republicans to a 218-seat House majority.

Democrats were not helped by a number of factors:

• 2024 Congressional redistricting efforts did not generally favor Democrats.
• Democratic retirements significantly hurt the chances of holding several current D seats.

On the other hand, things are not all doom and gloom for Democrats:

• The current 118th Congress has been one of the least productive in history.  In 2023, Congress managed to pass only 34 bills into law, the lowest number in decades.  Republicans controlled the House and thus shoulder that blame.  Democrats need to constantly remind voters that their Republican representatives were incredibly incompetent at their jobs.
• The OG lost to Biden in 2020 in 14 of the 18 districts where the Republican candidate won the 2020 House race!  Democrats need to coat those 2024 Republicans with bright orange paint.
• The Orange Guy is raiding the coffers of the RNC to pay his legal bills at the expense of down-ballot races, including House races.  In close contests, party money could easily make a difference.
• Since party primaries are still in-progress, many of the candidates are not yet set in stone for these races.  I’ll update things when I can discuss actual people.  At the moment, though, the candidate quality factor looks like it will favor Democrats by a fairly wide margin.  While admittedly subjective, the Democrats in many of the close races have impressive resumes – doctors, teachers, military veterans, etc.  Others have long, well-respected histories of working across the aisle in their respective state legislatures.  The Republican field, however, looks to once again be dominated by MAGA extremists whose primary qualifications are fealty to the OG, insistence that the 2020 election was stolen, an aversion to compromise, and a dedication to conspiracy theories and fear-mongering.  While that resume might motivate the GOP base, close races are mostly won in the center.

Here’s my current take on the 39 races:The strategy is straight-forward:

1. Democrats first need to defend the 21 seats above that they currently hold.  That’s not an easy task since 8 of them are currently Toss Ups.  Win all of these, and Democrats would have 214 seats – which is still not a majority.
2. Democrats next need to flip the 11 Republican seats that are currently forecast as Lean D or Toss Up.  Win all of these, and Democrats would have a 225-seat majority – a workable margin.
3. Democrats finally need to target at least a few of the 7 Republican seats that are currently forecast as Lean R – both to allow for some losses above and to make Republicans spend money defending their seats.

So what can we do now?  As the candidates come more into focus, I’ll try to post some individual campaign donation links.  In the meantime, I’ll suggest two DCCC programs that might be worthy of consideration for some hard-earned cash:

• DCCC Frontline:  This program distributes money to current Democratic members of Congress that the DCCC deem to be in competitive 2024 races. Frontline has identified 29 members while I identified 21.  I think they missed a couple of close races and they’re throwing money at several races that likely don’t need the help.  Still, Frontline’s overlap with my list is significant and I have no problem recommending this program for a one-stop donation to help hold the line.
• DCCC Red to Blue:  This program distributes money to Democratic candidates that the DCCC deem to have a decent chance of flipping a Republican-held seat.  Red to Blue has identified 20 races while I identified 18.   Again, I think they missed a couple of close races and I think they’re throwing money at a few lost causes.  While Red to Blue’s overlap with my list isn’t quite as large as Frontline, it’s still a decent set for a one-stop donation to help grow a Democratic majority.

Democrats have been absolutely soiling themselves over a New York Times / Siena College poll released this past weekend.

Granted that a front-page headline reading “Trump Leads Biden in 5 Key Battleground States” – in a newspaper that Democrats intrinsically trust – certainly provides a sufficient stimulus for an abrupt outbreak of explosive diarrhea.

So okay.  That happened.  But while Democrats are cleaning themselves up, perhaps they should consider some background before they overdose on Imodium.  In particular, I suggest that folks consider both the methodology of the poll and the timing of the poll.

Methodology

I’ll start by giving some credit to these pollsters for at least recognizing that national polls are useless.  Swing state polls can provide the only interesting data since we can be assured that the Electoral College votes in something north of 80% of the states are preordained and victory margins in those states are less than meaningless.  The states that the NYT polled – Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania – are a decent set.  At this point, I’d have added Virginia, New Hampshire, and North Carolina to the potential swing-state list, but that’s a nit.  The poll claims to have had 600 respondents in each state, attempting to cover various demographics (age, race, income, education, & party).  That’s all fine.

Unfortunately, that’s all the credit I’m going to give.

