Race Ratings
• NJ-Sen (Likely D to Lean D): The polls continue to look good for Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez, who hasn't trailed Republican Bob Hugin in any publicly released survey. However, there are far too many signs that Democrats are genuinely worried about Menendez, who remains unpopular almost a year after the Department of Justice dropped corruption charges against him after a jury failed to reach a verdict.
On Thursday, Senate Majority PAC launched a new $1.9 million ad campaign against Hugin, which takes their total investment over the last month to $7.6 million. It's possible that SMP is continuing to spend serious money here simply to ensure that Hugin, who has dumped in $36 million of his own money to boost his campaign, doesn't outspend Menendez by too great a margin. However, that's still a big commitment to make this late in the game when so many other Senate seats are at stake. Multiple media outlets have also reported well into the final week of the campaign that, even with so much going well for Democrats House candidates in the Garden State, state and national Democrats are nervous about Menendez.
We would still be surprised if, for all his flaws, Menendez lost on Tuesday in a state this blue and in a year this bad for the GOP. However, we wouldn't be shocked. Democrats are just spending too much here in the final days for us to feel this is a Likely Democratic race anymore.
• VT-Gov (Safe Republican to Likely Republican): GOP Gov. Phil Scott has been popular in this blue state for most of his first two-year term, and it would be a huge upset if he lost to Democrat Christine Hallquist on Tuesday. Still, we think this contest is worth keeping an eye on. Vermont gave Democrats a nasty surprise during the 2014 GOP wave when incumbent Peter Shumlin, who had looked completely safe, wound up barely fending off unheralded Republican Scott Milne by just a 46-45 margin. Hallquist, who would be the nation's first trans governor, has raised a credible amount of money, and if the political climate causes Scott some problems, she could be in a position to pull off a surprise.
There's also one added consideration here. If no one takes a majority of the vote, the governor will be chosen by the state legislature. This happened in 2010 and 2014, and since there are five third-party or independent candidates on Tuesday's ballot, it could conceivably happen again. There's no question that Democrats will continue to dominate both the state House and Senate after Tuesday, and if Scott only wins a plurality of the vote, things could get interesting.
• AR-02 (Lean R to Likely R): Democrat Clarke Tucker has been running a serious campaign against GOP Rep. French Hill, but things don't look great for him in this 52-42 Trump seat. A mid-October poll from Hendrix College gave Hill a 52-40 lead, and unfortunately, major national groups on both sides have been treating this contest as though they think Hill is well ahead. While the DCCC and House Majority PAC spent almost $600,000 here through Oct. 21, they never returned to the airwaves afterwards, and their GOP counterparts never engaged at all.
There has still been some outside spending in the final two weeks, though. The Democratic group Patriot Majority deployed $130,000 on TV while the super PAC America First Action spending $355,000 for Hill. That's at least an indication that this race isn't quite over, and if things go unexpectedly bad for the GOP even in red seats like this, Tucker could pull off a surprise. Still, the last few weeks underscore just what a tough hill to climb this is for Democrats. (Yes, pun intended.)
• AZ-02 (Lean D to Likely D): While major Democratic and Republican groups spent about $1 million each on ads though mid-October, the contest for this open 50-45 Clinton seat looks a lot less competitive than it once did. An early October Siena poll gave Democrat Ann Kirkpatrick a 50-39 lead over Republican Lea Marquez Peterson, and soon thereafter, both parties stopped paying much attention to this race.
The NRCC canceled all their TV reservations for this Tucson-area seat a little less than a month before Election Day and never returned, while the Congressional Leadership Fund ignored this seat throughout the general election. The DCCC also hasn't spent anything in about a month, while House Majority PAC has been launching only small ad buys for weeks. This area is too competitive to take off the big board altogether, but everything is looking good for Kirkpatrick to return to Congress.
• IL-14 (Lean R to Tossup): GOP Rep. Randy Hultgren faces a very well-funded challenge from Democrat Lauren Underwood, and he no longer looks like the favorite in a contest that has attracted millions in outside spending. The best news for Team Blue is that a fresh Siena poll found Underwood going from a 47-43 deficit in early October to a 49-43 edge. GOP Gov. Bruce Rauner's weakness at the top of the ticket also risks weighing Hultgren down in a suburban Chicago seat that backed Trump just 49-45.