Larry Sabato’s latest Crystal Ball … national changes, updates, and Gillespie

By Lynn R. Mitchell

Larry J. Sabato and Kyle Kondik at the University of Virginia’s Crystal Ball have new election predictions this morning with some changes (see A Tale of Two Elections: New 2014 Senate and House Ratings).

Beginning the latest with, “Overall, it is indisputable that Republicans will have more critical victories to celebrate than Democrats when all the ballots are counted, and they have a strong and increasing chance to control the next Senate,” it then notes, “On the other hand, there are unusual and even a few bizarre features on the landscape.”

Of course, all the number crunching is interesting to this political junkie but I was most interested to see what Sabato had to say about the Ed Gillespie campaign:

In Virginia, Sen. Mark Warner (D) has been hit with a nasty story involving the possible promise of a judicial post for a relative of a state senator to keep the official from resigning, and we wouldn’t be surprised to see this contest decided by single digits. Virginia, after all, is a highly competitive state. Yet Warner is well established and a victory by Republican Ed Gillespie would be a massive upset.

Ask George Allen about closing those numbers and bringing home the victory on election day. It is still very much within Gillespie’s reach.

There are changes from the last Crystal Ball update and it will be interesting to watch the final two weeks gel leading to November 4.