IOWA
Cook Political Report changed their rating of the Iowa Senate race to the "toss up" column, Friday morning, writing:
State Sen. Joni Ernst took 56 percent to win the nomination on June 3. […] The party has now united around Ernst’s candidacy. Democrats settled on their nominee, U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley, early. Braley is a solid recruit, but he has taken several missteps, including insulting Sen. Chuck Grassley, who is very popular in the state. He will also have to defend his voting record, including his vote for the Affordable Care Act, at a time when President Obama’s job approval ratings are upside down. While the state is competitive, Republicans have struggled here in recent years. Ernst ran a very strong primary race, and strategists hope that the prospect of electing the state’s first woman senator and that GOP Gov. Terry Branstad will be on the ticket will give her some added momentum. Democrats intend to portray Ernst as too conservative for the state, and have taken to calling her "the Sarah Palin of Iowa." Polling indicates, though, that the race is a dead heat. At this writing, the HuffPollster trend line shows the candidates separated by one-tenth of a point. The race has moved to the Toss Up column.
Braley has made a couple of gaffes, from the chick commercial to mocking Grassley, and those are probably catching up with him, but Ernst has also proven to be a stronger candidate than was initially expected. Her primary win made it obvious that she was initially underestimated and she has remained a candidate that Democrats need to worry about.
WEST VIRGINIA
Senate hopeful Natalie Tennant campaigned with fellow Democrat Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
CNN reports:
The Massachusetts senator and reigning champion of progressives everywhere arrived right on time Monday afternoon for a campaign event in West Virginia, this one for Democratic Senate hopeful Natalie Tennant, Warren’s latest stop in a national political tour boosting 2014 candidates. Her slight frame slid gingerly out of the passenger side of a blue SUV—her own car, with Bay State plates—and she greeted a volunteer with a golly-gee smile. […]
What followed was a pugnacious and folksy speech packed with the kind of full-bodied populist rhetoric that has thrust her into 2016 presidential conversation alongside Hillary Clinton—whether she wants to be there or not.
Let’s not forget President Obama’s primary challenger, convicted felon Keith Judd, who despite campaigning from prison, managed to secure 42 percent of the vote because West Virginia disliked Obama so much.
The state leans red, is continuing to trend-conservative, and hasn’t voted for a Democratic president since the 1990s. Mitt Romney carried every county in 2012.
At the moment, Warren is the progressive golden child. She votes with her party 97 percent of the time. The Democratic senator she votes with least often is West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin.
Warren may bring in big donors, and she may excite some members of the Democratic base, but that’s a very small group in West Virginia, and when it comes to winning a race in this state, Warren seems like the last person to help boost a campaign.
COLORADO
Democratic Sen. Mark Udall and his Republican opponent Cory Gardner are tied up, according to a Quinnipiac poll.
The Denver Post writes:
Despite low job approval numbers, Democratic Sen. Mark Udall remains locked in a statistical tie with Republican Rep. Cory Gardner in one of the most competitive U.S. Senate contests of the year.
Udall, who is vying for a second term, is at 42 percent and Gardner is at 44 percent, according to a new poll unveiled Thursday by Quinnipiac University.
When compared to a poll released in April, Udall has lost 3 percentage points in the head-to-head match-up, while Gardner's remained the same.
It might be a statistical tie right now, but forty-six percent of voters say they disapprove Udall’s performance as a senator. That rating, the article notes, is "Udall's lowest in the six polls Quinnipiac conducted in Colorado starting more than a year ago."
Last week an NBC/Marist poll found Udall up 7 points, but most polls look more even. For all intents and purposes, there’s a tie. The average rating of all polls puts Udall up by one.
This race was moved from "leans democrat" to "toss-up" back in April; it is consistently within the margin of error and Udall’s disapproval rating suggests it’s going to stay that way.