The Senate Spin Cycle
Two partisans give us their rosiest take on the midterms.
With a week to go until Election Day, the political universe is in full horse-race obsession mode. Who’s up, who’s down? Does fundraising matter? Who’s going to turn out on Nov. 6? What popular narrative that’s snaking its way through Twitter is the right one? WHO’S GONNA WIN???
FiveThirtyEight relies on forecast models to give a sense of where a race stands, and we base those forecasts on polls and what we call fundamentals — historic factors that help us predict the way voters will act. But even with the model, elections can be difficult to get your arms around. The Classic version of our model currently gives Democrats a 1 in 6 chance of winning the Senate1, but events in the last couple of weeks of the campaign and a lack of polling in some places leave our model with a couple of blind spots.
This lack of certainty in the last few days of campaigns means that partisans work overtime to slick the highest sheen of gloss onto races. They want the Twitter and media narratives to go their way — they want their party’s spin to work magic. With that dynamic in mind, I thought I’d ask a couple partisans to give us their best spin on the Senate map. Republican Josh Holmes, former chief of staff to Sen. Mitch McConnell and who now runs his own political consulting firm, and Democrat Lauren Passalacqua, the communications director for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, obliged.
What follows are their takes on a few key Senate races as the campaigns come down to the wire. Their remarks have been edited and condensed for clarity, and I’ve offered some fact checks and clarifications in the footnotes where appropriate.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-senate-spin-cycle/