Two Abacus Data polls in Michigan leave our Senate forecast at 69 percent

Two new Michigan Senate polls from Abacus Data, both fielded August 26-28, show Democrat Abdul El-Sayed ahead of Republican Mike Rogers. Among 332 likely voters, El-Sayed took 47 percent to Rogers's 42. Among 500 registered voters, the split was 41-35. Neither poll reports a margin of error, and samples of that size carry enough sampling noise on their own that a five- or six-point gap should be read as a close race rather than a settled one.

Our forecast did not move. The model gives El-Sayed a 69 in 100 chance of winning the seat, with a mean margin of D+5.6 and a 5th-to-95th-percentile range running from R+12.9 to D+24.1. The prior run, from 8:32 AM ET on September 2, had the same 69 percent and the same D+5.6; the only change anywhere in the numbers was a tenth of a point at the top end of the range. The Abacus pair lands close to where our average already sat, so it functions as confirmation rather than new information.

That is now three days of Michigan polling that has left the estimate where it was. The seat is open, with Democrat Gary Peters the incumbent and neither candidate running as one.

Nationally, our model gives Democrats a 48 in 100 chance of winning Senate control and Republicans 51 percent, with a mean of 50.2 Democratic seats. Democrats need 51 seats for control and Republicans 50, because the vice president is a Republican and a 50-50 tie goes to the Republicans. On that arithmetic, a Michigan outcome in either direction matters more than its 69-31 split suggests. Our generic-ballot average stands at D+6.5 across 26 polls over the past 45 days.