First, it took some digging to derive their methodology.  I’ll begrudgingly admit that they did at least publish it (unlike many other pollsters), but they certainly didn’t highlight the potential issues.  Raise your hand if you even thought to look beyond the headline into the methodology details.  Yeah, thought so.  Only data geeks would do that.  And one of them happens to have a blog.

The most glaring problem is that the poll intentionally over-sampled Republicans!

In an apparent attempt to avoid underestimating Republican support (as this poll did in 2016), the pollsters decided to over-sample Republican voters and then statistically adjust the results.  That approach “could” work with a large dataset and a low oversampling rate.  This sample, however, isn’t nearly large enough to accurately reflect reality with statistical weights.  And the over-sampling rate was way too high.

Only 20% of respondents self-identified as liberal or somewhat liberal while 36% self-identified as conservative or somewhat conservative.  No amount of mathematical magic in a 600-person poll can properly adjust the demographic coverage when one ideology has almost double the representation.

Swing states are called swing states for a reason:  The electorate in each is divided between Democrats and Republicans with a significant number of independents. In any given election, either party has a chance to prevail.

While this same poll over-corrected in both 2020 and 2022, underestimating Democratic support, they made a conscious decision to keep making the same mistake for 2024.  Go figure.

Furthermore, the poll’s definition of “likely voter” seems rather suspect.  The model uses a proprietary turnout-probability formula modified by a weighted version of self-reported voter intentions.  Wow.  Methinks the complexity of that math far exceeds the limitations of the minimal, statistically-adjusted data.

A valid poll today shouldn’t even try to weight the sample.  It should focus instead on identifying the most representative voter sample possible and stay far, far away from math tricks.

At the VERY least, it is inexcusable for these facts to have not been noted upfront in the New York Times’ coverage of the poll.

Timing

Even if we make the massively questionable assumption that the NYT poll provides an accurate snapshot, we still have another huge issue:

The poll was taken over a year out from the 2024 elections!

That’s an eternity in today’s political environment.  Here’s just a few related observations:

• The general election campaigns haven’t really started, and Biden’s re-election messaging is still a TBD. He’ll hopefully focus again on sanity and an improved economy.  He also needs to remind the electorate that his opponent is only four years younger… and is certifiable.
• As the campaigns progress, Biden will be Biden and will continue to be gaffe-prone.  He’s been that way for decades.  He’ll warm up when necessary but, more importantly, his Democratic surrogates will debate circles around what’s left of media-savvy Republicans with a multi-digit IQ.
• Biden’s opponent might be in jail.  Or at least under house arrest.  Seriously, I have to believe that any felony conviction will have an impact on the polls.  Also, a continued emphasis on revenge as a campaign message should wear very thin for those not already in the cult.
• We don’t yet know who will mount serious third-party campaigns nor what their impacts will be in the swing states.
• Younger votes simply don’t pay attention this early in election cycles.  Their impact will show up much later in the polls.
• Shit happens.  We have a couple of ongoing wars, an unpredictable economy, and a Congress that can’t handle the basics of governance.  There’s even a non-zero probability that the party nominees won’t be who we think they’ll be.  Oh, and locusts.  Swarms of locusts.

Bottom Line

The NYT poll mostly tells us that the 2024 election will likely be tight.  We already knew that.

Should Democrats be concerned?  Absolutely.  It would be much better to have such a commanding lead in the polls that timing & methodology problems are irrelevant.

Should Democrats panic?  Absolutely not.  This election has the highest stakes of any in my lifetime and some moderate levels of anxiety are certainly healthy.  However, there’s no current need for either Imodium OR Prozac.  While Chicken Little’s genes are in the Democratic Party’s DNA, we all need to just chill.  If necessary, we can always panic later.

We finally have a Speaker of the House.  Woo.  Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) will be an unmitigated disaster and a likely topic of future blog posts.  For the moment, though, I’m simply exhausted with all of the House drama and needed to switch my focus towards some state-level elections.  Even in this off year, there are some current contests that are worth watching.

None of them, however, are in my home state of Texas.  We have no statewide candidates on the November 7 ballot and instead have 14 proposed amendments to our state Constitution.  None are meaningful at a national level, a few are meaningful to Texans, and others aren’t particularly meaningful at all.  Early voting started Monday; I voted Monday.  “Shit happens. Vote Early.”

