Democratic Senate candidates who are running in states that lean Republican are fleeing President Barack Obama like the plague.
Some of them see the president and his slumping poll ratings since the first presidential debate as their largest obstacle to re-election,
The Hill reports.
West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin may be the most strident of anti-Obama Democrats. That stance is no surprise, given that the latest major poll in that state, taken before the first debate, shows Mitt Romney ahead by 21 percentage points.
Manchin has been lashing out at Obama for months, even declining to say whether he will vote for his fellow Democrat. Other Democratic candidates can’t fail to have noticed that Manchin looks headed for an easy victory while deploying this strategy.
And they’re keeping their distance too. That list includes former Sen. Bob Kerrey in Nebraska, Rep. Joe Donnelly in Indiana, Sen. Jon Tester in Montana, and Sen. Claire McCaskill in Missouri.
In those races, Real Clear Politics rates Nebraska as likely going Republican and Indiana, Missouri, and Montana as toss-ups.
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