Quantus finds Ohio Senate race even, and our estimate moves to 72 in 100 for Brown

Two new Quantus Insights surveys of Ohio, each of 695 likely voters fielded September 21-23, show a close race. The head-to-head version has Sherrod Brown at 47.6 percent and Jon Husted at 47.2 percent. The version that offers other options has Brown at 47.3 percent and Husted at 46.8 percent, with 2.0 percent for an independent and 1.2 percent for other candidates. The gaps in both are a fraction of a point, well inside what a sample that size can resolve. Neither reading separates the two candidates.

Our forecast now gives Brown a 72 in 100 chance of winning the seat, against 28 percent for Husted. That is up from a 60 percent chance in our previous run, at 12:32 PM ET on September 24. The mean margin in our simulations moved to D+3.4 from D+1.4, and the spread narrowed slightly: the 5th-to-95th percentile range is now R+6.0 to D+12.8, against R+8.0 to D+10.9 before.

The direction is worth stating plainly. The new polls themselves are not better for Brown than a tie; the movement in our estimate reflects how they sit against what the model had previously absorbed, including the shift toward Husted we reported on September 23. Our figure is back where it stood in mid-September, and the Quantus pair is consistent with a contest that our own range still leaves open in both directions 40 days out.

Nationally, our model gives Democrats a 54 percent chance of winning Senate control and Republicans 45 percent, with a mean of 50.7 Democratic seats. Democrats need 51 seats for control; Republicans need 50, because the vice president is a Republican and a 50-50 tie goes to them. Our generic-ballot average stands at D+8.3 across 30 polls in the last 45 days.