Polling Shows Senate Democrat Strength Despite Difficulties

Article by Oskar Doepke, TPT Staff Writer

Currently holding a 51-49 majority in the Senate, the Democratic Party will be seeking to maintain control after the 2024 election cycle. However, the Senate map paints a daunting picture for Democrat ambitions, with Democrats left defending seven out of the nine competitive races, according to CNN, and are all but guaranteed to lose West Virginia - thereby their one-seat majority - after Senator Joe Manchin’s retirement. With FiveThirtyEight’s polling placing President Joe Biden behind presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump in all nine competitive states, Democrats seemed destined to lose Senate control. Nonetheless, early Senate polling suggests otherwise, giving Democrats a glimmer of hope for Senate success.

Image Credit- 270 to Win- https://www.270towin.com/2024-senate-election/

Within the nine competitive seats, the two Republican incumbents, despite their states’ rating as “likely to flip” by CNN, will probably still win reelection. Florida, which voted for Governor Ron DeSantis by nearly 20 points in 2022 and has shifted considerably to the right in recent years, is unlikely to flip no matter what Democrats attempt. Similarly, Texas, although Republicans are fielding the extremely unliked Senator Ted Cruz, has been and will likely continue to be a Republican stronghold. While Democrats got within striking distance in the 2018 Senate elections, Beto O’Rourke’s abnormally effective campaign is the exception, not the norm, as shown by O’Rourke’s floundering gubernatorial campaign in 2022, losing by nearly a million votes to incumbent Governor Greg Abbott. With both incumbent Republican Senators in competitive seats likely to win, thereby giving Republicans 50 seats in the Senate, Democrats are left playing on the defense.

Nowhere else is Democrat plight as evident as in Ohio and Montana. Ohio, which Trump won by eight points in 2020, and Montana, which Trump won by 16, both hold incumbent Democrat Senators: Senators Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Jon Tester of Montana. With FiveThirtyEight’s polling average showing Trump running up the margins even greater than he did in 2020, these two seats seem easy Republican pick-ups; nonetheless, early polling suggests Democratic potential for success.

Brown, for instance, is up against all three potential Republican candidates in Ohio and has a history of outperforming the Democratic Party in his state. In 2018, Brown won his reelection campaign by eight points, the same margin Trump won by the state in 2016. Trump’s endorsement of Republican candidate Bernie Moreno seems to help Brown even more. Moreno, an ex-car dealer, is running on a populist platform against two more experienced Ohio politicians with a strong track record, State Senator Matt Dolan and Secretary of State Frank LeRose; Trump’s endorsement might very well be what pushes Moreno over the edge. According to Emerson College polling, while Brown is up by five points against LeRose and Dolan, he is up eleven against Moreno. Ultimately, Brown seems to be in a better position than originally thought.

Similarly, Tester seems likely to hold his seat despite running in a deep red state, with Montana not having voted for a Democrat presidential candidate since 1992. It’s important to note Tester has won reelection two times already: winning by four points in 2012 despite Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney winning the state by 14 that year, and maintaining the four-point victory in 2018 in spite of Trump’s even greater 20-point victory. Although Republicans are coalescing behind candidate Tim Sheehy, disregarding Representative Matt Rosendale, who previously lost against Tester in 2018, recent polls still show Tester’s extreme popularity in the state overperforms the state’s presidential voting history, beating Sheehy by as much as nine points, giving Democrats another gleam of encouragement.

