The issue there is winning a primary. Unless she has no principles, she’d have a hard time being the second most conservative Democrat
So make that part of the deal (and of course there would have to be a deal of some sort): The DNC agrees that if she flips, then they won’t support any primary challenger in the next cycle or two. There could still be a challenge, of course, but without national support it wouldn’t be so serious.
You could also have crossover Republicans voting for her in the primary.
One, in Maine, open primary … I’d suspect she’d not even get a serious challenger.
Two, she’s 65 and next cycle will be 72. She might decide 72 is time to move on to doing something else.
I think that Paul Ryan is telling us that the answer to the OP is: not a chance. Really he is telling us that the GOP will not hold on to the House, but I think one can infer the other conclusion.
Not really. No question, Mitch the Turtle ought to be nervous about maintaining control of the Senate, but realistically, the Dems still only have good chances at three seats (AZ, NV, TN) that are up for election this year, and are hardly guaranteed to hold onto seats in IN, MT, ND, and MO.
Gotta remember where we’re starting from this cycle: 34 seats are up for grabs, but the Dems already have 25 of them (including 2 Independents who caucus with the Dems). And of the other 9, I’ve already mentioned 3 as being prospects. The other 6 are in NE, TX, UT, WY, and two in MS.
Two in Arizona if McCain keeps failing.
scratch that
I don’t see how you get anywhere near 60 seats from that analysis. I said that Ryan is telling us that the answer to the OP is no. I agree that having a Democratic majority is a long shot, although not as long as it once seemed. But the Republicans getting 60? No way.
Sorry, the conversation in this thread had mostly been about who would have the majority, and I mentally glossed over your reference to the OP. So I was talking about whether the GOP would lose the majority, not whether they would get 60 or not. My apologies for the confusion.
Of course, it’s not like we needed Ryan to tell us that 60 GOP Senators was out of reach. That’s clearly been true for months - if Virginia didn’t nail it down, Alabama sure did.
Ryan wasn’t eager to take the speaker of the house role in the first place.
This 538 article seems to indicate the Dems have a good chance of taking the Senate.
Eighty-seven Senate seats can be taken for granted, either because they’re not up for election, are incumbents almost certain of re-election, or run in Utah, which hasn’t had a Democratic Senator since a young Orrin Hatch defeated Frank Moss in 1976.
Those 87 seats are split 48 R to 39 D+I. The D’s must win 12 out of 13 of the contested seats to win control, but only 2 out of 13 to mount a filibuster. Since the D incumbents in Montana and three rust-belt seats are heavily favored, it will be almost impossible for R to get to 60.
Given the likelihood of those four incumbents to win, and for D to retain Al Franken’s seat, the score is 48-44 with eight states rated as toss-ups.
TL;DR: There are only eight close Senate races: Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Missouri, Nevada, North Dakota, Tennessee, West Virginia. The Democrats need to win seven of these eight to name the Majority Leader.
However I see that Nate Silver is somewhat more optimistic. Texans may wake up and decide that they’ve had enough of Ted Cruz. (And John McCain’s seat may become vacant … I don’t see that helping much, however; surely it’s very unlikely that D’s could win two Arizona Senate seats.)
Even if Democrats can’t win two Arizona seats, it’s easier to win one if you’re running for two. With McCain staying, the Dems win a seat there if the best Dem is better than the best Repub. With McCain out, the Dems win a seat there if the best Dem is better than the second-best Repub.
Will there be some interesting gamesmanship, candidates deciding only at the last moment which Seat to run for?
Maybe so, but Kevin McCarthy would have been happy to take the gavel off his hands well before now. So it’s hard to see any evidence that Ryan was particularly eager to let go of it.
He threw it in between the unlikely prospects of retaining the majority, and the iffy prospects of his retaining his own seat.
The Republicans bringing out the long knives for their own:
GOP launches secret group to attack West Virginia Republican Senate hopeful Don Blankenship
Rooting for injuries! 