Good evening and welcome to Washington Week.

Right now, election forecaster Nate Silver is giving the Democrats a 93% chance of winning the House and a 74% chance of winning the Senate.

It is not just Kansas that is in play.

Alaska, Iowa, Texas, and possibly other red state seats are up for grabs.

Assuming that the polls are actually correct, which is a dangerous assumption these days, but one we will make with hesitation, Donald Trump's last two years in office could be very difficult.

Tonight, I'll discuss the Democrat's chances and the president's limited understanding of his own unpopularity with my guests, Carrie Dan, the managing editor of the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter.

Adam Harris, co-host Radio Atlantic, the flagship Atlantic magazine podcast.

Jonathan Carl is the chief Washington correspondent for ABC News.

And Annie Linsky is a White House reporter for the Wall Street Journal.

Thank you all for being here.

John, you're just back from Kansas.

Indeed.

Tell us about Kansas.

What do you find?

Well, well, look, this is a real race.

Uh I was there.

Uh I mean, look, 94 years since they elected a Democrat to the to the Senate.

Uh but there is no there's a reason that this race is now considered a tossup.

There's a reason uh that it is now quite possible that the Democrats have a better chance of winning in Kansas than they do in Maine.

Uh they've got I I spent time with Pastor Adam Hamilton who was the Democratic candidate.

If you'd gone into a lab to try to create the perfect candidate for the Democrats to run in Kansas, you might come out with somebody that looks like Adam Hamilton.

Uh he is somebody with no political uh you know background.

He's most of his life he was a registered Republican.

Uh he is a pastor who is the pastor at the largest church in the state of Kansas.

And he is a a deeply moderate guy.

He will tell you that the middle point of the lower 48 is there in Kansas.

and he calls himself I'm a liberal and I'm a conservative but the guys wait and he does this he does this but but he but but he but but he is deeply thoughtful um and he does uh you know speak to the issues and he's up against Roger Marshall uh who is the you know the Republican incumbent who you may remember uh earlier about a year and a half ago after the big beautiful bill passed uh he did a town hall meeting where he got heckled and got angry with the crowd um and stormed out saying that they were being rude.

He has basically not done publicly scheduled events since then, except he did one today.

It was the first in a long time.

Did they just realize I mean, their internal polling is showing bad things for Senator Marshall.

It it it it undoubtedly is.

I mean, the Republicans are spending money uh in Kansas, by the way.

So now are the Democrats.

Um and there both both sides of that coin are interesting.

Yes, Republicans don't have to spend money in Kansas and Democrats don't bother spending money, which is what it would be.

Yeah, this was not on anybody's list, but I but there's a reason that the Cook Political Report moved the Kansas Senate race to a tossup just this week.

Look, I don't know.

Are are Republicans going to lose in Kansas?

I mean, that would be a pretty extraordinary thing, but there's no doubt that this is a real race.

Yeah, Carrie, tell us the truth.

It's just your chicken endrails and tarot cards, right?

It's like when you move a race to toss up.

Well, we climb a mountain and we get the tablet.

Oh, no.

I I I didn't realize it was so elaborate.

So, tell us about what your Tell us about the polling and the decision to move Kansas into toss up.

Almost every cycle there is a incumbent senator who kind of gets caught napping a little bit and and wakes up to the reality that oh, I actually have a competitive race.

We were starting to hear months ago that there was a little bit of concern that Marshall wasn't taking this threat seriously enough and from the from the from the Republican side.

Yeah.

From the Republican side.

Um that it is a state that to your point, John, yes, they haven't elected a a a Democrat to the Senate in almost 100 years.

But they do have a sitting Democratic governor.

So it is a state where a D next to your name is not necessarily a death nail, even though it is a very heavily read state.

And in Adam Hamilton, you don't get to be a pastor of a mega church unless you are a very very good communicator and a very earnest communicator.

And you know, follow the money, right?

