As one new poll shows Republican Dan Sullivan leading Democratic incumbent Mark Begich in a crucial Senate race in Alaska, Democrats are starting to think they will lose control of the Senate in next month's midterm elections.
A CNN/ORC poll finds that Sullivan holds a 50 percent to 44 percent lead among Alaska voters. The race is one of several that could swing the balance of power from the Democrats to Republicans in the Senate body.
Democrats,
reports CNN's Jake Tapper, are now pressing the panic button.
"If you put a gun to my head, I guess I'd say that we're going to lose the Senate," a Democratic consultant told Tapper. The consultant pointed to both President Barack Obama's plummeting public support and the struggling economy as reasons why voters could select GOP candidates on Nov. 4.
Republicans need six more seats to earn control of the Senate. GOP candidates in three races — Montana, West Virginia, and South Dakota — have double-digit leads and are favored to win. That means the Senate will come down to who wins crucial elections in Alaska, Arkansas, Louisiana, Colorado, Iowa, New Hampshire, and North Carolina. If Republicans win three of those, the GOP will rule the Senate.
With Republican candidates leading four of those races in some polls,
experts are now saying it seems clear that Republicans will take the Senate.
"It's going to be bad," the Democrat consultant told Tapper. "Not 2010 bad, but bad. You can see why Eric Cantor went down — people are just so anti-Washington, and that's particularly a problem with Democrats because of ties [to Obama]. People feel hopeless and think that Washington isn't doing anything."
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