Tonight is day 2 of the 4-day DNC, from the United Center in Chicago. I have quite a bit of business travel this week, so I’m not going to be able to watch as much of the convention as I might want to, left to my druthers. I was able to hear most of Biden’s “One Last Time” speech, which closed out yesterday’s opening day, while sitting on an airplane; both Obamas are scheduled for tonight, then Walz tomorrow, and Harris to wrap things up on the final night.

A couple of minor political developments this week apart from the DNC. First, as expected Senator Menendez resigned today in the wake of his fraud conviction, and also has dropped out of this fall’s election where he had threatened to run as an independent. New Jersey’s governor is appointing a former aide to fill the seat temporarily, keeping the Senate at 51-49, and has signaled his intention to immediately appoint the winner of November’s election so as to give that winner (presumably, Representative Kim) seniority over other members of the entering Senate class. Menendez’s sentencing is scheduled for late October. Second, former Representative Santos has pled guilty to felony charges, avoiding a trial that was set to start in a couple of weeks. His sentencing is scheduled for early February and he is expected to serve jail time; indeed, as part of his plea deal he agreed to not appeal any sentence that is less than 8 years.

I wanted to make a few further observations related to my most recent post about the state of the race, pre-DNC.

In that post I discussed a highly plausible scenario in which Harris wins 270-268. That scenario starts with the Biden-Trump map, but with the 3 “Sun Belt” states of Arizona, Georgia, and Nevada flipping back to Trump, while Harris retains the 3 “Rust Belt” states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. If that scenario had happened in 2020, it would have been a 273-265 win for Biden. As such, in a sense population shifts between the 2010 and 2020 censuses have transferred 3 electoral votes to Trump, relative to four years ago.

That 3-vote transfer has elevated the potential importance of Nebraska-2, the electoral district containing Omaha, in the 2024 election. Four years ago, it was possible to imagine a 270-268 scenario in which NE-2 was decisive, namely if Trump had prevailed in both Georgia and Pennsylvania while everything else stayed as it was. In today’s map, that particular outcome (Trump winning Pennsylvania while losing Arizona and Nevada and Omaha) seems much less likely, but if it were to occur then it is Trump, not Harris, who would be a 270-268 winner.

Walz rallied in Omaha over the weekend, and today a new poll came out showing Harris ahead 50-42 in NE-2. On the strength of that new poll, Silver’s model now has Harris at 78% in NE-2, up from 67% last week. Without Omaha’s single electoral vote, losing the 3 Sun Belt states would put Harris into a 269-269 tie, which would throw the election to the House of Representatives where the Republicans currently have a majority of state delegations.

Indeed, prior to Biden’s departure from the ticket, this particular Omaha-driven 270-268 Biden victory was the most likely path to victory for Biden, with the 3 Sun Belt states seemingly having fallen out of reach. But with the Harris coalition running stronger than the Biden coalition in not only those 3 Sun Belt states but also North Carolina — which in today’s version of Silver’s model has moved ahead of Georgia on Harris’ list of targets, with Trump at 63% to retake Georgia but only 60% to keep North Carolina — the Democrats are now looking at multiple potential paths to electoral victory.

Nate Silver decided against trying to implement a formal Senate electoral model for the 2024 cycle, but the math appears difficult for the Democrats to hold on to the Senate. Today things sit at 51-49, but Manchin’s seat in West Virginia is a lost cause for the Democrats. Additionally, the Democrats have two vulnerable incumbents in red states: Brown in Ohio, and Tester in Montana. The good news is that with Harris on the top of the ticket, other Senate incumbents like Rosen (NV) and Baldwin (WI) no longer appear to be as vulnerable as it once seemed, and the open races in AZ and MI seem much more winnable for the Democrats. The bad news is that if either Brown or Tester loses, it is very unclear from where the Democrats could possibly pick up a 50th seat. The only two possibilities on the map, and they both feel like real longshots, are defeating Scott in Florida or Cruz in Texas. I think an interesting possibility would be whether either Murkowski of Alaska or Collins of Maine, both of whom seem increasingly detached from the modern Republican party (particularly on reproductive freedom), could be enticed to switch parties and provide a 50th vote.

It’s even harder to know what’s really going on in the House, but if you believe the Cook Political Report the most likely result is a 221-214 Republican edge. If the Democrats are to prevail in the House, they are going to need to find a way to pick up most if not all of 6 Republican-held swing districts in California and New York, as well as perhaps take the CO-3 district that Boebert almost lost last time and has now abandoned, and/or knock off moderate Republican Don Bacon in NE-2, who is still ahead 46-44 in the same new poll that had Harris leading 50-42.

As such, despite the wind at the Democrats’ backs over the past three weeks, it is still somewhat easier to imagine a Republican sweep in November than it is a Democratic sweep.