Last week, Republican Christine O’Donnell (R) secured the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate in Delaware, upsetting long-time Republican Congressman Mike Castle (R).  Prior to the primary, most political forecasters rated the contest between Representative Castle and New Castle County Executive Chris Coons (D) a solid Republican pickup.

With Ms. O’Donnell now the nominee, Charlie Cook, Larry Sabato and Real Clear Politics give the edge to the Democrat in this race.  Polls conducted after the Delaware Republican Primary showed Mr. Coons leading Ms. O’Donnell by 16, 11, and 15 percentage points.  It seemed as if the Republicans’ chances for recapturing the Senate had decreased.

Then the Senate landscape changed again.  On September 14, Quinnipiac University released a poll on the Connecticut Senate race between former WWE CEO Linda McMahon (R) and Attorney General Dick Blumenthal (D) that showed Mrs. McMahon significantly closing in on Mr. Blumenthal’s once double-digit lead.  In June, Mr. Blumenthal led by 20 percentage points, now that lead is only six percentage points – prompting the Cook Political Report to change the rating of the race to “Toss Up.”  Real Clear Politics still gives Blumenthal a slight advantage with a “Leans Democrat” rating, and a Real Clear Politics polling average gives Blumenthal a lead of 7.5 percentage points—outside the margin of error in polling.

Today, the Senate landscape continues to evolve.  Public Policy Polling is out with a poll on the West Virginia Senate race that gives businessman John Raese (R) a small three percentage point lead over Governor Joe Manchin (D).  In July, Governor Manchin led by 16 percentage points.  Real Clear Politics has moved the race to the “Toss Up” column, as their polling average gives Manchin a lead of two percentage points.

Overall, these Senate races in Connecticut and West Virginia represent a remarkable turn of events.  Most pundits and analysts didn’t expect these races to be very competitive at all, and most gave an edge to the Democratic candidates.  The mood of the voters in these states is clear: anti-establishment and anti-Democratic.  In Connecticut, 42 percent of those who support Mrs. McMahon say their vote is against Attorney General Blumenthal.  And while Governor Manchin remains popular in West Virginia, it is clear that the Democratic Party in-general is hurting his bid.  President Obama has an approval rating of 30 percent, and 34 percent of Democrats in West Virginia say the Democratic Party is too liberal.  Mr. Raese earns 23 percent of this vote and leads among independents with 56 percent to Manchin’s 30 percent.

In our last outlook on the battle for control of the U.S. Senate, we labeled Wisconsin, Illinois, California, Washington, Florida, Colorado, and Nevada as the most competitive Senate races.  Since then, Florida has continued to solidify in favor of the Republican candidate and West Virginia and Connecticut have now become more competitive.  The reality is Republicans still have a legitimate shot of capturing control of the Senate.  And while they would need to run the table on the competitive races in November, it isn’t impossible based on the mood of the electorate.

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