“I don’t agree with the oddsmakers,” vice-president Joe Biden told CNN this morning. “I predict we’re gonna … keep the Senate.”
When all the votes are counted, will Joe Biden be vindicated? We’ll raise an eyebrow at that question below. But first here’s today’s …
Number of import
Nine. It could be no other. That’s the number of toss-up Senate races to follow Tuesday night. The number used to be 10, until Republican Tom Cotton started to outpace incumbent Mark Pryor in Arkansas. In fact some people will tell you the number is actually eight, or even seven, depending on what you believe about Kentucky and elsewhere. Nein. It’s nine.
Here’s more on the state of the race:
The Des Moines Register thinks Republican Senate candidate Joni Ernst is up seven points in her Iowa race against Bruce Braley (other reputable recent polls have seen a dead heat). And some Iowa Democrats frankly find that a little bit freaky, the Guardian’s Rory Carroll (@rorycarroll) discovers in a trip to the Hawkeye State:
Many progressives consider the self-described farm girl their worst nightmare: a Tea Party radical who wants to privatise social security, curb abortion rights, repeal Obamacare and abolish the Environmental Protection Agency. A corn belt Sarah Palin with shears – and momentum.
“I find her sort of scary,” said Joan Sparland, 56, an educator, after casting an early ballot with her husband and son in Des Moines. They voted for the Democrats’ senate candidate, Bruce Braley, but feared the worst. “I’m praying,” said Sparland.
In response to potential voter concern that a Republican takeover of the Senate would mean two years of monomaniacal attacks on President Barack Obama and little else, GOP leaders have made lots of statesmanlike noises. Guess who’s not sticking to the script?
Texas senator Ted Cruz told the Washington Post on Sunday that “the first order of business should be a series of hearings on President Obama, ‘looking at the abuse of power, the executive abuse, the regulatory abuse, the lawlessness that sadly has pervaded this administration.’ Cruz also would like the Senate to be as aggressive in trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act as the House, which has voted more than 50 times to get rid of the law.”
Joe Biden spent the weekend in Florida campaigning for gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist. He predicted that the Democrats will keep the Senate. But he also issued a pre-emptive warning about Republican “obstructionism” – on the slim chance that they do win tomorrow:
I don’t think it would change anything, in terms of what we’re about,” Biden told CNN. “We know what we have to get done the last two years. And – quite frankly – going into 2016, the Republicans have to make a decision whether they’re in control or not in control. Are they gonna begin to allow things to happen? Or are they gonna continue to be obstructionists? And I think they’re gonna choose to get things done.
Here’s a comprehensive list of other people who think the Democrats are going to hold the Senate:
- Debbie Wasserman Schultz, head of the Democratic National Committee. “I think we’re going to win the Senate.”
- Guy Cecil, executive director of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. “But no, I’m not predicting wins in every single targeted state. But there’s a path to victory.”
That sweet moment is coming when we stop talking about polls and start taking about votes.
— Ben White (@morningmoneyben) November 3, 2014
Biden has taken a leading role for the Democrats in this year’s midterms campaigning, sure with an eye to 2016, but also to fill in for an absent Obama, writes Olivier Knox of Yahoo News:
Biden has labored all year to generate cash, supporters and positive headlines for his party’s candidates — as well as amass political chits he could call in should he decide to run for president in 2016.
In 2014 alone, the vice president has campaigned for 66 different candidates, local committees or Democratic Party branches and held 70 events in 22 states and Washington, D.C., according to figures provided last week by his office.
When will we know?
If you’re throwing a huge election party tomorrow night, with all your friends over and pizza and CNN projected on a big screen and a map on the wall to tick off races, be advised that your party might go down as legendarily terrible, because the map at the end of the night had like four states still not filled in (otherwise: great idea for a party).
Louisiana and Georgia both could go to a runoff, one of the Kansas candidates won’t say which party he’s in and Alaska is not only in pretty much Japan’s timezone but in 2008 it took two weeks to declare a winner in a close-ish Senate race. Even Iowa could add to the haze, with a report about 10 days ago that Republican Joni Ernst is gearing up for a recount (polling since then has increased confidence that that may not be necessary).
What could help to ensure there’s a definitive Senate winner by evening’s end? If Georgia, where polls close on the early side at 7pm ET, were declared expeditiously for the Republicans, or the Republican won in either North Carolina (7.30pm) or New Hampshire (8pm), that would probably do it. Here’s a map of poll closing times in each state.
In other news
This would qualify as an October surprise out in San Diego, except it’s November, and the candidate already has been accused by two other people of doing this:
Carl DeMaio staffer: "He had his pants up, but his fly was undone, and he had his hand grasping his genitals." http://t.co/xUfT6WxNk1
— Taegan Goddard (@politicalwire) November 3, 2014
Maybe Carl DeMaio just really gets politics, in a way everybody else will eventually catch up to.
Whither the Senate
With a day to go, it continues to look good for the GOP. The average probability of Republicans taking the Senate, according to three top elections modellers (538, theNew York Times and HuffPost Pollster), is 72.67% – up another point overnight after a seven-point jump over the last week.
The bright side
Is your daily consumption of political news harming your ability to love your country? #ff @Interior:
Snow is beginning to fall on some of America's public lands! Here's a cool shot @SequoiaKingsNPS from this weekend. pic.twitter.com/Xgpl14vJtx
— US Dept of Interior (@Interior) November 2, 2014
