Nate Silver: GOP Senate Takeover More Likely

ABC

Republicans are on their way toward a takeover of the U.S. Senate, according to FiveThirtyEight's Nate Silver, who released the site's first election forecast Sunday morning [1] .

Silver, whose fame grew during the 2012 presidential election, gives Republicans about a 60 percent chance of re-taking the Senate. 

Republicans need to swing six seats to re-capture Senate control . They're on track to win in West Virginia, South Dakota, Montana, and Arkansas, according to Silver. Four states are toss-ups â€" Louisiana, North Carolina, Alaska, and Michigan. The most likely path to victory, then, for Republicans is swinging the four seats in which they're favored and winning two of the four toss-up seats. Polls have continued to show a large Republican advantage in states with open Senate seats .

There are also three Democratic-leaning seats â€" in Colorado, New Hampshire, and Iowa â€" the GOP could plausibly win. In the end, Silver said, Republicans could swing as many as 11 Senate seats. Then there's the caveat â€" Republicans are facing significant challenges in Georgia and in Kentucky.

You can read Silver's whole forecast here [2] , and watch his appearance on ABC's "This Week" below: 

Links

1. ^{^} released the site's first election forecast Sunday morning (fivethirtyeight.com)
2. ^{^} here (fivethirtyeight.com)

source: www.businessinsider.com