Uh there is money being spent here, real American dollars that are being spent to prevent Adam Hamilton from winning.

And by the way, the money that went there came out of North Carolina, which should have been an intensely competitive race for Republicans.

They're basically forfeiting there, which really shows the urgency of trying to bail Roger Marshall out.

Now there Adam Hamilton thinks that he has a very good line of attack against Marshall as an OBGYn.

Marshall's practice sued um over 700 patients for outstanding debts.

Um 81 of those uh individuals faced arrest.

Um and I think in a era when there's a lot of people who are struggling with health care costs and everyday costs, that kind of story really resonates.

Annie, they're really they're really banging on that one in particular, right?

Oh yeah.

When you watch the ads in that race, you have these very compelling stories where you have real Kansas residents who are saying direct to camera, "This is my story.

I was sick.

I had a bill.

It was $50 and I faced arrest."

And so I I feel like those ads have broken through in a way that um you know that could move the needle, right?

Adam diesel fuel.

I mean, honestly, all of these things are are connected, right?

If you're thinking about affordability, you're thinking about people who are getting sued over their medical bills, right?

The idea of having a better medical system, Medicare system has been in the American um sort of water for the longest time.

And so, um, but if you you think about some of these races that Republicans are functionally looking away from now, right, thinking about North Carolina where, um, Democrats really just feel like they've had it was a godsend, right?

um and in the recruiting of the candidate for for the office because it's somebody who had who had won office before was a strong candidate um and and they're moving that money to places like Kansas because you know you you they're having to play defense where they didn't think they would.

Now, Democrats are also sort of feeling some of that um some of that pinched because the as the sort of blocks are moving around the board because you look at Maine now, um a state where, you know, Susan Collins has been dogged by uh the sort of question about abortion where she says, "Well, you know, I I she she ends up voting for a Supreme Court candidate who uh oh, he told me that he wasn't going to do anything about Roie Wade."

And then, of course, Roie Yeah, but Susan Collins is always going to Penelopey pit stop her way out of like a danger, though.

It always does, right?

She's She's sort of like the Democrat's wife.

Is that an antiquated reference?

Yeah, it might work for the audience.

Works in Maine, I think.

Whailing.

Does it work in Wayne?

All right, maybe it works in Maine.

But but no, I mean, she caught Look, she always gets out of a jam.

She caught a lucky break when Graeme Platner turned out to be Graham Platner.

Um, and she's up against a second tier candidate.

I mean, Maine is Maine is Maine.

And she won by nine points in a year where Joe Biden won by nine points in Maine, right?

You know, and the other thing, she's just did her second debate in a week.

Uh, and she's doing four debates and she's not, you know, running and hiding.

I mean, this is a contrast with some of these other candidates.

I mean, Roger Marshall, absolutely.

I mean, very few public events, very few interviews that aren't with extremely friendly outlets.

Not many of those uh either.

And, you know, Susan Collins is out there.

And I I I think you see a different result.

My favorite Oh, I was just going to say my favorite um uh result in there was a Washington Post poll of the main race.

That poll, by the way, did show um Collins behind, but one of the questions they asked is of Maine likely voters, have you voted for Susan Collins before?

And 70% of Maine voters have voted for her before.

So, not only does she have universal name ID in the state and some fairly, you know, high goodwill from her constituent work, but people have voted for her and now Troy Jackson has to ask them, "Hey, I know you voted for her before, but you got to vote for me now."

That that is a she's still running in a state that Kla Harris won convincingly.

I'm not saying easy.

I'm just saying she always the car.

Let me stay with you for a second.

Tell us about the polls in other deep red states.

Alaska is an obvious one.

Uh Nebraska, right?

And if we had had this conversation um a year and a half ago, I would have thought I had been dropped from Mars that we're talking about any of these races or that we're even talking really plausibly about Democrats perhaps losing Maine and having a path to a Senate majority.

