This install­ment of Sen­ate Watch, I’ve put more into the DW-​​NOMINATE analy­sis of the can­di­dates. More on that after the jump. First, here is the cur­rent map:

Now for the details.

As always, “Con­tin­u­ing” refers to the seats in Sen­ate Classes 2 and 3, which are not up for elec­tion this cycle.

Here the high­lights of the past two weeks, walk­ing from the Pacific to the Atlantic:

  • Ari­zona: Until recently, Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Jeff Flake (R-​​Mesa, AZ) was a shoo-​​in for the Repub­li­can nom­i­na­tion. But Wil Car­don, CEO of a real estate invest­ment firm, is sud­denly com­ing on fast, with an adver­tis­ing blitz tak­ing him from sin­gle dig­its to 20 per­cent in a cou­ple of months. This nar­rowed a 50-​​point lead for Flake a cou­ple of months ago to 22 points. The pri­mary elec­tion will be on Sep­tem­ber 11, leav­ing plenty of time for Car­don to cap­ture the nom­i­na­tion. Flake has a 13-​​point lead over for­mer US Sur­geon Gen­eral Richard Car­mona (the only declared Demo­c­rat in the race), which is pretty much the same advan­tage he’s had all along. Car­don and Car­mona are within the mar­gin of error, though Car­don has always polled up by a cou­ple of points. Thus far, as Car­don gets bet­ter recog­ni­tion, he per­forms bet­ter against Flake, and the same may hap­pen against Car­mona. This is def­i­nitely a race to keep watching.
  • New Mex­ico: Two polls were con­ducted in the past month. Both Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling and Ras­mussen give the likely Demo­c­ra­tic nom­i­nee, Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Mar­tin Hein­rich (D-​​Albuquerque, NM), a nar­row lead over the likely Repub­li­can nom­i­nee, for­mer Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Heather Wil­son (R-​​Albuquerque, NM). Yes, Wil­son used to have the seat now held by Hein­rich. Wilson’s DW-​​NOMINATE started at +0.325, but grew to +0.430 in her last term. Hein­rich, by com­par­i­son, is –0.232. With a PVI of D+2, the sweet spot  in DW-​​NOMINATEs is –0.1. On this basis alone, Hein­rich should be able to win the elec­tion in Novem­ber against Wilson.
  • Mon­tana: Demo­c­ra­tic incum­bent Sen­a­tor Jon Tester has a rel­a­tively dif­fi­cult job ahead of him. He rep­re­sents a state with a PVI of R+7, cor­re­spond­ing to a DW-​​NOMINATE of +0.35. Tester’s DW-​​NOMINATE is –0.292, a size­able gap of 0.64. The man con­sid­ered his most likely oppo­nent is Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Denny Rehberg, whose DW-​​NOMINATE is +0.496, a gap of only 0.15. While the two DW-​​NOMINATE scores are not directly com­pa­ra­ble (they don’t quite have the same scales in the two houses), the gap dif­fer­en­tial is sig­nif­i­cant enough to over­come that fac­tor. Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling shows Tester with a five-​​point lead over Rehberg, while Ras­mussen gives Rehberg the edge by ten. Con­sid­er­ing Rasmussen’s house bias, it’s still prob­a­bly a cou­ple of points in Rehberg’s favor right now. With­out the ben­e­fit of incum­bency, a Tester win would be an impos­si­bil­ity. With that ben­e­fit, it becomes merely an improbability.
  • North Dakota: State Attor­ney Gen­eral Heidi Heitkamp is the only declared Demo­c­ra­tic can­di­date. Her most likely oppo­nent is Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Rick Berg. Attor­neys Gen­eral are typ­i­cally on the con­ser­v­a­tive side of their respec­tive par­ties, because of the need for a “law and order” plat­form in order to be elected. This should result in Heitkamp being con­sid­ered par­tic­u­larly mod­er­ate as Democ­rats go. Berg is a fresh­man in Con­gress, and so has yet to war­rant a DW-​​NOMINATE score. His pub­lic pol­icy stances tend to be more in sync with the hard-​​line con­ser­v­a­tives than with the mod­er­ate Repub­li­cans in Con­gress, though, which should place him at or above +0.5. With the state’s PVI of R+10, a DW-​​NOMINATE of +0.5 is the but­ter zone. This all makes Berg look like the likely suc­ces­sor to Kent Con­rad, the Demo­c­ra­tic incum­bent. Indeed, the lone poll con­ducted to date shows Berg with a seven-​​point lead.
  • Nebraska: State Sen­a­tor Deb Fis­cher (R-​​Valentine, NE) pulled of a sur­prise upset, cap­tur­ing the Repub­li­can nom­i­na­tion. As Monotreme already dis­cussed, for­mer Sen­a­tor Bob Ker­rey has an uphill bat­tle for this seat, in a state with a Cook Par­ti­san Vot­ing Index of R+13.
  • Mis­souri: While for­mer state Trea­surer Sarah Steel­man has had a lead over Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Todd Akin (R-​​Town and Coun­try, MO), that lead has been dimin­ish­ing over time. The last poll, con­ducted in Jan­u­ary, indi­cated a nine-​​point lead for . Regard­less of which Repub­li­can faces Demo­c­ra­tic incum­bent Sen­a­tor Claire McCaskill, polls right now don’t give a clear lead to any­one. Missouri’s PVI of R+3 cor­re­sponds to a DW-​​NOMINATE of +0.15. This is a sig­nif­i­cant 0.39 gap with McCaskill’s –0.24, though her incum­bency might help counter this gap to a degree. Akin has a DW-​​NOMINATE of +0.748, result­ing in a gap of nearly 0.60, even larger than McCaskill’s. It’s not sur­pris­ing that Mis­souri is cur­rently in “Tossup” territory.
  • Wis­con­sin: Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Tammy Bald­win (D-​​Madison, WI) is con­sid­ered by most to be the most likely Demo­c­ra­tic can­di­date. For­mer Gov­er­nor Tommy Thomp­son is lead­ing com­fort­ably in polls against his Repub­li­can oppo­nents. Bald­win is pretty lib­eral, rat­ing –0.589 on the DW-​​NOMINATE scale. This is pretty far from the –0.10 that the state’s PVI would sup­port. The lat­est Ras­mussen poll closely matches the lat­est Pub­lic Pol­icy Polling poll, if you con­sider the house effect at Ras­mussen. Both give a small edge to Thomp­son, which makes sense given the DW-​​NOMINATE gap. The two are close enough to be able to affect the out­come, though.
  • Ohio: State Trea­surer Josh Man­del pulled off a sur­prise upset against Donna Glis­man to cap­ture the Repub­li­can nom­i­na­tion. He’ll face incum­bent Sen­a­tor Sher­rod Brown in Novem­ber. Polls have given Brown a small, but con­sis­tent, lead in this match.

The more obser­vant of you will notice no changes in the map since last time. Repub­li­cans still need three of the tossups to cap­ture the Sen­ate. Intrade is giv­ing them a 57 per­cent chance of doing it, up one point from two weeks ago. How cred­i­ble do you think that is?

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