In light of yesterday’s Quinnipiac poll showing Pat Toomey maintaining his consistent lead over Democrat Joe Sestak, The Fix has moved the Pennsylvania senate race from “toss up” to “lean Republican:”

Democrats have insisted for several weeks that the race is closing — thanks to an onslaught of television ads from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee totaling several million dollars — but the Quinnipiac survey suggests that Sestak isn’t closing the gap all that fast. (The Real Clear Politics average of polls conducted in the race of late gives Toomey a 7.8 percent lead.)
While the Democratic party registration edge in the state — thanks to a contested Democratic presidential primary between Obama and then Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) in early 2008 and then a contested general election fight — is wide (1.2 million, to be exact), it’s getting harder and harder to see how Sestak overcomes a Toomey’s lead in a very difficult political environment for Democrats.