While Ohio and Montana are proving more sturdy than thought for Democrats, Arizona remains a potential pitfall for Democrat success. Democrats originally flipped Arizona in 2018 with Senator Kyrstem Sinema in a nail-biting race; however, times have changed since then. In 2022, Sinema quit the Democratic Party after a series of disagreements and looks likely to gear up for a potential three-way race. Presumptive Democratic candidate Ruben Gallego, a popular five-term Congressman, has to run against the now-deeply unpopular Sinema, and due to Sinema’s past party affiliation, it’s possible Arizona’s left-leaning vote will split among the two candidates. Nonetheless, the presumptive Republican nomination of Kari Lake fails to utilize the erosion of Democratic power. Lake, a former news anchor, lost to Governor Katie Hobbs in 2022 despite polling giving her a considerable lead, as her extremist views on salient issues alienated voters. Sinema’s more centrist stances might pull Republican voters away from Lake, and the current polling average shows Gallego actually ahead in the race, despite Democratic difficulties. Gallego is leading by five points over both Sinema and Lake, perhaps due to Sinema pulling voters equally from both sides of the aisle, prompting more hope for Democrats’ electoral outcomes.

Outside of Ohio, Montana and Arizona, Democrats luckily seem geared toward a likely victory. Both incumbent Senators Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin remain highly popular in their states and ahead in the polls by a considerable margin, according to FiveThirtyEight. Similarly, although incumbent Senator Elissa Slotkin of Michigan is not nearly as popular as Casey or Baldwin, the recent inner turmoil of the Michigan Republican Party - holding two dueling primary conventions as a controversial leadership election goes to court - bodes well for her electoral outcome, prompting doubt on Republican ability as Slotkin grows her lead in the polls. In Nevada, incumbent Senator Jacky Rosen is up by two to three points, and combined with Nevada’s strong recent electoral history of electing Democrats, Rosen is likewise likely to maintain her seat in the Senate.

Moreover, despite Biden’s flailing approval rating and underperformance in a Trump rematch, presidential polling numbers do not necessarily have to translate to individual states. No more is this evident than in 2022. In 2022, Biden’s approval rating stood at roughly negative ten points as Democrats were expected to be blown out across the country in the so-called red wave. However, the red wave never materialized, and Democrats consistently outperformed both polls and Biden on every level. Democratic governors won competitive races in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Kansas, and Michigan - where Governor Gretchen Whitmer outperformed polls by ten points - while minimizing the Republican House victory and picking up another Senate seat in Pennsylvania, where Democrat Senator John Fetterman was expected to lose to the Republican candidate Mehmet Oz. Democrats even got a hold of multiple trifectas in competitive states such as Michigan. Nonetheless, despite Democrat’s overwhelming performance in 2022, national numbers do generally translate to state-wide numbers, as seen in 2010. In 2010, former President Barack Obama’s approval rating hit its record low at 45 percent, leading to an astounding 63-seat flip for Republicans in the House. Nevertheless, Democrats’ electoral outcomes in 2022 suggest that while top-ballot performances generally influence the overall state-level outcome, Democrats have the potential to succeed despite Biden’s lowering approval.

Ultimately, although it seems as if Democrats are posed for an electoral disaster in 2024, this does not have to be the case. While nationwide polls create an intimidating outlook, individualized state-level candidates are likely to build up their own reputation distinct from the national umbrella. Early polling hints at this possibility, with Democrats showing promise in retaining their existing seats - and even potentially making strides against Florida and Texas. However, it remains too early to definitively make projections about any of these races - nonetheless, Democrats should reasonably maintain a degree of optimism regarding their electoral prospects, and a Democratic victory may still yet be possible.

Sources:

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/01/01/politics/senate-race-rankings-january-2024/index.html

https://www.politico.com/election-results/2018/senate/

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/19/us/politics/trump-endorsement-bernie-moreno-ohio-senate.html

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/senate/2024/ohio

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/11/06/us/elections/results-senate-elections.html

https://ballotpedia.org/Jon_Tester

https://www.nytimes.com/elections/2012/results/states/montana.html

https://www.270towin.com/states/Montana

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/09/kyrsten-sinema-approval-rating-equally-unpopular-everyone.html

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4480909-gallego-leads-lake-sinema-in-arizona-senate-race-poll/

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/kyrsten-sinema-quits-democratic-party-b2242122.html