| Democrats and Republicans have agreed for nearly a year that control of the Senate would be determined by races in seven critical states: Arizona, Nevada, Montana, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Democrats need to win all of them to have a shot at holding the chamber. But several other Senate races show signs of being competitive. Some of them have attracted new attention in recent weeks as polls show Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) trailing, giving Democrats a glimmer of hope that they could retain the Senate majority even if he loses. Here are four races in which one party has a clear advantage — but that could surprise us on Election Day. Texas Why it could be competitive: Republican Sen. Ted Cruz beat Democratic Rep. Beto O’Rourke in 2018 by less than three percentage points. Cruz is up for reelection again this year, and Democratic Rep. Colin Allred is running a strong campaign against him. The Cook Political Report moved the race to “Lean Republican” from “Likely Republican” this month after the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee invested in the race. Allred’s campaign is trying to win over voters who might agree with Cruz on policy but don’t like him personally, including suburban women and younger Latinos. He’s attacked Cruz on abortion and Cruz’s ill-timed 2021 trip to Cancún after a storm knocked out much of Texas’s power. Why Cruz will probably win: No Democrat has won a Senate seat in Texas since Sen. Lloyd Bentsen was reelected in 1988, and it’s not clear Allred will run any stronger than O’Rourke did. Paige Hutchinson, Allred’s campaign manager, argued in a memo that polls show Allred outperforming Vice President Kamala Harris, and a Marist poll conducted this month found Cruz leading Allred by a slightly smaller margin than former president Donald Trump leads Harris. But two other recent polls found Allred running no stronger than Harris. Allred outraised Cruz in the first nine months of this year, bringing in $50.4 million to Cruz’s $32.2 million. But Cruz has the backing of two super PACs spending millions of dollars on the airwaves. Florida Why it could be competitive: Republican Sen. Rick Scott barely won in 2018, and he’s facing a well-funded challenge this year from former congresswoman Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, whose campaign manager described the race last week as Democrats’ “best Senate pick-up opportunity.” Jim Margolis, a longtime Democratic ad-maker who’s working for Mucarsel-Powell’s campaign, told us the race is competitive because Scott — one of the richest members of Congress — is not spending as much he could and is not especially popular. Mucarsel-Powell will overperform with Latino voters, and Florida’s abortion ballot measure will help her, he added. - “Rick Scott is not [Republican Gov.] Ron DeSantis. Rick Scott is not [Republican Sen.] Marco Rubio,” Margolis said. “This is somebody who has never won a race by more than a point despite spending millions and millions of dollars.”
Why Scott will probably win: Florida has been cruel to Democrats since 2012, when former president Barack Obama and Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson won reelection, and the abortion ballot measure might not be enough to help Mucarsel-Powell in a state Trump is almost certain to carry. A Marist poll conducted this month found Scott leading Mucarsel-Powell by two points — but a recent New York Times-Siena College poll found Scott leading by nine points. Maryland Why it could be competitive: Democrats aren’t the only ones who see opportunity in long-shot Senate races. Republicans recruited Larry Hogan, Maryland’s popular former Republican governor, to run for retiring Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin’s seat. Democrats are concerned enough that WinSenate, a Democratic super PAC, has invested millions of dollars in TV ads in the final weeks of the race attacking Hogan on abortion rights, according to AdImpact. Connor Lounsbury, a senior adviser to Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks, the Democratic nominee, said he agreed the race was competitive. “We’ve got a governor with eight years of name ID who is popular in the state, full stop,” he said. Why Alsobrooks will probably win: President Joe Biden won Maryland by a bigger margin than almost any other state in 2020. Polls show Hogan running ahead of Trump in the state — but probably not far enough ahead to win. A University of Maryland at Baltimore County poll conducted late last month found Alsobrooks leading Hogan by nine points; a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll last month found Alsobrooks leading by 11 points. Nebraska Why it could be competitive: Republican Sen. Deb Fischer is facing an unusual challenge from Dan Osborn, an independent candidate who says he won’t caucus with either party if elected. (Independent Sens. Angus King (Maine), Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.), Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Bernie Sanders (Vt.) all caucus with Democrats.) Osborn has attacked Fischer for running for a third term after pledging to serve no more than two. His campaign raised more than twice as much as Fischer’s in the third quarter, and an Osborn adviser said the campaign’s internal polling showed Osborn leading or within the margin of error. (There is no recent nonpartisan public polling of the race.) A super PAC funded in part by the Sixteen Thirty Fund, a liberal outside group, is running ads attacking Fischer. Republicans are concerned enough that the National Republican Senatorial Committee has invested in the race, and Trump cut an ad for Fischer calling Osborn “a radical-left person.” Why Fischer will probably win: Trump won Nebraska by 19 points in 2020, and Osborn would need to run far ahead of Harris to win. A New York Times-Siena College poll of Nebraska’s 2nd District last month found him running only slightly ahead of Harris. (Osborn’s campaign is relying on outperforming Harris in rural areas, not the 2nd District, according to the Osborn adviser.) Republicans say they’ll do what it takes to make sure Fischer wins. “The NRSC’s number one priority is bringing back all of our incumbents,” Mike Berg, an NRSC spokesman, told us in a statement. “In places where the Democrats have gone in heavy, like Texas and Nebraska, the NRSC has responded in kind with over $6 million in investment.” | 
Theodoric Meyer and 
