JUDY WOODRUFF: Most of the focus of the 2020 election so far has, of course, been on the
presidential race.
But races for the U.S. Senate also present tough challenges for Democrats who are trying
to win back the majority from Republicans.
These concerns were highlighted at the first Democratic presidential debates last week,
when almost every candidate, including sitting senators, struggled to answer how they would
push through their agenda if Republicans maintained control in the Senate.
SEN.
ELIZABETH WARREN (D-MA), Presidential Candidate: I want to see us get a Democratic majority
in the Senate.
But short of a Democratic majority in the Senate, you better understand the fight still
goes on.
SEN.
MICHAEL BENNET (D-CO), Presidential Candidate: Gridlock will not magically disappear as long
as Mitch McConnell is there first.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
SEN.
MICHAEL BENNET: That is why it is so important for us to when not just the presidency, to
have somebody that can run in all 50 states, but to win the Senate as well.
SEN.
CORY BOOKER (D-NJ), Presidential Candidate: They need to campaign in places like Iowa,
because we can win a Senate seat there.
This is about getting us back to having 50 votes in the Senate.
JUDY WOODRUFF: For a closer look at the 2020 Senate map and the challenges facing Democrats,
we're joined by Philip Bump.
He's national correspondent for The Washington Post.
Philip Bump, welcome back to the "NewsHour."
So how much of a challenge is it for Democrats, say, they win the White House, but if they
don't win control back of the Senate?
PHILIP BUMP, The Washington Post: It's a huge challenge.
All of the conversations that are being had right now in the Democratic primary about
policy issues that the candidates would like to advance, all of that hinges, of course,
on their being able to pass things in the Senate.
I mean, setting aside the issue of the filibuster, which demands a 60-vote majority, even getting
to the 50-vote count, they're right now down by four votes in the Senate, and they need
to pick those seats up if they're going to pass any legislation at all.
So this is something that should be of huge concern to the party.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So where do you see the main obstacles for Democrats?
And where do you think their best chances for a pickup are?
PHILIP BUMP: Well, the main obstacles are twofold, I think.
The first is that the Senate -- only a third of the Senate is up in any given year.
And so that makes it challenging.
You can't simply just overhaul the Senate all at once.
The second challenge is that a lot of these seats that they could pick up, a lot of the
incumbent senators who are up on the ballot, are in pretty red states.
And, obviously, the redder the state, the tougher it's going to be for a Democrat.
So we have, if you look at what -- Cook Political Report, they do general assessments of the
state of the race periodically.
If you look at what they say right now, there are three states where the Democrats could
pick up seats.
Those are in Colorado, in Maine and in Arizona.
Now, none of those is necessarily a gimme, but two of those states at least voted for
Hillary Clinton in 2016.
At the same time, though, the Democrats also will need to defend the seat that they won
in the special election and Alabama, Doug Jones' seat.
And that's going to be a challenge.
I mean, Alabama is a very, very red state.
And so they have to defend that.
They have to win the three states I just mentioned.
And if they do that, they're still one seed short of getting to the 50-50 level in the
Senate, which would essentially serve as a majority.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, setting Alabama aside, where we know Doug Jones is going to be fighting
to hold on to that seat, how well are the Democrats doing right now at recruiting strong
candidates?
We saw the news this week that Governor Hickenlooper's staff, five of them, quit working for him
because he wouldn't agree to leave the presidential race and run for the Senate in Colorado.
PHILIP BUMP: Right.
Yes, I mean, there's going to be some pressure, some increasing pressure on candidates from
states with competitive Senate races or potentially competitive Senate races to drop out of the
2020 race, especially if they're not polling well.
Hickenlooper is a good example of that.
It's not clear how damaged those candidates might be.
So, for example, if Beto O'Rourke were to drop out of the Texas -- or drop out of the
presidential race, and decide he wants to run for Texas Senate again, it's not clear
how much his own political brand has been damaged by his so far not very good presidential
bid.
There are, however, races like in Georgia.
In Georgia, the incumbent senator, David Perdue -- Stacey Abrams is someone who's being talked
about as a potential candidate there.
She hasn't yet announced what she might be planning to do next year.
So there are certainly glimmers of hope for the Democrats.
In Maine, for example, the speaker of the state House in Maine announced her candidacy
against incumbent Senator Susan Collins, who has been under fire there.
There are a lot of places where the Democrats could potentially pick up seats.
It's just a question of, to a large extent, what the environment looks like next year.
Will we see an environment, as we did last year, where the Americans are so frustrated
with President Trump or so celebratory of President Trump that it really shifts the
national dynamic in a way that helps or dramatically hurts the Democrats?
JUDY WOODRUFF: And what about Democrats trying to mount challenges against Republican senators
who right now seem to be in pretty strong shape?
PHILIP BUMP: Well, it depends on the state.
So, for example, there are states like Kentucky where Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
is going to be on the ballot.
Is it possible the Democrats win there?
Potentially.
If the national environment is so strongly Democratic, it's possible even McConnell could
lose.
Lindsey Graham in South Carolina.
There are a lot of well-known Republicans who are up for reelection next year whose
reelections are not simply slam dunks, that they may have a tougher time than you might
think.
There are, of course, some Democrats who, if the national environment goes very heavily
against the Democrats, Gary Peters in Michigan, for example, he's probably going to end up
running against a guy who ran for the Senate there previously and did fairly.
These are the sorts of things that it depends a lot on where the country is going.
But it is safe to say that, all things being equal at this point in time, the Democrats
have an uphill climb in terms of retaking the Senate.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And, Phil, finally, what about the messages that we know are going to be
coming from the Senate candidates, Democrats running in red states, vs. the message that
a Democratic presidential candidate is going to be having?
PHILIP BUMP: Well, this is a key question and potentially a key problem for the party.
So there are certainly indications that, had the Democrats done a better job of turning
out their base in 2016 -- there were some 4.4 million Obama 2012 voters who didn't cast
a ballot in 2016 -- if those people had been encouraged to come out and vote with some
sort of strong national message from the Democratic Party, they could have won that year.
However, this year, in 2020, you're going to have a lot of Democrats competing in potentially
red states who are going to be having to battle the national political environment.
Right now, so far, the Democratic primary contest has led to a relatively liberal and
progressive set of messages from the Democratic Party, which, if that floods out the message
of a red state Democrat, could be problematic for that Senate candidate.
We saw in 2018 Claire McCaskill in Missouri and Joe Donnelly in Indiana, both of them
complained after the election, having both lost, that their message in their red states
was drowned out by what the party was saying nationally.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Crosscurrents of all -- of all kinds.
Philip Bump of The Washington Post, thank you.
PHILIP BUMP: Thank you.