The incumbent was the subject of a much-publicized corruption trial, in which ophthalmologist Salomon Melgen, who was accused of making large campaign contributions and providing extensive perks in exchange for help from Menendez in a Medicare-fraud case. This is one of several polls showing Menendez with a less than overwhelming lead. A new survey of likely voters from Stockton University (a well-reputed pollster) showed two-term incumbent Bob Menendez in a virtual dead heat with Republican challenger Bob Hugin (the incumbent leads by 1.8 percent, but the margin of error for the poll is 4 percent). Two of those four would do the trick if Democrats sweep their own races.īut suddenly there’s a Democratic seat in jeopardy that hasn’t drawn much attention until now, and it’s in a deep-blue state, New Jersey. Republican seats in Arizona, Nevada, Tennessee, and Texas are all vulnerable. The path to a Democratic Senate was first made manifest by Doug Jones’s shocking special-election victory in Alabama last year, which reduced the magic number for Democrats to a net gain of two seats (a 50-50 Senate would be controlled by Republicans thanks to the vice-president’s tie-breaking vote).Īt this point, FiveThirtyEight shows every single Democratic incumbent senator leading. Twenty-five of the 35 seats up this year (including special elections in Minnesota and Mississippi) are held by Democrats, and 10 of them are in states carried by Trump in 2016 (only one Republican, Nevada’s Dean Heller, is running for reelection in a state carried by Clinton). Initially, the idea of a Democratic Senate takeover in 2018 seemed absurd, thanks to one of the most heavily skewed landscapes in living memory. If Democrats control Congress entirely, Republicans can forget about another run at repealing Obamacare or cutting taxes, and will be dealing instead with multiple investigations of Trump-administration corruption and worse. And a Democratic Senate could certainly curtail Donald Trump’s power significantly during the remainder of his term, if only by slowing down Mitch McConnell’s freight train of executive and judicial confirmations. It’s an important subtext of the fight over Brett Kavanaugh, if not (as Lindsey Graham claims) the main motive of Democratic efforts to delay his confirmation until the midterms. House on November 6 could be joined by a less-likely-but-feasible takeover of the Senate as well. Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Imagesĭemocrats are understandably excited about the possibility that their more-likely-than-not conquest of the U.S. Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey and his deep-pocketed GOP opponent Bob Hugin.
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