Louisiana held their gubernatorial election earlier this month.  Gov. John Bel Edwards (D-LA) was term limited and, sadly, Republican Jeff Landry flipped that statehouse red.  Louisiana isn’t in-play at the national level, but it’s still a shame to lose a Governor’s office to a MAGA idiot.

Kentucky’s gubernatorial elections are Nov. 7 and Gov. Andy Beshear (D-KY) is running for re-election against Republican David Cameron.  Kentucky is definitely a red state and Republicans hold a strong supermajority in the state legislature.  However, the state has a long history of thinking locally when it comes to the Governor’s office and Beshear has been good for Kentucky’s economy.  With a slight lead in the polls (even the GOP-funded polls), there’s a decent chance he’ll win re-election.  A Beshear win, however, would be indicative of nothing at the national level.  Biden lost Kentucky by a 26% margin; he’ll lose the state again in 2024.

Mississippi’s gubernatorial elections are Nov. 7 and Gov. Tate Reeves (R-MS) is in a surprisingly tight race with Democrat Brandon Presley (Elvis’ second cousin).  Reeves is the least popular Republican governor running for re-election this year.  On the other hand, Presley has run a great campaign and the latest polls show him only slightly behind, well within the margin of error.  I’d love to see the statehouse flip in a bright red state, but it’s doubtful and it wouldn’t be indicative of a trend in any case.  Biden lost Mississippi by a 16% margin; he’ll lose the state again in 2024.

Pennsylvania has a Supreme Court race that is highlighting one particular issue.  The race between Democrat Daniel McCaffery and Republican Carolyn Carluccio won’t itself change control of the state court but could shed some light on how potent the abortion issue might be in 2024 swing states – including Pennsylvania.

Ohio will vote on a state Constitutional amendment to protect abortion access and a separate ballot initiative would legalize marijuana in the state.  Despite Republican efforts to keep both issues off the ballot, polls show that both have a high chance of passing.  Ohio is itself a red state, but the vote margins here may provide a hint toward what issues will resonate with voters in 2024.

Virginia’s state legislative races will provide a major clue about how that state will factor in the 2024 elections.  Virginia is definitely a swing state.  Biden won by 10% in 2020, but Republican Glenn Youngkin won the governor’s race by 2% in 2021.  Democrats have a slight majority in the state Senate; Republicans have a slight majority in the state House.  However, all seats in both state chambers are up for election this year.  While education is the prominent local issue this cycle, abortion access is a close second.  Both parties will be targeting suburban swing districts, trying out key campaign messages that will take them into 2024.

Finally, it’ll be interesting to see the results of a ton of Nov. 7 elections in New York’s Long Island.  Yeah, you heard me.  Long Island.

All county legislature seats are up for election in both Nassau and Suffolk counties, the county executive election in Suffolk will be the first without an incumbent in a decade, and there’s a ton of town supervisor races.  If you’re wondering why anyone that doesn’t live there should give a damn, it’s because Long Island is a quintessentially purple suburban swing district with a fairly equal number of Democrats, Republicans, and independents.  This area has thus been a testing ground for political messaging and serves as a decent bellwether for the strength of each party’s pitch to voters in swing states.

Off year elections in Long Island historically favor Republicans and, indeed, they did quite well in 2022.  Democrats took a beating, including the loss of all four U.S. Houses seats.  Presidential election years are almost always closer.  In 2020, Biden won Nassau county by a wide margin and only barely lost Suffolk county.  Current polls indicates that Biden would do even better today, but 2024 is too far away for accurate polling.  The upcoming elections will thus provide a much better canary in the coal mine.

Both parties have their own albatrosses in this cycle.  Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY) isn’t particularly popular in Long Island and Rep. George Santos (R-NY) was the winner of one of the aforementioned Congressional seats in 2020.  Republicans will try to focus on policy issues while steering away from abortion restrictions that aren’t popular here.  Democrats will pounce on issues of candidate integrity while steering clear of unpopular state policies out of Albany.

Local issues and candidate personalities will prevail at a micro-level in Long Island, so I’m not personally focused on any individual races.  However, a macro-level review of the Long Island election results could shed some light on how 2024 might play out in swing states.

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