Senate Range

The Democrats have 23 senate seats to defend, while Republicans only have 10. That sounds bad, but how bad is it? I took each seat and gave it a range of retention and what I feel it is currently. If Daniel Akaka runs against anyone other than Linda Lingle or Duke Alona, I'd put retention at 100%. If Akaka retires and Lingle runs, I'd put it at 60%.



The best case scenario for Republicans is +10.4 seats. The worst case is +1. Right now I see a +5.1, for a 52-48 Republican advantage. You can quibble with my percentages.

I'm sure there's plenty of disagreement on my ranges. I tried to make them as broad as possible based on the best and worst possible conditions for each party. I'm sure that with some adjustment you could find that the Democratic best scenario is losing 0 or the Republican best case is winning 11 or 12. And you might be right. After all, I thought the Republican best case in 2010 was +4 and worst case was -3.5. If you had asked me in January 2009 I would've thought that Evan Bayh, Blanche Lincoln, Russ Feingold, and the Illinois open seat would've been 60%-70% Democratic wins worst case for them. In addition to that Obama won Florida, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Those should've been toss ups at best for the GOP. It's difficult to see conditions that will be as good as 2010 for Republicans or 2008 for the Democrats.

Because they have so many seats to defend, Democrats are all but certain to lose seats even in favorable conditions. Right now I'd give Republicans a 65% chance of taking the majority.