But the way that it stands now, Democrats have expanded the map so that they're looking at very plausible competitive races in Alaska, as you mentioned, in Ohio, in Texas, um in Kansas, uh and um as you mentioned, in Nebraska.

Now, this is a really unique situation um because the candidate who's running is running as an independent.

Um, it's clear from all of the Republican advertising that they're trying to drop on the state to they want to remind everybody Dan Osborne is running as an independent, but he's going to caucus with Democrats.

Now, this is not the first time that Dan Osborne has run in Nebraska in the last even two years.

He ran two years ago, came up as an independent, came up six points short, which was sort of a a shock at the time in that cycle.

Deb Fischer, by the way, was probably the equivalent of a candidate who got caught napping and didn't take that threat seriously.

The real question is, does that trick play work two times in a row?

Yeah.

Um, but it's interesting.

I mean, the Democratic brand is so toxic in some of these, uh, you know, western states that you have not just in Nebraska, but also in Idaho, in South Dakota, and Montana, uh, independent candidates running.

And in the cases of of, uh, Nebraska, Montana, and Idaho, they've actually the Democrats actually withdrew their candidate.

So, the only candidate, the only major candidate on the ballot against the Republican is an independent, and that's done because they know.

Now, I don't know if any of those independents, I mean, I mean, uh, you know, Nebraska is the best chance.

They're all long shots, but the only way you have even a long shot is if you don't have a D next to your name.

Yeah.

Um, by law, we're mandated to talk about Michigan, even though it's actually not the most interesting one of these, but it's pretty interesting.

It's pretty interesting.

No, just not as interesting as Alaska, which shouldn't be discussed at all.

That debate was certainly compelling.

Yeah.

And if you look at the landscape in Michigan, I mean, Michigan is a state that has um been hit hardest by the Trump tariffs at I think the tariff burden in Michigan is over $5,000 a household.

So, this is a place that was, you know, a swing state that Trump won just, you know, two years ago.

But this is where Trump's policies have, you know, bled out of Washington and are really hitting home.

And so if you if you are paying, if you can imagine a 5 thou, and this is on average $5,000 burden per household in Michigan, suddenly it becomes quite, you know, it it opens the door for a Democrat, even a Democrat whose um, you know, views are are outside of the mainstream.

I mean, in these other cases, we're talking much more natural politician, I I think.

No, it's he's he's pulling it off certainly.

I mean, also I mean he's been on Fox a bunch of times, which is a great move for very very for highly articulate Democratic candidates and Democratic figures.

Pete Buddha Judge is obviously the trailblazer on that, but it's not a bad move.

But especially if you're being portrayed uh by the right as this kind of jihadist uh this this this extremist, this dangerous, you come on, you're like you're getting along and you're joking along with Jesse Waters and you know, and everything is is is fine.

But I thought the key moment in Michigan was seeing uh Mike Rogers doing an ad drinking a Lebatz, which as you know is a great Canadian beer, and saying, you know, we can't have a trade war with with Canada.

Canada's are friends, right?

It has to break on it has to break on and the war.

He's broken on the war as well.

And he broke on the war and he's a hawk usually.

I mean, it's not that that's a little bit surprising.

Uh just one more state, Carrie.

Ohio.

Um Houston not looking so great for him.

Um, I mean, this is a this is a state that's so interesting to me because I think um voters may would be forgiven for being a little bit confused about who the incumbent is because shared Brown served for so long and John Houston has been pretty low profile uh and and would very much like voters to think that Sherid Brown is the incumbent.

There's a lot of ads that he and his allies are earing reminding folks well shared Brown has represented the state for 50 years like it's sort of time for someone new.

Well, you're the actual the incumbent.

But one of the big animating issues there aside from the fact that shared Brown is also has sort of universal name ID uh in the state is has been data centers.

Data centers have been really resonant in a lot of different races, but this is a place where Sherid Brown, I think, recognized early that the politics of this were going to be on the more populous