Even if Christine O’Donnell never comes close to beating Chris Coons, control of the Senate is still in play this year. Public Policy Polling gives Democrats perhaps one of their most depressing results yet this cycle:
PPP’s first look at the West Virginia Senate contest finds a very tight race with John Raese up 46-43 on Joe Manchin, a result within the poll’s margin of error.
The contest provides a fascinating choice for voters in the state who love their Democratic Governor but hate the party’s ranks in Washington DC that he would be joining.
Manchin is the second most popular Governor PPP has polled on all year, behind only Bobby Jindal, with a 59/32 approval spread. He breaks almost even with Republicans as 42% of them approve of the job he’s doing with just 44% disapproving. In a highly polarized political climate the list of politicians with that kind of crossover popularity is very short.
At the same time West Virginians couldn’t be much more down on national Democrats. Barack Obama’s approval rating in the state is just 30% with 64% of voters disapproving of him. Even within his own party barely half of voters, at 51%, like the job he’s doing. Support from Republicans (91% disapproval) and independents (73% disapproval) is pretty much nonexistent.
Yesterday Rasmussen found Raese down seven. Either way, this is a good chance for a GOP win in a state where Democrats thought they had it in the bag.
With this poll, John Raese leaps to the top, or near the top, of GOP Senate candidates who need help from the grassroots right now.
This might be similar to the Bill Weld-John Kerry match up for Senate in MA back in the 90's. Weld was a very popular R gov in MA, and John Kerry was never really loved by anyone even the D's. They voted for him but no one had the love for him like they did Kennedy.
Kerry won the senate race basically because people liked him as Gov and wanted him to stay in that position. The people of WV like Manchin as Gov so they could keep him in that position and punish Pelosi, Reid Obama at the same time.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBet Manchin and the state Democrats are kicking themselves for pushing for the special election in the first place. They could have had a placeholder in there until 2012 had they not pushed to amend the law to allow for a special election this year. While I imagine Democrats won't get any more popular in WV in the next 2 years, you figure that some of the edge might have worn off and Manchin would be in a better position to have won then.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis really isn't the same as MA Hoover. Kerry was an incumbent Senator even if he wasn't wildly popular (or as popular as Weld). That race was also held in 1996, which gave Kerry a leg up as Clinton was clearly going to win Massachusetts going away. Weld, while popular, was running against a sitting Senator in a blue state in a presidential year.
Manchin, also popular, may be running against the tide in a reddish state, but he isn't running against a sitting Senator (that may actually be a disadvantage in this environment). In fact, he's running against a guy who's never held any elected office. That a pretty significant difference.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis could be Obama's greatest two achievements- replacing Kennedy and Byrd with Republicans.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWest Virginia - Almost Heaven.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe key number in this poll can be seen in the PPP blog memo:
"22% of voters in WV have the competing impulses of both liking Manchin and wanting Republicans to control the next Congress. With those folks Raese leads 57-29"
That means about 7% of the electorate want GOP control of congress but are voting for Manchin because they like the job he's doing as Gov and 3% of the total electorate (and 30% of the undecideds) likes Manchin but want the GOP to control Congress.
Raese and the GOP would be smart to play up the "Keep Manchin in the Mansion" theme to move more of that 22% of voters to Raese.
If this senate election is nationalized and becomes about who controls congress Raese wins.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIndeed, they could successfully take the high ground route of, "Manchin has served West Virginia well in Charleston, it would be a shame to send him to Washington to be just another one of Harry Reid's pets. Let's keep Manchin where he has already served us so well, and send Raese to Washington to stand up to Harry Reid's kennel."
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